Esperanto in China （世界語在中國裡, Esperanto en Ĉinujo）

[Demian]

How many people speak Esperanto in China, Hong Kong and Taiwan? Can you speak this language? Do you even know what Esperanto is?

在中國、台灣和香港裡多少人會說世界語？你會說這語言嗎？你知道不知道世界語是什麼？

Kiom da personoj scipovas paroli Esperanton en Ĉinujo, Hongkongo kaj Tajvano? Ĉu vi scipovas paroli la lingvon? Ĉu vi eĉ scias, kio estas Esperanto?

They say several thousand people speak the language in China. I was wondering if one of them happens to be among us.

謝謝！

[Lu]

I studied it for a short while, a long long time ago, but don't speak it. Esperanto has been quite big in China at some point, I think poet 北岛 used to be chairman of the Chinese Esperanto organisation.

[Demian]

How glad I am to meet you!

Kiom feliĉa mi estas renkonti vin!

很高興認識您。

So you are an "eterna komencanto" (eternal beginner), are you? Do you know anyone who speaks it? Where did you learn about Esperanto? Why did you stop learning it?

Sorry, if I am coming off as intrusive. I am merely curious, and unable to contain my joy!

前幾年你是世界語者。

[Lu]

'Eternal beginner' sounds a lot better than 'lapsed learner' :-) I don't remember how I first heard about it, but I was in secondary school, liked languages, was idealist and thought Esperanto would be an easy additional language. I stopped because it turned out to be not entirely easy and I wasn't very good at keeping myself motivated. I've never met anyone else who learned it but I never looked for anyone either. Have you looked for Esperanto speakers in China? I suppose there still should be plenty of people there who speak it.

[Demian]

I have talked to Esperanto speakers from China. One if them was a policeman, another was a housewife (stay-at-home mom), the third was a computer science student, and the fourth was a country girl from ChengDu. I talked several times to each of them over Skype. We talked in Esperanto. There was a Buddhist girl too. Perhaps she contributes to http://www.budhano.cn/ I remember talking to an old artist from Shanghai. There are a few others.

China Radio International broadcasts in Esperanto. I still remember that hot summer night. I was rotating the knob of my small radio AM radio when I suspected someone was speaking Esperanto. The signal was bad. I ran to terrace. It was indeed Esperanto and they were broadcasting from China. I cannot describe how happy I was. (I didn't have a computer then.)

In case you are interested, you can try http://zh-cn.lernu.net/ or http://zh-tw.lernu.net/ or http://www.elerno.cn/ . You will find many Chinese Esperanto speakers through these two websites.

=== Later edit ===

You are right. Esperanto is not as easy as some claim. But there is no denying that it is easier than any foreign language you can think of. The vocabulary is bloated, but that is not the fault of the language. You can limit yourself to around two thousand words without limiting your expressive power. You can say: 外國人＝eksterlandano (外= ekster, 國=land, 人=ano) if you have forgotten the word "fremda" (foreign).

[abcdefg]

I've never met an Esperanto speaker here in China, but must admit I have not gone searching.

[imron]

In one of Benny Lewis' china videos he met up with an Esperanto speaking monk and had a conversation with him. It should be relatively easy to find on google/YouTube.

[liuzhou]

I've never met an Esperanto speaker here in China, but must admit I have not gone searching.

I've met one. He was a deeply unpleasant specimen, although I won't blame that on Esperanto.

There was a brief vogue for learning it in the 1980s, but it never really stood a chance. Languages don't work like that. There has never been a successful "invented" language and I suspect there never will be.

Of all the languages spoken in China it is the least interesting.

Try Klingon. It is is nearer to a natural language.

there is no denying that it is easier than any foreign language you can think of

Wanna bet?

[Demian]

Wanna bet?

Unless you are talking of Hindi for Urdu speakers, or Swedish for Norwegian speakers, or Portuguese for Spanish speakers.... Esperanto is easier than any foreign language.

I am curious to know what makes you think otherwise. I may be wrong. I am not an Esperantologist. What I am saying comes from my little experience with Esperanto.

I have failed at learning all the foreign languages I have undertook to study. I am a trilingual, I use Punjabi in family, Hindi/Urdu with friends, and English at work and for study. I have tired to learn Russian, French, Japanese, Arabic, Portuguese, Spanish, Swahili.... and I have never succeeded. Esperanto is the sole exception. This makes me think it is easier.

And, I am somewhat lucky with Chinese.

[anonymoose]

But, what's the point?

[liuzhou]

Esperanto is easier than any foreign language.

There you go saying it again with no proof whatsoever. You ask me to disprove your argument. I think you have to prove yours first.

Esperanto is an irrelevance. I am perfectly serious about Klingon.

[Demian]

But, what's the point?

What are you getting at?

[Demian]

There you go saying it again with no proof whatsoever. You ask me to disprove your argument. I think you have to prove yours first.

Did you even read my post?

I was saying I thought Esperanto was easy from my little experience with the language. I could chat with people from Brazil in Esperanto only a couple of months after seriously studying it. I don't think I can do that in any other language. That makes me think Esperanto is easier than any other langauge in the world. There must be several studies out there. Here is one of them: http://journals.camb...ine&aid=2546192

It reads:

The claim of Esperantists that their language is easier to learn than natural languages has seldom been subjected to an empirical test, and the few tests that have been carried out are not widely known outside the Esperanto community. After an introduction to the Esperanto movement and other experiments based on the teaching of Esperanto, the two “Five-country Experiments” carried out in the 1970s are described and evaluated here. The findings of these tests support the claim of Esperantists but could be challenged mainly because of the wide range of variable factors involved in language learning. These experiments are nevertheless valuable as an attempt to measure some of these variables in a very precise way.

[Lu]

There was a brief vogue for learning it in the 1980s, but it never really stood a chance. Languages don't work like that. There has never been a successful "invented" language and I suspect there never will be.

How about Mandarin? Or Hebrew, raised from the dead?

Of all the languages spoken in China it is the least interesting.

I disagree. 'Interesting' is of course a matter of taste and if you find it uninteresting, that's fine, but I suspect there are all kinds of interesting sides to what Esperanto has meant in China at various points in time and to various groups of people.

[abcdefg]

Esperanto seems kind of like a cult, almost a religion. Is there a secret hand shake and are there special club colors?

If I were a believer, the first thing on my agenda in going to visit Xi'An or Chengdu would be to undertake a vigorous search for others of the same persuasion.

Are there sub-sects? Esperanto users who also do juice fasts and swear by colonic lavage? Are there Esperanto users who are into trance music and body piercing? Is there a particular branch of Esperanto users who believe in UFO's?

[liuzhou]

How about Mandarin? Or Hebrew, raised from the dead?

Neither are "invented languages" in the sense of being constructed from scratch, from nothing. They are natural organic languages.

[Demian]

afcdefg: Esperanto seems kind of like a cult, almost a religion. Is there a secret hand shake and are there special club colors?

Educate yourself.

liuzhou: Neither are "invented languages" in the sense of being constructed from scratch, from nothing. They are natural organic languages.

Who said Esperanto was constructed from scratch? The vocabulary comes from Romance, Slavic, and Germanic languages. The grammatical suffixes and prefixes are European. "Esperanto estas vivanta lingvo." (Esperanto is a living language.) Each of the words in the preceding sentence can be etymologically connected to Latin, Greek, or some current living language. These words did not drop from the sky.

[liuzhou]

I well aware where Esperanto vocabulary comes from, thank you. The eurocentricity is one of the main criticisms against it.

Taking vocabulary from multiple languages and shoving them together like some mismatched jigsaw puzzle is nothing like how real languages develop.

How much Esperanto slang is there? How many neologisms in say, the last year?

[imron]

Taking vocabulary from multiple languages and shoving them together like some mismatched jigsaw puzzle is nothing like how real languages develop.

With the exception of English

[skylee]

Somehow this joke comes to mind -> http://www.davidpbrown.co.uk/jokes/european-commission.html