Illustration: Liu Rui/GT

I have a dreadful confession to make. Though I have lived in China for over seven years, I just cannot learn Putonghua. Something about it just utterly baffles and perplexes me. And though I know that it makes my experience living in China shallow and even fraudulent - who am I to talk about anything I think I know here? - I just go on, blithely inarticulate, dumbly incapable. It's embarrassing, shameful, stupid and lazy. But the language just doesn't sink in.

This doesn't mean I am entirely helpless. There are certain words and phrases that even a dummy like me has to pick up. "Duoshao qian?" ("How much?") for one. "Bu yao!"("I don't want it!") is another.

Food is obviously another vital area. Basic directions and landmarks of course, from yinhang ("bank") to gongyuan ("park") - well, you can't get anywhere without them. Simple verbs, like go, like and want get you a surprisingly long way. But of course these are the simplest of baby steps.

The biggest trouble I have with Putonghua is its radical difference to English. The words have nothing comparable. For example, the French verb vendre, to sell, reminds you of vending machines and vendors; they have the same Latin roots, so the relationship is easy to grasp.

But Putonghua? How can I remember lizi ("chestnut") or zixingche ("bike")or mobuguanxin ("I don't care") except by committing them to memory? For words and phrases I use every day, like tudou ("potato") and "Wo ai ni, laopo" ("I love you, wife"), this is easy. For others, I find it impossible.

I once spent a week trying to commit to memory about 40 foods, all the fruits, meats and vegetables you'll find in your local market. All that happened was that I remembered the ones we needed when shopping and forgot the rest. The same happened with all the other lists of things I tried to remember, whether jobs, parts of the house, or relatives. Nothing sticks in the mind.

Anyone who wants to really learn Putonghua has to commit to study. You just can't pick it up by osmosis, like you can with, say, French, German or Spanish. Other countries have the convenience of being able to connect words and sounds; Chinese characters offer no such luxury.

Several friends of mine, who arrived at about the same time, put in the hours and have now passed the HSK4 exam. But Chinese cities have so many options that you can spend your time any which way. I spent my spare time working in the industry I wanted to break into, so there was no time to be studying. This, on the whole, worked out well for me, as the part-time work eventually led to some great jobs, but it came at a cost. I never did learn.

So whenever I was around other people, they were either foreigners who were far more fluent than I was, or they were locals. I became accustomed to having people intercept for me: they would talk to the authorities, the shop staff, the waiting staff, the landlords. This, again, might be stupid laziness on my part. It's like you see that everyone else is so far ahead of you that there's no point starting. Of course, every learner has to begin somewhere and all journeys are step by step. But it can all get highly discouraging.

There's also the way that occasionally Chinese people will refuse to believe that you can actually communicate with them. Whenever I got in a taxi with my wife, I would state the destination, only for the driver to turn to her and say, "Qu na'er?" ("Where to") which was discouraging.

Similarly, sometimes people would back away from me when I tried to say something. Once in the supermarket I used Putonghua to ask for two jin of pork, and the woman at the counter literally backed away from me, her brain telling her ears not to work. These are tiny incidents, but they're revealing. Again, if there's no incentive, why put in the time?

Chinese cities often make life convenient for English-speaking foreigners. The road signs and subway announcements are bilingual. Most people under the age of 40 can speak some English, and many are keen to practice. You can get by not knowing any Putonghua. You miss out on so much, though. Even I, as illiterate and ignorant as I am, can perceive that.

The author is a freelance journalist in China. Follow him at @bucketoftongues.