<p>how do i go on about this? i have a chinesse friend and i want to learn it. How should i start?</p>
<p>Haha, good luck…</p>
<p>I’d start by having him teach you pinyin, buy a few chinese learning books (the ones pretty much geared towards little kids) and just going from there.</p>
<p>yeah good luck, it might take you a couple decades:P</p>
<p>You Can teach yourself the basics…
[Chinese-English</a> Dictionary](<a href=“http://www.mandarintools.com/worddict.html]Chinese-English”>Chinese-English Dictionary)
Teach yourself pinyin…
I’ll help you…
roughly:
x= sh
zh= J
Q= Ch
z= dtz
iu= yo
ui= wei
y= silent
i=ee
e=uh
a=a
u= (this is hard, especially if you’re white…LOL) sort of like euouh…LOL no JK
ou=oh as in ‘o’ the letter
2nd u=oooh (like the ‘oo’ in boo)
there is a difference between the ‘ch’ and ‘q’ and so forth…
like
Gui= goo-wei
qiu= chee-yo
ming-mee-ng
chang= chah-ng (not chay-ng)
kou= k-oh (like the oe in the ‘h’ word) LOL
yi= eee
you= yo/ oh (chinese people can understand it all the same)
qing-chii-ng
xu= shoo
ching- ching</p>
<p>then learn how Chinese is logical… then learn sentence order…start to construct basic sentences…then add vocabulary and construct more complex sentences.</p>
<p>It’s possible. I taught myself as well. I’ll try to tell you the steps I took:
First I downloaded, “Pimsleur’s Mandarin Chinese”, Parts 1-3 (It contains about 90+ Lessons): This helps introduce you to the language.
Visit <a href=“Http://Chinesepod.com%5B/url%5D”>Http://Chinesepod.com</a> - It’s a very helpful website.
Purchase College-Quality Mandarin textbooks from Amazon.com (Visit a college website that teaches Mandarin, they’ll usually have a list of books their course uses in the syllabus, purchase a few from Amazon. Aim for college-quality because they’re most comprehensive)
Visit an expat/China forum, I can’t recall the exact one I went to, but there are a lot of people who are willing to exchange languages there (i.e. You teach them English, they teach you Chinese). Make sure you have a microphone and a program like Skype, you need to learn hold conversations.
Watch movies/tv shows/etc. in Mandarin, listen to online Mandarin radios …once again, there are several online. Just Google them.</p>
<p>This won’t make you fluent of course, but it’s a start.</p>
<p>ok thanks guys</p>
<p>ni hao ma?</p>
<p>wo hen hao</p>
<p>haha!</p>
<p>Haha I want to learn too. My parents grew up in Taiwan and all I can say is “wo yau tse bing chi ling” [1]</p>
<p>[1] I want to eat ice cream</p>
<p>start by spelling “chinese” right. </p>
<p>there’s no 2 s’s.</p>
<p>How about you start by capitalizing first letter in your sentences before correcting others? </p>
<p>people like you disgust me</p>
<p>Get yourself a native speaker boyfriend/girlfriend.</p>
<p>^^</p>
<p>Good idea.</p>
<p>And it’s Mandarin Chinese.</p>
<p>//"Haha I want to learn too. My parents grew up in Taiwan and all I can say is “wo yau tse bing chi ling” [1]</p>
<p>[1] I want to eat ice cream"//</p>
<p>lol.</p>
<p>amandeep</p>
<p>you screwed up there yourself; you didn’t capitalize the p in people. :D</p>
<p>and no, i don’t care much about grammar on the internet.</p>
<p>She missed the period as well. Sigh, the pains of failed ownage.</p>
<p>isn’t aMANdeep a guy?</p>
<p>too bad .</p>
<p>Chinese are much diffcult to learn than English, good luck.</p>
<p>IS. Chinese = singular. bah, grammars.</p>
<p>grammar. damn it!</p>
<p>Try the Rosetta Stone Program.</p>
<p>I’ve never done it, but I know people who did and they said it really worked. I think my brother and I are going to do the French and Mandarin. If you go to their website you can find the telephone number to get a free demo CD, which is what I did. The way it works is the computer shows you the word in the language you’re learning, says the word, and shows a picture of what it is. No translation into English, so it’s like learning a first language. It costs a few hundred dollars, but if you’re really serious about learning the language and you want to go at your own pace it seems to be worth it.</p>
<p>Also, when I called to order the demo, the lady told me that if in 6 months you’re not fluent you get a full refund.</p>
<p>ok i will look into the rosetta stone program!</p>
<p>thanks</p>