Lerning Chinese is tough and time consuming I'm thinking of starting learning Chinese and I've just read an article that says Chinese requires 3 or4  hours of  daily practice   for a few years, otherwise it isn't  even worth starting  it as you won't make any progress. They say one or two hours a day is nothing. That is really discouraging. Is it really so? Those who are speaking Chinese as a foreign language  at the intermediate level or higher, please, share your experience... How much did it really take you to master it? Of course 4 hours a day for a year or two sounds insurmountable to me.