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Linguaholic

I need a little help!!


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I'm learning Chinese for a trip that I am taking and I want to be able to have the basics down so that I can communicate while I am there.  My favorite way to learn a language is by immersing myself in the culture but this is impossible until I go over there and I want to be prepared.  Should I read books, watch movies, or get a tutor?  What is the best way to learn in your opinion??

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Exactly when will you be going there? If there's sufficient time left then yes, reading books and watching movies to get the "feel" of the language, it helps a lot if you got a good language guide book (You know, the kind that teaches you how to pronounce some commonly used words in Chinese like "Hello, how much is this, You are welcomed, etc").

If you are running out of time then I think it would be wise to take a quick look through these sites and try to memorize the important phrases:

http://www.omniglot.com/language/phrases/mandarin.php

http://www.tour-beijing.com/beijing_travel/Chinese_Phrases_for_travelers.php#.UxL9lfmSxqU

Practise your pronunciation with this site:

http://www.neospeech.com/

Just copy the chinese characters to the middle left section and start practising by saying the phrases out loud.

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We are planning on going in late summer early fall, I have started and have been reading some books but these websites are fantastic.  Thanks so much for posting I am so excited to look through them and become fluent in Chinese.  I will keep you posted on my learning and how it is going.  I do have a tutor that is helping quite a bit as well but I really want to know the language before I get there.  Thanks again.

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Still plenty of time. I suggest you go take up some quick lessons to learn about the basics. Watch movies in Chinese to get a picture of how the language sounds so you won't mess it up. You probably won't be able to master it so just focus on learning some greetings and common phrases.

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I suggest getting started with the Chinese alphabet first. They are relatively easy to memorize and learn, and when you learn it and know how the combinations work, you'd be able to read any word that has the alphabet written next to it with total ease, and this way even if it takes you longer to know all the words, at least you'd get the pronunciation down first thing and you'd have more chances of getting understood when talking to the people there. Good luck!

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