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Im teaching myself Chinese(Mandarin)right now actually. I was debating whether to study Spanish or Japanese first, but seeing as how my brother , his wife, and her whole family speak Mandarin, I figure I go that way at the start. Right now im just teaching myself how to speak then later will probably pick up reading.
I would probably recommend Chinese as it is becoming more and more spoken and will probably be extremely common that most people can speak it along with english the future(more so than Spanish).Personally, ive always loved Chinese culture, so studying a language whose culture you want to learn about as well creates a plus for motivational purposes. I will probably find time to learn basic Japanese sometime in the future too though(alread know some now with all the anime I watch). I figure if I can teach myself Chinese first then everything else will be cake. I believe Chinese and Japanese are the 2nd and 3rd hardest languages to learn, closely behind the infamous English language.
And as someone has already mentioned, Chinese is a tonal language. Meaning that there can be several meanings(4 tones to be exact) to a word that sounds the same at first. It takes ALOT of listening to get the tones down and can be extremely confusing to the untrained ear. The words seem to flow together and sound similar as they aren't as discrete or distinct as in english or spanish. This can be a pain. Id still consider myself a noob even though ive been studying off and on for over a year, but notice that its getting easier to think of what to say in certain situations. And like most languages, just getting more and more vocab seems to be the toughest. I can speak some simple sentences really well, but throw in a word ive never learned before and i'll have no idea what your saying.
I would also recommend, if you choose Chinese, to watch as much Chinese TV as possible, after you've got some vocab under your belt. Yea, you won't understand 99.9% of whats being said, but it helps you get used to the pace. Check out CCTV or if you dont have it, try online at www.cctv.com Its China's only English language station ranging from travel, business, science, and even some dialogue lessons.
Overall, I have found learning Chinese to be pretty fun so far. If you have the patience to learn properly and can stick it out, I think it will be very rewarding. Ive probably got a year or more to go before I can start having coherrent conversations at a decent pace, but every now and again, i'll says some simple phrases to try and impress people.
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Last edited by Kakoroto on Oct-01-2006 at 05:56
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