200 Words to Talk About Everyday Things

[Shelley]

HaHa DD brilliant, had me laughing.

[Silent]

 

In other words, as Shelley said: there are no shortcuts.

 

shortcuts to what? The advise given comes to me across as aiming at language proficiency. Understandable, but if the goal is short term survival a textbook is not always the best advice. Getting the message across is more important then correct language use. OP has however 9 months so I guess a bit more then just learning a couple of hunderd words should be possible and a good textbook that helps with basic grammar can certainly help.

 

 

I just, personally, think that it's not necessary to start at "What's your name?" when it comes to Chinese.

In principle you're right. However it's pretty much the first question asked when meeting a stranger and even many survival courses start with this kind of crap. I agree however that for survival it's much more useful to start with counting, and asking a lot of question about prices, directions, tickets, times, availability etc etc  and understanding the answers. Depending on the setting also restaurant and hotel conversations are important. Emergencies like doctor/hospital are maybe not high frequency, but it would be good to learn these early on too. Problem is finding a good course that starts with these.

 

Considering you still have 9 months I think a standard textbook isn't a bad choice. It will cover basic grammar and some elementary vocabulary that may be not your highest priority to survive but is still handy to know. The most basic survival issues are often still fairly early covered and you might try to cover them even a bit earlier and more in depth by supplementing some extra vocabulary etc.

[Demonic_Duck]

I don't think you lose much by starting with "what's your name?" or other very basic social niceties. These are simple, communicative tasks you can complete with friends without too much trouble, so in a sense, they're a good way of easing you into the language. At the most basic level, there aren't really many phrases like this you'll need to learn. Of course, if the textbook spends an inordinate amount of time on this at the beginning, it could become a real waste of time (I had one beginner textbook in which the first few dialogues all seemed to be dealing with polite dinner party conversation and asking who was or wasn't married, which was more than a little off-putting).

[li3wei1]

Use a textbook

Supplement with a tutor or language exchange, but in the early stages no more than a few hours a week

Supplement that with a list of words you need to use. Don't memorise someone else's list, make your own as you go along. If you have a leaky faucet, you'll be saying 'leaky faucet' a lot, so put it on your list and learn it. If you don't, don't. If you never eat cabbage, you won't need to learn 'cabbage'.

Learn characters as you need them. 男/女 (the toilet characters) would be a good place to start, along with your address and bus stop. Then the menu terms.

Use what you learn, every day, and pretty soon you'll be chatting away. Have fun!

[Demonic_Duck]

I'd say stuff like “东南西北” (East/South/West/North) would be more useful than “男女”, because “男/女” on toilets is invariably accompanied by the symbols. Also, “卫生间” (which means toilet/washroom, and is not always accompanied by symbols or English). All that stuff's worth learning, though. Also, for menu terms, start off with generic words such as rice, noodles, the various types of meat (which are just the character for the animal followed by the character for "meat"), various common vegetables, common types of seasoning etc. You can actually get quite far in most restaurants with some well-chosen vocab in that area, as you'll find the names of many dishes are simply descriptive. It won't help you out much with stuff like “麻婆豆腐” (literally "pockmarked wife tofu"), but you don't need to understand every single menu item, just enough that you can order a few things you're fairly sure you'll like.

[Bigdumogre]

http://www.self-learner.com/files/Pimsleur_Mandarin_Chinese_I_Notes.pdf

That's why I always recommend pimsluers audio. The link above is the notes to the first box set. Great starter questions and sentence structure

[ChTTay]

Let's not forget that often the first 3-4 questions you get when you meet Chinese people are "Where are you from?" "How long have you been in China?" "What are you doing in China/why are you in China?" And "Are you married?"

These are just one step away from "What's your name?" But are all worth knowing as an absolute beginner. These questions and answers are the first things I learned when I moved here and I plenty of practice answering them. Pretty much every taxi, shop and restaurant I went in for the first month in Yinchuan was asking me one or more. They'd throw in other questions but, at that time, I'd be pretty lost unless they were asking how old I was or where I lived.

[rayne]

Forum question: Are there supposed to be no quote buttons on this forum? If I quote, I'll have to do it manually but copy and pasting other people's posts, is that right? 

 

 

It sounds like the textbook you were using for Korean was just a bad textbook. I'd suggest that the best solution is not to scrap textbook learning entirely, but to make sure you start out with one that will give you a good, solid foundation whilst also teaching you in a way that's practical for your needs. If you're finding it's lacking in some aspect (as you certainly will at some point - even the best textbook can never be perfectly tailored to you), that's where you can supplement with other materials and study methods.

 

Actually, I find many Korean learning textbooks very good. Korean is different because there's an alphabet and a "complicated word" isn't harder to learn to write than an "easy" word. For example, "word" is 단어 in Korean and "vocabulary" is 어휘. Many elementary school students don't know the word 어휘 since it's considered a more advanced word for "word" in Korea. The grammar is difficult because of conjugation rules. 

 

 

In principle you're right. However it's pretty much the first question asked when meeting a stranger and even many survival courses start with this kind of crap. I agree however that for survival it's much more useful to start with counting, and asking a lot of question about prices, directions, tickets, times, availability etc etc  and understanding the answers. Depending on the setting also restaurant and hotel conversations are important. Emergencies like doctor/hospital are maybe not high frequency, but it would be good to learn these early on too. Problem is finding a good course that starts with these.

 

Yes, that's what I'm looking for... something more survival based.

 

And I get what everyone's saying about asking for someone's name/job/education/etc. is useful.... but in my opinion, it's only useful to a short point. If that tumblr user's theory or whatever worked it would have been useful on a continuous basis. But looking at all the replies it looks like everyone here doesn't believe it to have much use, if any. I knew already it wouldn't be 100% full proof but I liked the idea and it was kind of what I was looking for when I began researching about studying Chinese. 

 

Again, my struggle comes from finally coming to a place where I felt comfortable with Korean after many obstacles to finding myself to have to start to learn another language. 

 

 

Let's not forget that often the first 3-4 questions you get when you meet Chinese people are "Where are you from?" "How long have you been in China?" "What are you doing in China/why are you in China?" And "Are you married?" 

 

These are just one step away from "What's your name?" But are all worth knowing as an absolute beginner. These questions and answers are the first things I learned when I moved here and I plenty of practice answering them. Pretty much every taxi, shop and restaurant I went in for the first month in Yinchuan was asking me one or more. They'd throw in other questions but, at that time, I'd be pretty lost unless they were asking how old I was or where I lived. 

 

I got these questions a lot in Korea too. Those are fairly "easy" questions but you don't learn that until quite a while down the road when you use a question. 

[Demonic_Duck]

Korean is different because there's an alphabet and a "complicated word" isn't harder to learn to write than an "easy" word. For example, "word" is 단어 in Korean and "vocabulary" is 어휘

 

It's true Chinese lacks an alphabet (or at least, a widely used alphabet - it can of course be written with the Latin alphabet as in pinyin, or with bopomofo/zhuyin fuhao). However, it's not true that high level words are necessarily easier to write than low level words. To use the same example:

 

Word: 单词／單詞 [dāncí]

Vocabulary: 词汇／詞彙 [cíhuì]

 

The word for "vocabulary" actually contains three less strokes in the simplified script versions (left), and only one more in the traditional script versions (right).

 

In fact, after a little research, it appears that the Korean words are both half-cognates with the Mandarin words, with “词／詞” being swapped out for “语／語” [yǔ], which is also a commonly used character in Mandarin.

 

In light of that...

 

Again, my struggle comes from finally coming to a place where I felt comfortable with Korean after many obstacles to finding myself to have to start to learn another language.

 

The very fact that you've learnt Korean already means that you're not quite starting from the beginning. There are a hell of a lot more cognates between Korean and Mandarin than there are between English and Mandarin, and even though they're often pronounced very differently, it should still help you to some extent.

[rayne]

it's not true that high level words are necessarily easier to write than low level words. To use the same example:

 

Word: 单词／單詞 [dāncí]

Vocabulary: 词汇／詞彙 [cíhuì]

 

The word for "vocabulary" actually contains three less strokes in the simplified script versions (left), and only one more in the traditional script versions (right).

 

In fact, after a little research, it appears that the Korean words are both half-cognates with the Mandarin words, with “词／詞” being swapped out for “语／語” [yǔ], which is also a commonly used character in Mandarin.

 

 

 

I'm not sure if I'm not making myself clear enough... What I mean is that Chinese characters don't get more difficult to write (more strokes) as the the words get more difficult (meaning-wise). So I completely agree with what you stated. (I think you may have confused what I said to be the opposite? Which is why you gave that example?) And that's why i tried to explain with my Korean example too, which is similar to Chinese in that more difficult/high-level words aren't harder to write or pronounce than easier words. 

 

Ok, I re-read my post and I can see why it's confusing. I meant that Korean is different because there's an alphabet. But it's similar to Chinese in that Chinese characters in general are pretty hard. 

 

Well, in the first chapter of a Chinese textbook I have, there is "你好吗?" which is pretty easy. But then there's "谢谢", which is pretty complicated, in my opinion. But both are standard introductory words. 

 

For that reason I think it wouldn't be a huge leap - vocabulary wise - to start somewhere else that's more practical for survival Chinese. 

 

Too bad most survival language books are for tourists and are for memorizing sentences and doesn't break down the vocabulary and grammar.

 

I'm thinking about my every day life and I'll need to know things like, "Where is the produce section?" and stuff like that. 

 

Ideally, I'd like something like that to study until I go to Qingdao in March. Then when I'm actually in Qingdao (or 2~3 months before), I'll start from a regular textbook.

 

I just need a sense of security. I studied Korean for about 3 months before I came to Korea but it was pretty useless for everyday stuff. Asking people their names and whatnot didn't real go far. I needed survival language stuff which i wasn't able to learn until this year when the introductory stuff was finally over. I honestly didn't talk much about my hobbies and stuff with Korean friends. With my friends we usually rant about the bad parts of our jobs, talk about fun moments in our jobs, relationships with our S/Os, if the restaurant we posted a picture of on facebook was worth the hype, shared different opinions about some sort of news story, compare our cultures. I couldn't do any of that until this year (except for talking about the news, I can hold my own on the other topics). And thinking about having to go through all that in Chinese is so frustrating which is why i was seeking another method to learn Chinese.

[Demonic_Duck]

Different people's conversational needs are different. I often tend to enjoy talking about more conceptual topics touching on linguistics or philosophy, but then again, I'm up for gossiping about co-workers as much as the next guy (it's a guilty pleasure). It really depends which group of friends I'm with. When I said "areas of interest", I really meant the things you tend to enjoy talking about, and the things you tend to find yourself talking about. So if you meet for badminton with friends once per week, it'll be useful to you to learn how to keep score, how to check whether the ball was out, words for "shuttlecock" and "racket" etc. If you like to talk about "if the restaurant [you] posted a picture of on facebook was worth the hype", you'll need to learn words to describe the taste of food, the atmosphere in a place, the quality of service etc.

 

Once again, I'd urge you to seek out language exchanges to help you with this, whether online or in person.

 

As for your textbook(s), if you're finding a specific chapter to be largely irrelevant for your needs, there's nothing to stop you from just skimming through it or skipping it entirely (I'm assuming you're self-studying). You can always come back to it later. Textbooks rarely follow a completely linear path from chapter to chapter such that skipping a chapter or two here and there will cause you massive comprehension problems in the next one.

[Shelley]

你好吗, 谢谢

 

I am sure i would consider hello/how are you and thank you worth learning.

 

How do you know what you will need? As Demonic_Duck says you can skim through lessons you don't feel you need. You can also pick and choose what characters to learn to write, but I would suggest learning characters at least so you can recognise them and use a chinese input method on a computer or smartphone. Good text books usually present new words in a certain order for good reasons that may not be obvious at first.

 

Not sure why there is such resistance to use a text book and giving yourself the best possible chance, after all you have a reasonable amount of time(10 months approx) before you actually go to china, so why not spend that time learning as much as possible rather than just what you think you might need.

[rayne]

 

 

I am sure i would consider hello/how are you and thank you worth learning.

 

Oh my goodness, I am really not clear am I? it must be me since everyone keeps misinterpreting me. I was just saying that 你好吗 and 谢谢 are both introductory words but 谢谢 is significantly more difficult (to write) than 你好吗 so learning something more complicated wouldn't be a huge stretch when it comes to Chinese. Hope it's clear now. 

 

And I wrote a LOOOT about why I want to try an alternative method rather than a textbook. I am not AGAINST textbooks, I enjoy self-studying from textbooks. But I am from Canada living in Korea and I had the experience of what I studied being more or less useful.

 

I know maybe 99% of this forum uses textbooks so I hope it doesn't feel like I'm insulting the usage of textbooks O_o I like textbooks! I am learning from multiple different Korean textbooks because I like them so much and I like using a variety. But for Chinese, I just wanted to find an alternative method based on my experience withlearning Korean. 

[rayne]

(Hope I'm not sounding rude, either by the way. Just frustrated that I'm being misinterpreted a lot. I think my posts are too long X_x ) 

[ChTTay]

I'd just accept that there isn't a really worthwhile alternative for you, as a beginner.

Start using your IC textbook, get Pleco and a buy a good dictionary add-on to help you review. As suggested above, try find a language exchange (or tutor or class) so you can learn tones correctly from the off. If you don't want to just use textbooks all the time then supplement that with some graded readers. You could also check out Chinese music. TV might be hard now but worth dipping into it as you progress.

Job done. Forget the 200 word tumblr thingy. Good luck.

[rayne]

Ok, will do. I Thanks!

[Demonic_Duck]

The very fact that you've learnt Korean already means that you're not quite starting from the beginning. There are a hell of a lot more cognates between Korean and Mandarin than there are between English and Mandarin, and even though they're often pronounced very differently, it should still help you to some extent.

 

I mentioned this today to my teacher (who lived, studied and taught in Korea for a while), and she said the percentage of words in Korean with Chinese cognates is something like 70%. This book gives a slightly lower estimate of about 60%, which is still huge. I'd suggest capitalising on this and using it to strengthen your memory of new words you learn in Mandarin by trying to find Korean cognates for them. This will generally be a case of educated guesswork, but all you'll need is some form of Korean dictionary (electronic or otherwise) which also provides the Hanja to check whether your hunches are right or not.

[Demonic_Duck]

Regarding the original blog posts you were looking at, though don't think the articles themselves are particularly valuable, the point they're angling at (that you can express a surprisingly large variety of things with a relatively small vocabulary and a decent understanding of basic grammar) is perfectly valid. Here's an exercise you can try with your language exchange partner once you move beyond elementary level and already have a somewhat sizeable vocabulary to work with (200 words probably won't cut it, but try when you get to around 1,000): take your list of newly learnt words and have your exchange partner describe them to with simple Chinese vocabulary. Your task is to guess which word s/he's describing. Then switch roles (you describe and s/he guesses), and have him/her correct your descriptions if it seems you haven't fully understood the meaning of the word. The idea is that you get used to describing words and concepts in this way, and in future you'll be able to use the same technique to describe concepts you haven't learnt before, prompting your interlocutor to ask, "oh, you mean ____, right?", thus expanding your expressive ability as well as your ability to learn new words "in the wild".