Beijing (CNN) -- Who would've thought? Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg speaks Mandarin. When I first read a banner headline saying that the 20-something billionaire spoke fluently in Chinese, I was skeptical. Yes, I know he's young and smart. Yes, he's married to Priscilla Chan, a publicity-shy medical doctor of Chinese parentage. But she's also American-born Chinese and, like many of them, does not necessarily speak Chinese like a native. Besides, one does not learn a foreign language simply by marrying a Chinese speaker. But the Facebook CEO impressed his star-struck Chinese audience when he spoke in Chinese during a 30-minute Q&A recently at Beijing's Tsinghua University.
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Mark Zuckerberg deserves credit for learning Mandarin, says Jaime FlorCruz
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Mastering Chinese is a lifelong process and its grammar, five tones, and pictographs can be overwhelming
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Chinese is now enjoying a new found popularity among language learners
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About 25,000 American students in China each year, most of them studying Chinese language
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Zuckerberg spoke entirely in @placeholder, albeit with a heavy accent and the occasional error.
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Two months into my first @placeholder course some 42 years ago, I was ready to give up, totally intimidated and overwhelmed by its grammar rules (or lack of them), five tones and pictographs.
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"China is a great country," Zuckerberg told his Chinese audience on why learn @placeholder."