Is there anything Mark Zuckerberg can't do? Well, maybe not. The wildly successful programmer, philanthropist and, of course, Facebook co-founder and CEO took the stage at Tsignhua University in Beijing on Wednesday and casually launched into a Q&A speaking Mandarin.
"My Mandarin is not good," the 30-year-old said. "But I want to try to speak Chinese today."
The fact that he said that — and almost everything else at the event — in Mandarin clearly impressed the crowd, who clapped, laughed and cheered in return.
While the talk marked the first time Zuckerberg publicly unveiled his skill with the difficult-to-learn language, he discussed his interest in learning years ago.
"In 2010, my personal challenge was to learn Mandarin," he revealed in a Facebook post. "I have always been interested in Chinese culture and learning a language is a great way to learn about a culture."
Zuckerberg's interest had personal roots, too. In 2012, he married then-longtime girlfriend Priscilla Chan, and many of her family members speak Chinese exclusively.
"I wanted to be able to talk to them," he explained.
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