Kunming or not to Kunming?

[michael289]

Hi

I graduate this year and I am planning to head to China to study Mandarin. I plan on studying over the summer at home (UK) and then heading ou for August/September. I've been asking around my friends (some chinese and some foreigners who have studied in china, mainly who I met on my exchange year in Korea) and been asking for advice on where I should go.

I want to go somewhere:

1) Cheap

2) Fun

3) Not too cold in winter (I've been to beijing in December, I got sick!)

4) A little bit different

5) good for learning mandarin (ie. fairly standard dialect)

Maybe I seem fussy, but based on this I've been recommended Kunming, Yunnan province. I've done a bit of research and so far I'm quite keen. Seems like a nice place and a bit less developed than Beijing/Shanghai etc which appeals to me.

I am looking for some more opinions on this choice! Do you think Kunming is a good place to study Mandarin? Am I crazy... should I consider other places? Is anyone here studying in Kunming? Any advice, ideas and suggestions welcome!!

[brenna]

Hey,

I'm in the same boat as you...from what I can tell, Kunming seems like a pretty sick place...most of the posts from this forum/others are a bit old, but really how much could a place change in a couple years...right?

Where are you thinking of studying in kunming?

[Horchata]

Kunming is certainly gorgeous. Very little pollution, never too cold or too hot.

Not sure about the Mandarin, but there is a local dialect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kunming_dialect

[michael289]

I was considering Yunnan University or Yunnan Normal University, I contacted a Chinese girl who lives in Kunming and she seemed to think that these were the best places to study Chinese. These two are also listed for the csc scholarships, so when I apply I think I'll go for them.

Brenna you're right, it does look pretty cool, and it has a wikipedia article triple the size of some much more prominent cities. Maybe my logic is skewed but someone obviously finds it interesting! Would be great to hear from anyone who has studied in Kunming, or knows anyone who has. A first hand account would give me the confidence or not to just go ahead and apply!

[JenniferW]

In a conversation about putonghua and pronunciation, a Chinese friend recently said to me that people from Jilin have the loveliest pronunciation. She's studying linguistics, which is what my own degree was in, so we were having quite a serious discussion about perceptions of different accents. You'll be aware of this sort of thing as regards your own first language, and we were talking about the same for Chinese.

This tied in with a comment years ago someone who'd been studying Chinese in Australia and then China said about what they heard in Chengde - how 'standard' it sounded. Not exactly the north-east, but heading that way. I lived in several different parts of China (working), and one was Shenyang. Although there's a distinctive local accent, people there seemed to switch readily to a very 'standard' pronunciation when talking to me, and I remember the same thing happening when travelling around in Jilin province in places off the beaten track. So, how about the north-east for somewhere to study? The language university in Dalian has a particularly good reputation, but how about visiting Jilin first and just listening to people?

Despite the cold winters, I liked a lot about living in the north-east, and because they expect bad weather in the winter, it always struck me they prepared for it and coped with it - and I was never cold. Lots of things of historical and cultural interest all over the north-east, plus coast and some stunning mountains.