Number crunching is what bank statements and profit statements are all about; they are the tools of the numeric man, you and I, the homo sapien or the modern man.
No wonder I found myself wondering if mandarin Chinese is the next language school that will be as popular as the Alliance Française here in Lagos?
Why? Check out what this blog post numbers say: 420 milliion people in china have internet access and are available on baidu; for those who do not know, baidu is the Chinese equivalent of the search engine, Google. For a country of one to two billion, 420 million is just a scratch of the potentials, there will still be a walk towards a figure or number greater than 420 million.
Who’s not going to learn mandarin Chinese for such a huge market base? Now is the time to start. Sooner than later, Chinese language would be a necessity on the resumes of those who want to do international business.
I think I have ideas towards Chinese but that will not be so fast, maybe towards 2012 or thereabouts. By the way, do you realize that Chinese trade policy is much Africa-centric than other developed western countries?
If you want a linguistic advantage, forget learning French for now, take a course in mandarin Chinese before anything else.
