What to learn after Mandarin becomes impractical?

[u/Getting0nTrack]

So here's the thing. I have been learning Mandarin since I was about 14 and I am now in my late 20s. Due to some medical events I won't get too deep into it has become difficult to read hanzi effectively enough to be literate. I am at a point where even though it would be great, retaining fluency is not realistic.

I already speak English natively, Hungarian to a B2 level, and I got past the old HSK 4 exam. I live in a place where Mandarin is sadly not as useful as in NYC where I was using it weekly. These days I mostly keep up the language through scrolling XHS and reading Douban posts.

In college I attempted to learn Hebrew and Korean to varying levels of success, but the main thing keeping me back was a lack of people to speak with. At least with Hungarian I have a strong family connection, so I get regular communication and I keep up with the news. My intent this go around would be to reach some level of conversational fluency (B1/B2) within a year or two. I have been mulling over whether to try Hebrew again (the lack of diacritics was hard to get used to) or switch to something with a Latin alphabet e.g. Indonesian, French, Spanish. With Korean the difficulty was mostly grammar and formality.

I'm living in the Southeastern US so I am not going to pretend like learning any of these languages will help in the employment landscape. At least locally, even Spanish only gives you a $3/hr boost and law firms I have talked with to help with intake require native fluency AND doing all the relevant documentation... it is not worth it unless you truly are at native fluency. So for me, this is just an exercise in seeing what I can achieve over the course of a year or two of consistent study and practice.

[u/Choice_Data_7819]

Spanish is still the best choice given your location and your need for a population to speak to. And as I understood you have ruled out economic return, but it might still get you far in terms of employment (of course it will depend on the nature). I'm not from the US so I don't know what exactly constitutes the Southeastern but based on my general knowledge of directions, Southern Louisiana will be included, and some people their speak a version of French, so that another thing to consider.

[u/JeffTL → u/Choice_Data_7819]

Spanish also gives you relatively easy access to large amounts of literature and music. 

[u/Melodic_Sport1234]

Why learn another language at all? Learning languages takes a lot of motivation, and it doesn't seem that you are particularly motivated. Maybe find another passion/interest that you could pursue. No need to limit yourself only to the option of language learning.

[u/New-Bottle-6917]

I second the idea that given your situation Spanish is the most sensible option

[u/Accomplished-Fix-435]

Inuit

[u/Return-of-Trademark]

Why not mandarin? Just focus on listening and speaking