Now, don't be fooled by the facade of "allocated job system" under the communist regime. The derived demand for a language study, or lack thereof, although suppressed, still reared its head from time to time. For us pursuing foreign language studies, there was not much of a choice, because China was at odds with America (UK, and the entire English camp), and then USSR. So although I spoke two foreign languages very well, the job prospect didn't look that promising. It was not until I moved to Hong Kong that my English skill eventually found its most desirable application.
After almost 4 decades of teaching English, I am picking up my first love - Russian again. Once you master Russian, no foreign language will be too formidable to crack. To me, there is no surprise that Russians are known for grooming the world's best mathematicians, because the language itself is a precise and complicated computation unrivaled by any other languages that require conjugation and grammatical maneuver. Here is the Russian class I joined to refresh my Russian. I am going to Eastern Europe this summer, but intentionally skip Russia, because I want to spend at least a good month or two there alone, to see the Red Square, the Hermitage, the forests of Siberia...
