Well, you have officially beat my spit in food paranoia.
I am using duolingo
I mean a real Mandarin Chinese language course offered in a classroom setting.
Let’s be real, we just get used to sweat, saliva etc in our food if we eat out here. Gotta try and make a point 
I am not a young person.
Also i still have no long term place to stay. I need to solve mamy things first
For sure, many of us can feel for that situation. But the bare bones, basic truth, is communication is necessary for a more fulfilling life. Doesnt matter the naion, cultre or language. We need to be able to talk fluently wih people. The time sacrifice to learn how to talk to people will return loads of dividends in the future. It wouldn’t be a sacrifice at all after a few years as all the benefits that come from it will far outweigh the tiredness, financial cost etc initially. It took me I guess 15 years before I even tried to learn Mandarin here. Life sucked, always reliant on others, easily tricked and yaken advantage of. Bad relationships. Constant frustration etc etc… After learnjng at least how to speak and listen (writing and reading is a different level in my opinion) I started opening businesses, a couple companies, started manufacturing and met LOADS more people. Life is easily 100x better in every metric after learning more. My frustrations are now more about thugs, not about communicating things. This may seem not so important, but in my opinion this is HUGE.
The o ly negative is now I hear how fucking negative and moronic so many people are when out and about (intentionally ironic). In this instance, ignorance really was bliss! But that’s about the only thing I can say that made me more happy before knowing how to communicate with my community.
Truly, as hard as it seems. Push forward. I guarantee you it will be one of the best long term investments you make, after health. Just do it. Don’t wait, sign up tomorrow.
Can you send link to where you studied?
I studied via escaping and divorcing an absolute tyrant of a lady and being forced to survive to eat and not get deported for many years. I’m not sure you want my schools’ contact info 
I did actually attend a proper school once upon a time where I learned little and just stopped going so I could make enough money for rent and food. Wenzao in kaohsiung.
I think others may have better school suggestions. But really the key point is effort. Schools are great for a social group motivating each other. That was really amazing. The downside was most were foreigners and we ended up talking in English or other groups in their languages (Japanese and russian), and not Mandarin. I would personally suggest taking a class for some structure, but perhaps consider taking another class totally unrelated to anything academic and be forced to learn that skill in he local language. This helped me quite a lot. I joined hiking groups, but turned ot many hikers are well to do educated people that spoke English and loved practicing it. Then I went to martial arts. That was fun because they didn’t know much english where i went. I also went to the gym for same reason. Eventually I just reverted back to opening my own business and being forced to deal with customers. THAT was a game changer, because my bread and butter depended on it.
Perhaps a side hustle that requires non written communication would help. At least for me, starting with the written word in Mandarin is too much time. But comprehendig people talkin and being able to speak back is paramount. Meaning not selling online. I did a year doing food markets because I am in agriculture industry. Not for the money but because it forced myself to learn to understand, and that provided a realm where I am fluent in the industry already, just not the language. doing retail allows a pretty broad spectrum of people. From great to total trash. And everyrhung in between. I hate retail. Like, full stop. but it was a useful tool to learn Mandarin for me haha. I think that’s a good point to leave on. Put yourself in a spot you rel on it. People are fantastic at adapting. We are equally fantastic at justifying and procrastination. My normal way forward now for thigs I loath wanting to do but know objectively I need to do well is just create a situation I have to do it or suffer. We won’t let ourselves suffer for Ling, it’s amazing how fast we adapt when we want say food or electricity.
What is ling
Are you dead?
I do you one better.
Alive and Kicking: 活蹦亂跳
Raw: 生
Rare: 一分熟
Medium-rare: 三分熟
Medium: 五分熟
Medium-well: 七分熟
Well-done: 全熟
If it’s black, it’s not done yet: 如果很黑, 就還沒好
Do you really need to fuss about with the night market steak so much? All i ever remember is them asking me do i want mushroom or black pepper sauce.
I dont care, both are nothing special. Just make sure you give me one of those small bread rolls with butter inside and a 酥皮濃湯 and im good.
Medium-well: 七分熟
I always go with 八分熟
In which case, if you are close to starvation, then you should be less picky with how you like your steak or maybe just eat something else first 
Just bought a sandwich qt family mart 35 yuan
anything on blue rare? 
Maybe 零分熟?
I just made it up.
匹茲堡式 lol
我想吃一塊嘗起來像燒焦輪胎的牛排。