Studied Japanese at the undergrad, 15-or-so years ago, and am forced to learn basic Chinese now (living for the second year in a weird province where Mandarin is pronounced with Cantonese sounds, but Cantonese has fallen out of use, and where 38 of Chinese 55 minorities live and speak each their own language).
Japanese grammar is indeed slightly harder than Chinese -- but easier than English, not to even mention French or Russian, perhaps at a par with Scandinavian -- but the pronounication of Japanese with its 5 basic vowels that can only be short or long, never umlauts, never rising or falling, but flat, is much much much easier than Chinese.
BTW, I want to study European Portuguese. With my native French, good Italian and basic Spanish (plus Norwegian, Dutch, Serbian and the language this is written in), will it be a piece of cake?
Or just easy but not very much so?
Japanese grammar is indeed slightly harder than Chinese -- but easier than English, not to even mention French or Russian, perhaps at a par with Scandinavian -- but the pronounication of Japanese with its 5 basic vowels that can only be short or long, never umlauts, never rising or falling, but flat, is much much much easier than Chinese.
BTW, I want to study European Portuguese. With my native French, good Italian and basic Spanish (plus Norwegian, Dutch, Serbian and the language this is written in), will it be a piece of cake?
Or just easy but not very much so?