One reason Perl resonates with me is, it's a language I can explore, even more than a language to master. Scheme is the same way: it feels like a language that's more about discovery than about churning out code. And ironically, I find it easier to get a working product in both Perl and Scheme than in ``flat'' languages like Java. I was a professional Java developer for some time, and never really felt passionate about it.

This is all highly subjective.