Chinese learning via ping-pong

[querido]

I have acquired another family of Cantonese speaking friends. How lucky I am! This time it started at the local ping-pong club. My city is of modest size but there are three clubs that I know of and lots of Chinese players. 

 

Starting at ITTF.com (International Table Tennis Federation) you can look for your national organization here and hopefully find a local club.

 

Fits in with that "exercise is good for learning" thread too.  :-)

[Yadang]

Awesome! Thanks for the link! Are the people in your club crazy good? I'm not sure how good you are, but I wonder if there is anyone in the club in Taipei who are as bad as I am and who would want to play with me

[querido]

Hey Yadang!

No, I'm not and no they aren't all crazy good. One of my clubs has a long row of tables and the custom is that the weakest players and strongest players play on opposite ends. That works ok. I know this issue from (Western) chess clubs too: when one is the strongest player present or when the stronger players are all busy one learns to enjoy teaching. That happens in ping-pong too.

 

If you're really interested, there are traditional ways to get better without an opponent or a table.

 

Well, one could make oneself interesting in ping-pong about a hundred times faster than one could become a skilled conversational opponent: six months vs. fifty years. That's about right. :-)

[muirm]

I totally agree! When I was living closer I took lessons in Chinese at this club in California. In a lesson you probably don't get as much casual conversation practice as playing with friends, but it's still great for sports terminology, and getting used to how to describe body movement/positioning as the coach makes corrections.

[yhe2006]

muirm

The Burlingame Ping Pong club looks interresting. It's nearby I'd like to check it out.

Thanks for the sugguestion.

 

By the way, shouldn't 謬 be miu not mui?

[muirm]

By the way, shouldn't 謬 be miu not mui?

 

It's just a silly transliteration of my real name "Muir".

[Yadang]

I'm sorry - forgot about this thread and was reminded today!

 

 

If you're really interested, there are traditional ways to get better without an opponent or a table.

 

Yeah, if you have some cool resources/tips to look at, I'd definitely be interested!

[querido]

Join one of the big table tennis forums and search and/or start a thread. 

 

But I'll say a little here:

This was the first thing that came to my mind, from a bio of my favorite player at http://www.teamusa.org/Athletes/GA/Jun-Gao :

 

"Her first lesson in table tennis was to learn how to use a paddle to bounce the ball against the wall without letting the ball drop." 

 

Not only her but innumerable Chinese children, is my understanding.

 

I can think of lots of variations and extensions of that. You could choose a wall with manageable irregularity, draw lines on the floor and wall to invent challenges, etc. You could make a wall with a sheet of plywood with or without rubber on it. It's called a returnboard. Google Images "returnboard".

 

If you have a friend you could hit over some obstacle. You could hit in and out of a window! Etc, etc, etc. :-)