Here's an interesting tidbit about the new junior Senator from New York, Kirsten Gillibrand. According to this article in the New York Times. Apparently, she speaks a little Mandarin, even if it is a bit rusty:

Ms. Gillibrand is no ordinary politician when it comes to linguistic and cultural comfort: as an Asian studies major at Dartmouth, she studied for six months in China and Taiwan, becoming proficient enough to absorb stories in Chinese newspapers, and later spent four months in Hong Kong as a corporate lawyer.

Apparently, her language skills were good enough to impress the Chinese language media as well as key community leaders.

Furthermore, the article goes on to point out that...

Ms. Gillibrand is apparently the only member of Congress with some proficiency in Mandarin, other than Representative David Wu, an Oregon Democrat who was born in Taiwan.

I am not sure why it surprises me that there are only two people in Congress with some proficiency. I guess I assumed some of the other members of the Foreign Relations Committee or some other of these "highly-educated" folks would actually know how to speak the most spoken language in the world. Anyway, it's nice to know that we have another person in the Senate who is at least curious about learning about other cultures. Add this to the fact that she has come out in favor of marriage equality and she looks like she's building the necessary inroads to win the Senate seat outright.