Bet you five bucks your wise teacher doesn't know either language(and a few phrases in Spanish doesn't count). I can't stand people who make statements like that and act as if they know what they're talking about. It would be like me putting on a Texan accent, adjusting my belt, and saying "Now listen here, the only golf club you're ever gonna need is..."
There are over a billion speakers of Mandarin Chinese, but remember, almost all of them live in China or east Asia. Most of the ones living in the US speak English. And you don't see them very often(I believe Asians make up around 2% of the population, and "Asian" on US forms includes anybody from India eastward, although many Arabs like filling in "Asian" too).

I'm going to assume you meant to write Portugese.
There are certainly several countries there that speak Spanish.

There is a perfect language though. It is the language of pictures. You can explain most anything with a picture, to anyone of any nationality. People go into too much detail with words, in my opinion.
Bah. Just learn English.