Anyone speak Chinese?

[mahon83050]

I know some German, but I think Chinese would be another great language to learn. The housekeeper at the Hotel is Taiwanese and she has taught me a few Mandarin Chinese words.

Since it has over 1 Billion speakers, it is very valuable. I admire the Chinese for their culture, conservatism and reserved attittudes.

 

[Phoenix_of_the_ashes]

German is better, we have better literature.

 

[diablo]

Originally posted by Phoenix_of_the_ashes
German is better, we have better literature.

Try giving a speech in German at a WWII Veterans convention though.

 

[DJDamage]

German is better, we have better literature.

"WE THE GERMANS HAVE EVERYTHING BETTER"

lol seriously you can't make that statment when you are culturaly biased and never read any Chinese literature or any other world literature.

Beside I wouldn't call some of the German literature between 1933-1945 to be any good.

 

[jakethasnake]

Guys guys.... Germans fvcked up good and proper like a bunch of morons during WW2, but they still have a pretty cool culture. I know a little German, and appreciate their culture too. I personally don't think it's an elite culture, but it's still advanced.


However, no offense (and I don't want to sound like a nationalist), but most East Asian cultures are traditionally more advanced, have deeper and broader roots than European cultures. Western/Northern Europe flourished during the past 300 years, largely due to the influx of income from colonies which they used to rape, pillage and plunder - but East Asian cultures date back upto 2500 years ago. There are five civilizations that can be considered the pillars of humanity - China, India, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome. The rest are also very impressive and advanced, but come in a lower tier in terms of historical, cultural, and linguistic importance.



I would recommend that you learn Chinese mahon - for international businessmen, it's the way of the future. The Chinese will own the lot of you (me included) with their ridiculous financial power in about 20 years (1.3 billion people = $$$$$). Best master that language so you can kiss their butt to convince them to split with their hard earned currency. That's the way of the world these days - money is king.

 

[mahon83050]

Originally posted by jakethasnake
Guys guys.... Germans fvcked up good and proper like a bunch of morons during WW2, but they still have a pretty cool culture. I know a little German, and appreciate their culture too. I personally don't think it's an elite culture, but it's still advanced.


However, no offense (and I don't want to sound like a nationalist), but most East Asian cultures are traditionally more advanced, have deeper and broader roots than European cultures. Western/Northern Europe flourished during the past 300 years, largely due to the influx of income from colonies which they used to rape, pillage and plunder - but East Asian cultures date back upto 2500 years ago. There are five civilizations that can be considered the pillars of humanity - China, India, Mesopotamia, Greece, and Rome. The rest are also very impressive and advanced, but come in a lower tier in terms of historical, cultural, and linguistic importance.



I would recommend that you learn Chinese mahon - for international businessmen, it's the way of the future. The Chinese will own the lot of you (me included) with their ridiculous financial power in about 20 years (1.3 billion people = $$$$$). Best master that language so you can kiss their butt to convince them to split with their hard earned currency. That's the way of the world these days - money is king.

Jakethesnake you are Korean?

I admire the Germans for their engineering, map-making and flawless transportation system. They just need a little work on being a little more personable and less cold..haha.

Yes, I know the Chinese invented many things before the White man did.

There is a man called Phillip J. Rushton who supposedly is a evolutionary scientist or some sort. Eventhough, his work is considered brazenly racist, it is interesting somewhat. Basically, according to him...Asians have the largest brains, are less aggressive, less sexually active, highly cultured and more cautious than both blacks and whites. I guess this could explain their superior culture and reserved, respectful attitudes.

 

[liberal]

Living in the United States, it would be beneficial for you to learn Chinese, or Spanish.

There are some people who believe that China's economy is growing at such a rate where most of the now American jobs will be shipped over there. You may want to learn how to say "Can I get a job?" in Chinese.

Really though, with Chinese you would have to learn all of those characters, I believe there are 500 different ones in the simplified version. Also, you must master the accent, or you will end up saying totally different things than you intended.

Spanish would also make a lot of sense to learn, with the increase in the Spanish speaking population (Mexico, Cuba, etc).

 

[m4a1]

I'm trilingual, I speak Italian, Spanish, English (in that order) and some Arabic.

How hard is it to speak Mandarin (don't call it 'Chinese', it makes you look ignorant, it's correct, but a cultural person uses the term Mandarin)?

Arabic was pretty hard for me to learn since every verb can be put in a different way depending on the people you're directing it to. For example, English uses "you" for everyone, etc. but Arabic has a different verb for: 1- a single female 2- a single male 3- 2 males 4- 2 females 5- a group of females 6- a group of males

Quote from soyouwanna.com:
Speaking Mandarin can be really tough, because each word can be pronounced in four ways (or "tones"), and a beginner will invariably have trouble distinguishing one tone from another.

That can't be fun. I'll give it a shot though.

 

[jakethasnake]

Originally posted by mahon83050
Jakethesnake you are Korean?

I admire the Germans for their engineering, map-making and flawless transportation system. They just need a little work on being a little more personable and less cold..haha.

Yes, I know the Chinese invented many things before the White man did.

There is a man called Phillip J. Rushton who supposedly is a evolutionary scientist or some sort. Eventhough, his work is considered brazenly racist, it is interesting somewhat. Basically, according to him...Asians have the largest brains, are less aggressive, less sexually active, highly cultured and more cautious than both blacks and whites. I guess this could explain their superior culture and reserved, respectful attitudes.

Yeah, I'm Korean. And I also think Germany and their culture is cool. It's just that they can't think for themselves and are like robots sometimes - a lot like Asian, actually. Hahah!


I've of Rushton too, but if you think about it, there is enough overlap between the races for his theories to amount to not much more than a half-truth. His theories don't hold water all the time. There are a lot anaemic blacks and a lot of Asian steriod apes that fvck like gigolos. As citizens/residents of America we are trapped in a propaganda bubble where our view of the world is strongly obstructed by the tripe that Hollywood promotes ("blacks are strong but dumb, Asians are smart but weak, and whites are in the middle..." ). But if you're resourceful enough, you can break free of those shackles and see the world for what it is - either thru alternate media channels or by travelling in person.

 

[aBAzLLnA]

Chinese is a pretty damn hard language to learn if you didn't learn it as a child. It's more tonal unlike english which is pretty straight forward until you get to the grammar.

 

[diablo]

Not that I can speak it, but from what I understand Mandarin is a language which is easily forgotten - if you don't continually practice, you won't be able to be fluent in it. As for Arabic, I know a few words... enough to get me by in the Khan el-Khalili. My aunt (who's returning to the USA on Thursday) has lived there (Cairo) for 35+ years (Information Co-ordinator at the American University in Cairo)... anyway, enough with the (brackets)... cheers.

 

[Marcopolo]

qing ni gei wo gongzuo? por favor? Ich habe nicht geld!

Seriously, the civilizations of Greece and Rome are European and they are in the 2500 year old range. These cultures are considered the basis of Western Civilization.

 

[JoE BoXeR]

Not to burst your bubble but I've heard that Mandarin is single-handedly the most difficult language to learn. In other words, this would not simply be a "listen to this tape during your commute to work" type project. That said, I agree with you that Mandarin would be an extremely beneficial language to know as China continues to boom.

Maybe, just maybe, they'll take pity on us and learn English

 

[RiceHapa888]

I speak Mandarin cause Im hapa...its difficult for foreigners to learn but for me just thinking about learning Cantonese....damn 9 freakin tones..............

 

[m4a1]

Originally posted by JoE BoXeR
Maybe, just maybe, they'll take pity on us and learn English

LOL!

 

[diplomatic_lie]

Meh, the words are the hardest. There's no "spelling" with Chinese words, you gotta learn every single one of them.

There are also 2 types of Chinese writing/reading: simplified words, and traditional words. Learned simplified, all of mainland China uses that. Only Hong Kong (and I think Taiwan) still uses traditional, but even that is dying out.

I'm Chinese myself and even though I can speak mandarin and cantonese, I still have trouble with a lot of words. Hell, even my parents have trouble!

 

[jonny football hero]

Ich habe nicht geld!

Shouldn't that be "ich habe kein geld?"

Anyway, what about cantonese, why just mandarin?

 

[Phoenix_of_the_ashes]

If he learns cantonese first, that would be like learning the bavarian dialekt before learning german.

 

[Phoenix_of_the_ashes]

Originally posted by DJDamage
"WE THE GERMANS HAVE EVERYTHING BETTER"

lol seriously you can't make that statment when you are culturaly biased and never read any Chinese literature or any other world literature.

Beside I wouldn't call some of the German literature between 1933-1945 to be any good.

No we dont have everything better, we as German culture dont have much of anything good anymore, but we have great literature, as thins was written during a time when Germany DID have most things better than the rest.

I dont think I am culturally biased as Ive spent the other half of my life in the US and also love that country.

And yeah, the nationalist literature from the nazi time sucks, making the reactionist literature even better.

 

[doctoroxygen]

Originally posted by jonny football hero
Shouldn't that be "ich habe kein geld?"

Anyway, what about cantonese, why just mandarin?

Cantonese is pretty much only spoken in Hong Kong, where most people speak English too. I'm trying to learn it anyway because my girlfriend speaks it...impossible to learn from a book, I think an immersion course in HK would be the only way to go.