Ice Breaker / Smooth Coversation Starter

[edelweis]

I've never actually done it, but at a time I was considering getting T shirts (similar to Shelley's, but have a collection of them and they would not all be that explicit, but raise the curiosity - or perhaps hope for help - of the Chinese tourists...) then the idea was to go to tourist spots and have the Chinese come and talk to me, instead of the reverse.

You can look at that thread to see what suggestions the forums members had.

@ heifeng: use the "ignore" list in your profile.

[xiaotao]

Starting a conversation with a Chinese person is like starting a conversation with other people. I find that the best place to chat with people is at the park or even better at a dog park. If they are not in a hurry they will chat with you. Another easy place to chat is at the grocery store or farmers market. I usually ask how they cook something. I don't talk to somebody in Chinese unless I know they can speak Chinese. If your chinese is good enough, go to a chinese restaurant and order in chinese.

[Adam_CLO]

As has been mentioned earlier, I'd recommend waiting till you overhear someone speaking Chinese first before you approach them just to avoid any potential embarrassment. I find Chinatowns where you can try speaking to restaurant staff or ordering in Chinese are a good place to practice. You can also try asking random questions in Chinese like "where is the bathroom" or so, just to watch them do a double take. Sometimes that can get a conversation going, although since they are working, it may not be long.

I also like the advice of listening to tourists speaking Chinese, then use your Chinese to offer to take a picture of them (with their camera). That's a good way to break the ice, then ask them where they are from etc. I've done this lots of times, and they are usually quite friendly back in return.

[imron]

haha if you added a smiley face after "happen" i would of got it. its hard to tell reading vs listening to you.

It was someone else who made the comment, I was simply providing clarification. Having been a white foreigner living in China, it was pretty obvious that it couldn't have been anything else.

your first post on this thread is to pinpoint me but not answer the op's question? nice...

She's only trying to help keep the thread on topic, and as a long-term member who has helped many other posters in many other threads, I think she gets the benefit of the doubt that she wasn't just trying to pick on you

[Shelley]

Well as if to prove myself wrong, I struck up a conversation with some Chinese students the other day in the bank. The queue was long and I was sandwiched between 2 young orientals, one girl and one boy. I got my phone out and started to review some characters in pleco. The young girl was filling in some forms and she asked the young man in english "is surname the same as last name?" He relpied in english and chinese. So I plucked up courage and confirmed in chinese that it was the same.

So she said are you learning chinese?, I said yes I was learning chinese in chinese and he said enthusiasticly of course she is, of course she is

She then asked if dependent meant her parents and so i said no usually it means children who depend on you. We then chatted happily in chinese about the child she had.

The young man smiled and joined in occasionaly. Finally our turns came and one by one we said our goodbyes again all in chinese.

Feeling very pleased with myself I wondered off and did the rest of my shopping etc.

Later as I was going to sleep that night, i suddenly realized that i had refered to her child consistantly as 汉字 and not 儿子. I went slowly red from head to toe I thought at least I tried and no one corrected me so maybe they thought it was just bad pronouciation which strangely enough seemed better than getting the wrong word all together.

But all in all it wasn't as bad as i thought it might be

[langxia]

All you need is that your best friend thinks that it is so cool that you are able to speak chinese that he tells every chinese restaurant you go to that you are able to speak chinese and makes you speak chinese to them