Do you think learning English is easy? Probably not. But it is a lot easier than many other widely spoken languages and perhaps that’s why it’s so popular. Chinese, for example, and its dialects have many more native speakers than any other language, and over 200m second language speakers! China is as an emerging superpower and many suggest that Mandarin may become the next lingua franca. Perhaps, but it’s unlikely because however important China becomes, Mandarin is a very difficult language to learn – just think of the tonal system and the vast writing system that takes years to master. The weirdest thing about English (grammatically speaking) is the auxiliary verb ‘do’ as in ‘Do you have any tomatoes?)’ and our overwhelming preference for using of the progressive ‘-ing’ forms of verbs – in almost no other language can we say something with a structure like ‘She has been singing that song for years!’ and mean the same thing. For these two quirks, according to modern linguists, we can thank influence from speakers of Celtic languages, especially Welsh (Diolch un fawr!). But they are not that difficult to master for most learners. A much greater complication is the awkward and nonsensical spelling system. On the other hand, we don’t have (anymore) a substantial or exhaustive system of case markings, noun genders, or any need for noun-adjective agreement, and our plurals are mostly regular. These are all the things which most confuse English speakers when learning another language for the first time. Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m not suggesting that learning English is easy. Learning to communicate in another language is never easy. It takes time, commitment, motivation, access to the necessary resources, and them some more time. But if you can supply (or obtain) these things, then it is entirely achievable.