Your article (I'd like to order in Mandarin, please, G2, 19 May) says Mandarin is "notoriously difficult" to learn. As any English speaker who has learned it will testify, it is far from difficult; unlike the European languages that put off schoolchildren for life from studying a second tongue, it has effectively no inflection, no conjugation of verbs, no agreement, no gender and fairly basic tense structures, making it one of the easiest spoken languages to learn (leaving aside its more complicated written form). As someone who struggled with French and German at school, I was delighted to discover in later life how relatively accessible Mandarin was to me. I hope your piece hasn't put off too many potential sinologists from delving into a linguistic treat.
Dom Marsh
Croft-on-Tees, North Yorkshire
• I am disappointed to see Michelle Obama being held up as the ultimate role model for young women (Dear Michelle, G2, 23 May). I'm sure she is a perfectly nice, well-meaning woman who does a lot of good. But is this really what we want our daughters to aspire to: being the wife of a powerful man, giving up their own successful careers to support his? How long before the US has the opportunity to elect a woman in her own right?
Anne Liddon
Tynemouth, Tyne and Wear
• When natural disasters occur, the reporting of humanitarian issues usually takes precedence over the rather unimportant effects of the disaster on people far away from the area in question. Is there any reason why Icelandic volcanoes are subject to a different set of rules (Volcanic cloud grounds flights, 24 May)?
Kasper Lurcock
Akureyri, Iceland
• The first step in going green, removing blots on the landscape and stimulating the economy has to be putting electricity cables underground: electricity pythons (Wanted: bright sparks to give 84-year-old electricity pylon a 21st-century makeover, 23 May.
Tom Spooner
Twickenham, Middlesex
• Hank Ballard's instructions to do The Continental Walk are more suited to this stiff-limbed pensioner (Letters, 23 May): you "just walk, walk, walk (eeyaah!)".
Bob Jones
Worcester