<p>I will be a college freshmen next year and i would like some advice on what foreign language i should take...</p>
<p>german or chinese?</p>
<p>I recently visited taiwan and LOVED the culture, cuisine, people, pretty much everything about it...needless to say i would love to return to that part of the world (that would be a plus for chinese). but my older siblings informed me that chinese is a five day a week class (something like that), which is intimidating...but they also said that because of this, i could make some good friends because it would probably a small group of people taking it (closeness)</p>
<p>I will be either a physics or chem major, so german is also appealing (i have never taken any classes in either language)...also sounds like a neat part of the world</p>
<p>pretty much i would like to take the class that would be most beneficial to me (maybe for science, or because of the number of people who speak it world wide) thanks for your opinions!</p>
<p>I would have to go with mandarin. I'm actually looking to take mandarin next year.</p>
<p>German is a great language to take. Because English is a Germanic language, the latter will be easier because some words are borrowed from it for the former. German is also great if you plan to go into Ph.D. and become a researcher in physics/chem, because German is often the official language of international conferences if English is not. Also, for most scientists, reading in German is absolutely essential, even if you can't speak it. 40% of scientists in the USA recommend the study of German. In terms of discovery, Germany has 13.2% of all world patents, with only America claiming a larger share. If money is an issue for you, more than 2,000 scholarships are issued by Germanic institutions every year for U.S. students. You still will be able to communicate with most asians, 68% of Japanese study German. In terms of classes, German classes are probably one of the funnest language classes. The majority of German teachers are fun and wacky, loving their handpuppets and German songs. :) I highly recommend you take German!</p>