[dingaling]

> On the other hand, Mandarin grammar is pretty simple. No conjugations, no genders, just slightly different word order from what you're used to

That's interesting to me as this week I stumbled into Afrikaans, which likewise lacks genders and conjugations and only apepars to have two tenses ( present and perfect ).

Which makes me wonder why other languages have evolved to such levels of complexity, since it seems entirely possible to conduct the affairs of a state without have a distinction between 'I eat' and 'he eats'.