Neat article, The Great Wall and beyond about traveling to China and the key words they Learned in Chinese. We started learning Chinese phrases. Three words stuck: yuan (Chinese money; 6.85 equals $1); nihou (hello), and pijo (beer)

In my around 20 years of marriage to my wife (Taiwanese), I have picked up a bit of Chinese. I understand more than I speak.

My limited vocabulary:

hello, shao lan bao (steamed dumplings), good buy, thank you, counting 1-10 on a good day, wife, ice water (you speak in perfect pronunciation to a Chinese waiter and because your white they don't expect it), is so and so home, little boy, little girl, grandfather, father, mother, grandmother, dog, small, large, yes, no, no thank you, rice, and a few others.

And with my fluent, sarcastic teenage daughter around, I usually don't use it. Easier on my ego.

My dream is to take a full immersion class in Chinese with my family not around to, um, help me :-) The good side is I have a huge amount of great material for Learning Chinese and some that take care of that bug bear of learning Chinese, pronunciation. I like the idea of Learning Chinese with Bo Po Mo to avoid the Pinyin issues. Champion Chinese does this.

Labels: Learning Chinese