The craziest thing in human existence to me is the fact that we were able to come up with communication methods so sophisticated it takes years to learn how to communicate with a group of people.

One of my biggest passions outside of tech is language learning and communication. I’ve grown up being someone immersed in two worlds, never in one truly. I am ethnically Chinese yet I cannot read and write it fluently. I speak broken Cantonese compared to a child. I am completely fluent in English and adopt the cultural norms that come with it. I am only what I grew up with.

I decided to make a change in university:

• I started learning Mandarin. I can read, write and speak conversationally with anyone in China, starting from 0 ability to read and write.
• My Cantonese is better, I can feel the conversations flowing with my ability in Mandarin improving.
• I started learning Portuguese
• Rekindling my love for French

I know no limit to my ability to learn languages, I am proud of myself for learning so much in only 3 years. I don’t plan on quitting ever because I know that the future is the ability to communicate. We are only what people can understand about you.

I make a vow on my Notion then: I’m going to come back in 5 years, completely fluent in Chinese, English and Portuguese, and if https://www.trypencil.dev/ doesn’t take off, I’ll build a startup for language learning.