The longer I stay the dumber I get

The western woman at the restaurant (not expensive enough to be a restaurant by the way but that's the type of establishment I tend to establish myself in) who called over the waitress on the pretence to ordering what she wanted for lunch. Instead, she decided to ask about what seemed to be everything on the menu. In Chinese. Because she could.

It was a show-offy practice of check me out, I'm a foreigner speaking fluent Chinese. I just wanted to poke her eye out with a toothpick. And if you're reading this lady I mean it. Fight in the apartment compound at 3… bring your toothpick. You're going down.

I've decided to unlearn Chinese. Actually, it's a fair deal easier than learning it in the first place so let's just cut out the middle ground here and revert back to general ignorance. And as we know, it's bliss.

Well that doesn't sound like that much of a different plan for me considering I've been on a steady unlearning English regime since I arrived here. I suppose it's about high time I simply went public and really embrace it. I might even revert to grunts and nods pretty soon. Maybe emoticons. Copywriting could pose a problem but as they say, nobody reads copy anyway.

I can give you a gazillion reasons why I haven't followed in the footsteps of my looking for a toothpick in the eye friend. They're all well rehearsed and over-used. My environments are still very much western; I don't get to practice much; there's no time for learning; I'm as smart as a four week old chimp; yadda, yadda, yadda. The simple fact is that these excuses are... duh, excuses. Valid ones, sure. But reasons for not doing, nonetheless.

There was a tipping point, maybe at the three year mark. It was the realisation that try as I might I was not going to be a Chinese linguist. There was not going to be a moment when a room full of Chinese peeps were going to be chatting about Chinese stuff, there would be a lull in the convo and then I would break out into a monologue of pitch-perfect mandarin. It would be poetic, not to mention wittily insightful, and there wouldn't be a dry eye in the place. Oh well, it's a smile and an unfunny joke in English instead.

I arrived gung-ho (no, not on a Chinese fishing boat, as much as that may imply) and once I knew I was here – really here, unlike the 'let's see how it pans out' kind of here – I enrolled in lessons.

She was a former weightlifting champion, until a knee injury ended her career. Obviously that qualified her to become my language teacher. However, her methods revealed themselves to be a little too weightliftery for me: Here are your 20 new words that look completely foreign to you as it's not like a European language with common root words. Now, read them to yourself. Great. five minutes are up, so I'll test you now. Why don't you know those words?

Not surprisingly I graduated to a new teacher – one less likely to bench press me if I made a mistake. Things proceeded rather well for a while and the possibility of being able to string a couple of words, or even sentences, danced on the tip of my tongue. But unfortunately it never expelled out of my mouth. Well, certainly not like the projectiles at the end of a night when too much alcohol is consumed. What's really important though, is that I know how to say 'fax machine' in Chinese.

Anyway, work became an obstacle a little too difficult to overcome, so I had to choose between sleeping and studying. Sounds like a an excuse to me. And why, yes indeed it is. So as I come to terms with my my aphasia, the city has seen an increase in foreigners proficient in the language. The mystical arts as far as I'm concerned; right up there with alchemy and necromancy.

They usually pick up their mandarin from their home country or some lower-tiered city famous for once giving birth to the third wife of an ancient general. A great many of these interlopers newcomers appear as interns – trading in their lack of experience with a proficiency in the local tongue. Just as well, as they vie with locals for a number of their positions so they might as well be on an equal footing.

So as a result, gone are the days where the Chinese would marvel at the white guy who's sole claim to fame is that he can speak the language better than them. Roll up, roll up... gawk in amazement at Coco the two-headed lemur; Sparky, the combustable boy; and Rob, the Chinese speaking white guy. Once upon a time that's all it took but those golden days are gone as nonsense such as skills are needed. The world really has gone to shit.

Well, now I'm forgetting and let me tell you, it's all bliss. Phrases and words I used to know recede back into the blackness of memory where mental fingers grope for them but come up short. Oh well, it's goodbye to 'bear' and 'plant' as I suppose I didn't use you enough to keep you. But I'll always have you, my dear 'fax machine'.

I must admit, it's a little embarrassing and I find myself lying to those asking me how long I've been here. It's always three years. And even with that I'm sure they're thinking I've learnt the language at an insane asylum. Of course, you learn tricks over the years and the responses to questions you know will be fired your way. Problem is, I've had so many years of fake responding with those phrases that it sounds like I know what I'm talking about. This pretty much acts as an invitation for others to talk more. And faster.

In order not to come across as a complete dumb arse I do a bit of contemplative nodding and grunting. They see through it but we go on with our little charade until some point they ask, "You have no idea what I'm talking about do you?" To which I nod thoughtfully and respond with a heart-felt hmmm.

And somewhere along the line I realised that my emphasis has been all wrong. It's about the un-learning. That's where my my skills lay. You see, I'm like a special needs child learning but a jedi master when it comes to the unlearn. Might even create a school. Might not even stop at this language either as when it comes to unlearning you might as well go multilingual.