Larry, I thought the same thing. The French are always touting French as the main second language, but I just don't get it. French is, in fact, losing popularity as it is supplanted by English.

Someday Mandarin Chinese might top the list, but it is such a difficult language to learn as a second language. Of course, it is all characters and not letters and it is tonal. I was thinking of getting Pimsleur CD's for Mandarin, but not much point as no trip to China is planned anytime soon.

My first language is Cantonese (Chinese dialect). I keep meaning to learn Mandarin, but I always put it off. Fluent in English of course. And I guess I should learn some Dutch since my bf is Dutch but I just can't seem to make the "g" sound. Last time I was there for a wedding and for the life of me couldn't properly say "congratulations."

Baybee,

can you make the "k" sound? G and K are virtually identical as far as the position of the speach organs, but in K the sound is made by releasing air suddenly, whereas the G sound is made using the vocal cords. G is what is called a "voiced" consonant.

Mother tongue - English

Fluent - French (attended Lycee in Paris yonks ago); Dutch (lived & worked in Amsterdam for nearly 2 years)

Tourist level - Bulgarian, German, Spanish

Smattering - Scots Gaelic, Italian, Greek, Welsh,

Me- Native language is New York English. Remnants of Undergraduate German and Russian that has devolved into tourist talk. I worked on a contract in Jerusalem for two years after the '73 war and learned Hebrew pretty well, some of which remains. I do well with menus most anywhere.

DW - Native Spanish and Yiddish. English is her third language. She has used her Yiddish on a number of occassions in Germany and most don't recognize the language for what it is. They usually ask her what village she comes from with that strange "German" dialect.