Want to Speak Mandarin or Cantonese?
February 20th, 2007
Submitted By: Steven Feng
Speaking Mandarin or Cantonese would enhance the experience of the trip. We could interact with more people if we could speak the dialects. Unfortunately, it takes years of practice, and we have less than six months before the trip. Still, we should make an attempt to learn some basic words and phrases or to practice the language for those that already speak one dialect.
I am proposing we have an informal discussion/practice once a week for an hour during the spring quarter. If you are interested, please leave a comment. Include in your comment:
• The language, Mandarin or Cantonese, you would prefer to speak
• The weekday and time you prefer to meet (I figure the following times would be most appropriate, but you could suggest an alternative: Tuesday 11-12 and Thursday 11-12 on the days we are not in a China lecture)
I will count up the votes, and majority to set the time and language. I looked on the internet for books and the least expensive is about $15 with a CD.
Entry Filed under: Pre-Departure, Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, China, Misc.
20 Comments Add your own
1. Chris Carr | February 20th, 2007 at 5:48 pm
Good post and idea!
My suggestions for “must” phrases to learn:
-Hello
-Thank you
-Good bye
-It costs too damn much, please give me a lower quote
-Where is the _________ [my] hotel?
-How much for a taxi ride to ______?
-What is that?
-Where is the toilette?
2. Patrick McGuire | February 20th, 2007 at 10:36 pm
There are also quite a few podcasts out there and they’re free. I started listening to one a while back and it was pretty good–Chinese Lessons with Serge Melnyk. It’s available through iTunes by clicking here: Chinese Lessons. There’s a few others out there but I found this guy to be pretty helpful.
3. Patrick McGuire | February 20th, 2007 at 10:41 pm
It seems the link didn’t work for me, maybe spam protections? You can paste this URL into your browser and it will take you to iTunes to access the podcast.
4. Erik | February 21st, 2007 at 5:59 am
I can confirm Patrick’s opinion about the Serge Melnyk freebies. I’ve tried to get going on them - they seem pretty good, but I think having a group to practice with instead of my steering wheel would make a huge difference. Thanks Steven for offering to lead the charge on getting us to learn enough of the language to be able to function while in China.
5. Chris Carr | February 21st, 2007 at 10:02 am
I like how your group is staring to share ideas, resources, tips for the trip, etc. more. Keep doing that and looking out for each other! That is one of the purposes of this blog. And remember, you may need/want a job someday from the person sitting on the left or right of you in an MBA class.
6. Felipe Hernandez | February 21st, 2007 at 3:34 pm
I’m in. Either day works for me.
7. Felipe Hernandez | February 21st, 2007 at 3:42 pm
BTW - my vote would be for Mandarin, i’ve heard it’s wider spread.
8. Chun-Te Peter Wu | February 21st, 2007 at 5:52 pm
The sayings below are in Mandarin
-Hello - - Ni Hao Mah?
-Thank you – Hsieh Hsieh
-Good bye – Tsai Jian
-It costs too damn much, please give me a lower quote – tai guei leh, pien yi e dian
-Where is the _________ [my] hotel? ________ hotel tsai nah li?
-How much for a taxi ride to ______? This one is long, I’ll explain in person
-What is that? nah shi sher muh?
-Where is the toilette? Tseh schwo tsai nah li?
good idea Steven, I can help with Mandarin
9. Chuck Rylant | February 21st, 2007 at 6:40 pm
This is a great idea. I am interested, time permitting. For those of you who are serious about learning a second language, I suggest the following site:
http://how-to-learn-any-language.com/forum/default.asp
I have followed this site for years and it provides the most objective advice on products and methods of learning languages. A second bit of advice, the best language learning programs are from Pimsleur and FSI. I have not checked if they offer products in Mandarin or Cantonese, but Pimsleur is the best language program for beginners and FSI is the best if you really want to learn the language. I have tried them all and you will be satisfied with either. You may be able to get the FSI program for free if you look hard enough.
10. Victoria Whelan | February 21st, 2007 at 8:45 pm
Great idea. I would love to do this. I would do either day.
11. Jeremy Gordon | February 21st, 2007 at 11:58 pm
An interesting project you all have going here. I would recommend http://www.ChinesePod.com as a practical and flexible language resource (free for the basic services). Good luck with it.
12. Chris Carr | February 22nd, 2007 at 10:13 am
Jeremy,
Thanks for checking in and for the tip. Love your blog, by the way. Great info there.
13. Kerry Huang | February 23rd, 2007 at 12:13 pm
I vote for Mandarin–it is the “official” dialect of China. I just picked up a Pimsleur cd set to learn Manadrin from Costco yesterday before reading Chuck’s comment so I guess I was lucky. It was only $30 but it was the last one but I don’t mind sharing it for our informal classes.
I’ll try to wrangle my roommate or another Mandarin speaking friend to help out occasionally.
14. Bonnie Morse | February 23rd, 2007 at 4:00 pm
I think this is a great idea. My vote is for Mandarin. I’ll talk to Xiaodan in class too and see if she’d be willing to help us out.
15. Steve Feng | February 25th, 2007 at 12:00 am
I wanted to thank everyone joining the dicsussion. It seems Mandarin will be the language. Keep you posted on the time, waiting to see if anyone else wants to join and is time specific. Thanks. Steve
16. Stacey Westenberger | February 25th, 2007 at 9:09 pm
Thanks for organizing this Steve. Thursdays are best for me, but I’ll adapt to whatever you decide.
17. Peter Thelen | February 26th, 2007 at 6:53 am
I am available for either day. Should be a good time.
18. Chuck Rylant | February 27th, 2007 at 10:05 pm
Now that I have some time I want to share some more info on language CD’s. The Pimsleur set that Kerry Huang bought at Costco is a good teaser. It will get you warmed up, but if you want to get a little more serious about learning the language you need to get all three of the complete sets from Pimsleur. Each set is almost $300 (3×300=$900) and is a total of 90 CD’s. I went through all of these CD’d for Spanish. It took me about six months and I was able to communicate fairly well in Mexico, but you will not be fluent. The FSI program I described earlier will make you fluent, but it is for very serious students. The Pimsleur method is VERY effective and can be done in your car or on a plane.
Now my secret!! You can rent the Pimsleur sets at recordedbooks.com for $16. They are a great company. Here is a link that will get you there. Make sure you click “CD” if you decide to order.
http://recordedbooks.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=rb.search_books&searchtype=keyword&search_by=keyword&search_text=pimsleur+&x=12&y=6
19. Christopher Arena | February 28th, 2007 at 9:01 pm
This sounds like a great opportunity. My vote would be for Thursday’s when we don’t have a China meeting or a speaker from 11-12.
20. Steve Feng | March 4th, 2007 at 9:39 pm
I would like to thank everyone for responding.
Bloggers would prefer practicing Mandarin. Although Thursdays represented the majority vote, my concern between the MBAA speakers and China meetings, we will have less time to meet. I will get in contact with the MBAA planning speakers to determine if Thursday will work out. For now let’s set Thursday 11-12 as the tentative day.
Because we have such a small group, I could afford to provide lunch at the first meeting. Also, I could make a Chinese food another day, which we could practice saying food items and utensils such as “fork” so that when you get frustrated using chop sticks to eat rice, you could ask for one. I’m not sure if they have forks at our convenience.
I’m not limiting the amount of people coming to the meeting, but if you could please make a comment saying you plan to come, I would appreciate it. The individuals above do not have to make another comment. Thanks.
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