Were these people exposed to Chinese culture?
Were they interested in it?
Did they start attempting conversation right away or did they wait until they knew a ceetain ... etc

This mindset annoys my wife lol. I hear something and am perpetually skeptical. Anything good, there must be a catch or a nuance. It's usually true, but I just can't bring myself to accept not everybody is interested in the nuance - nor is it even useful most the time.

If somthing says it takes 10 years to learn Chinese, you can just take it at face value, like 'on average', or not even statistically, just a vague expression of difficulty.

But I'd be right on Google reading stories of people who learnt in 6 months by living in a farm in Yunnan or something lol.

There's always a 'however' with every reality around me, and I can totally see why it can get annoying XD

And so this is where I differ from people. I think like a scientist but in the end, I trust my gut.

This describes a conspiracy theorist!

But yeah, a good scientist will never, ever say anything is 100%, Not even 'there is no god' will be 100% to a real scientifically minded person. It is the pop science folk who are arrogantly certain about things, those who have become politicized and have tiktok accounts.

Oo damn home time, no time to keep reading, back in a bit!