Comments on: Want to Speak Mandarin or Cantonese?

By: Steve Feng

Steve Feng — Mon, 05 Mar 2007 05:39:40 +0000

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.

By: Christopher Arena

Christopher Arena — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 05:01:47 +0000

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.

By: Chuck Rylant

Chuck Rylant — Wed, 28 Feb 2007 06:05:08 +0000

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

By: Peter Thelen

Peter Thelen — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 14:53:47 +0000

I am available for either day. Should be a good time.

By: Stacey Westenberger

Stacey Westenberger — Mon, 26 Feb 2007 05:09:56 +0000

Thanks for organizing this Steve. Thursdays are best for me, but I’ll adapt to whatever you decide.

By: Steve Feng

Steve Feng — Sun, 25 Feb 2007 08:00:56 +0000

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

By: Bonnie Morse

Bonnie Morse — Sat, 24 Feb 2007 00:00:52 +0000

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.

By: Kerry Huang

Kerry Huang — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 20:13:39 +0000

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.

By: Chris Carr

Chris Carr — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 18:13:20 +0000

Jeremy,

Thanks for checking in and for the tip. Love your blog, by the way. Great info there.

By: Jeremy Gordon

Jeremy Gordon — Thu, 22 Feb 2007 07:58:16 +0000

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.