[rtpg]

echoing this, getting to a "everyday discussions doable" level for the spoken language is a relatively quick affair. There are very few sounds in the language, and the hardest thing for native-english speakers is perhaps the double-vowel timing and like trying to decipher loan words/overwrite the "original pronunciation"

The writing system is hard, but learning it helps complement your vocabulary in the same way that learning greek and latin prefixes/suffixes expands your english vocabulary.

Not even to get into the fact that, as a high context language, you can get away with extremely simple sentences and rely on context way more than in other languages.