Paddy Ashdown Speaks... Mandarin Chinese

Did you know that Paddy Ashdown, one time leader of the Liberal Democrats Party in the UK and British Diplomat, is fluent in Mandarin Chinese and is a fully qualified Chinese Mandarin interpreter?

After trying to teach himself Chinese, Paddy Ashdown learnt his Mandarin Chinese during a Royal Naval interpreter at the joint services language school in Hong Kong. In 1970, way ahead of his time, he gained a first-class interpretership in Chinese, recognised by the civil service at the time as the equivalent of a first-class degree in the language. He claims, however, that he failed his French O-level miserably.

Read more about Paddy Ashdown's Chinese learning in his autobiography: A Fortunate Life>>