All East Asian languages

[xuechengfeng]

My goal is very LOFTY!!!

but

by the end of my death i'd like to know all east asian languages,

chinese, korean, japanese, vietnamese, and cantonese possibly (am i forgetting ne???).

no need to tell me i'm an idiot for chasing this goal, i know!! but

could anyone possibly give me links to books or maybe some (cheap) audio tapes where i could get a start on this in a couple years

not for chinese though, i'm already a year up on that, unless you can recommned a book that has good slang, stuff not taught in american school

謝謝你們﹗﹗

[skylee]

It is good to be ambitious. I don't mean to say you are an idiot, but your post reminds me of this (you know what the English is) -

貪多嚼不爛

[xuechengfeng]

I'm not familiar with the characters, but from what I looked up, I'm assuming it is saying

I'm trying to "bite off more than I can chew?"

[Quest]

missed mongolian, tibetan, shanghainess(ala wont forgive you for this!), minnan, minbei, + other chinese dialects........

[xuechengfeng]

aiya!!!

i need to get moving and stop typing!!

[pazu]

Here's a summary of Vietnamese reference reviewed by me... have a look

http://www.pazu.com/vietnamese/

Here's another website (well... also made by me, haha),

http://kongjr.blogspot.com/

Photolog with Chinese, English, Japanese and Vietnamese.

[galitonwu]

There a 56 nations in China , many of nations has their own language and character .

[xuechengfeng]

sorry i suppose i should have added the most prevalent languages.

thanks for the suggestion pazu, i ordered the Vietnamese rough guide by Penguin group book, very cheap!! hopefully it is as good as you say and i can pick up a few things.

[bhchao]

Good luck

I recommend this book for Japanese. You won't find this book in many bookstores. The book uses Japanese hiragana and katakana to teach the reader. It gives an English word like "book", but it won't put "hon" right next to it. It will put the Japanese hiragana characters for "book" right next to that word. I think this is a better way of learning than using English letters to spell out how it would sound in Japanese. This is my preference though.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/4789009637/102-0527740-2783310?v=glance

[Guest Yau]

I met a german a year ago, he spoke fluent mandarin, english and german, fairly good cantonese, and apparently wonderful japanese, spanish, french too.

I was quite surprised on that and asked if he's doing any linguistic study. Then he said he's just a worker to repair the ceiling, but he played no tv game, no film and seldom watch TV, so he spent time by learning languages.

What a bravo hobby.

[Quest]

thanks for the suggestion pazu, i ordered the Vietnamese rough guide by Penguin group book, very cheap!! hopefully it is as good as you say and i can pick up a few things.

I see you are learning 3 languages all at once!! bon courage!

[xuechengfeng]

i just received the rough guide in the mail today pazu, looks like a good explanatory book!

謝謝您﹗﹗

[pazu]

Yes, it's good. But be careful about the pronunciation guide, it's a guide for tourist and travellers alike, not for a serious learners. You really have to find a VN friend to help you on this. ... indeed even if you come to VN you will still face a big problem about the pronunication problem..... haha. Okay, no problem.

[xuechengfeng]

I think I basically have 4 tones of Mandarin down, but I am having trouble grasping the idea of 6 tones.

Do you know where I can find a keyboard for Vietnamese? Maybe you could help me as I progress in my studies.

[pazu]

Please have a look of my reference website again here: http://www.pazu.com/vietnamese/website.html

Check the program of "WinVN", it can let you type Vietnamese.

And you should ask NNT if you have any Vietnamese problem, because I'm just a newbie!

[Guest dingo]

you dont need to be dead to know all these languages

my dad is only 50 something

and he can speak fluent mandarin, cantonese, teochew, japanese, english and german..

[HashiriKata]

xuechengfeng,

If you can keep up with all three foreign languages at the same time, it'll be an amirable effort and you'll reap the reward (later on) that Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese all have around 70% of their wordstock in common (example of "dictionary": jiten (J), cidian ©, tudien (V)).

I think there will be a lot of resources around for learning Chinese & Japanese but if you got stuck with Vietnamese, I may be able help if you let me know.

Good luck!

HK

[LiYuanXi]

Looks like over here nobody speaks any form Min nan dialect. Yoo hoo~ Anybody speaks Min nan here?

[CBC]

Vietnam belongs to SE Asia I think.

Within China there are over 80 languages spoken by Chinese minorites. Within Han Chinese there are 7 main dialects(languages), each with several branches.

Try hard!!

[xuechengfeng]

I've realized this goal sucked and it's hard enough learning one complex language.