After 10 years in China

[ouyangjun]

After 10 years in China I have relocated back to the USA.  I want to make sure I keep my mandarin skills and am looking for groups or a place to find groups of people where we can speak mandarin.  I’m living in the Seattle area.  Any suggestions on the best places to find a mandarin speaking group (meetup, others?)?

 

Thanks!

[Flickserve]

Badminton clubs

[happy_hyaena]

Seems like Seattle has lots of opportunities for you:

 

https://www.meetup.com/find/?allMeetups=false&keywords=Chinese&radius=10&userFreeform=Seattle%2C+Washington%2C+USA&mcId=c98101&change=yes&sort=recommended&eventFilter=mysugg

[大块头]

I volunteer at my local senior center teaching English to Mandarin-speakers. It's been a lot easier than trying to coordinate schedules every week with a language exchange partner.

[ouyangjun]

21 hours ago, Flickserve said:

Badminton clubs

The first time I played badminton in China I got smoked so bad I never stepped foot on court again.  It was a traumatizing experience for someone who is highly competitive.  So I guess this one is ruled out for me.

 

[DavyJonesLocker]

34 minutes ago, ouyangjun said:

The first time I played badminton in China I got smoked so bad I never stepped foot on court again.  It was a traumatizing experience for someone who is highly competitive.  So I guess this one is ruled out for me

 

Haha same here. I got thrashed by a 50kg 20yo lady. Even at 6'3" ,  96kg and pretty fit I hadn't a chance. I decided to use brute force but was pointless. 

Then later on I walloped by a 50 yo 5'4". woman with a bad leg 

 

That was a day off shame. 

 

How is your Chinese after 10 years of being here?

[imron]

51 minutes ago, ouyangjun said:

The first time I played badminton in China I got smoked so bad I never stepped foot on court again.

How will you ever improve if you never practise?

[Flickserve]

1 hour ago, ouyangjun said:

The first time I played badminton in China I got smoked so bad I never stepped foot on court again.  It was a traumatizing experience for someone who is highly competitive.  So I guess this one is ruled out for me.

 

A competitive person not going back to try again??

 

Missing a lot of chinese language practice opportunities. ?  (and exercise!)

[Flickserve]

Just to add, I play badminton. 

 

I like to take my my gear with me travelling and playing. It’s easy to meet people and get talking to them with badminton. It’s a very popular sport amongst Asians and the Chinese subgroup. 

[abcdefg]

On 3/8/2019 at 1:59 PM, Flickserve said:

It’s easy to meet people and get talking to them with badminton. It’s a very popular sport amongst Asians and the Chinese subgroup. 

 

Another forum member had similar positive comments about ping pong. (I've forgotten the member's name, but I recall that he switched from Mandarin to Cantonese a few years ago.) 

[imron]

@querido

[querido]

Here was the relevant post about ping pong: https://www.chinese-forums.com/forums/topic/44484-chinese-learning-via-ping-pong/?do=findComment&comment=332679

 

Those new friends I spoke of five years ago are still with me, and we're still playing ping pong too.

(No, I never said that rummy is *better* than mahjong. I just suggested that we try it, taught them, and they became addicted. ?)

 

And, here's some ping pong vocabulary: https://www.chinese-forums.com/forums/topic/10990-ping-pong-vocabulary-乒乓球词汇/?do=findComment&comment=84637

[abcdefg]

After my own ten plus years in China, I wholeheartedly agree with the wisdom of others that finding people with whom to be friends flows naturally from pursuing mutually enjoyable activities, and conversation (language learning) flows naturally from engaging in those activities together.

 

Early on, when I first arrived in China, I read advice suggesting to tackle the issue of learning Chinese the other way around. Namely by seeking language partners with whom to practice conversation. Often these relationships foundered because the native speaker and I lacked common interests, didn't have sufficient common ground. 

 

 

[DavyJonesLocker]

2 hours ago, abcdefg said:

Early on, when I first arrived in China, I read advice suggesting to tackle the issue of learning Chinese the other way around. Namely by seeking language partners with whom to practice conversation. Often these relationships foundered because the native speaker and I lacked common interests, didn't have sufficient common ground. 

 

Same experience, just never had any luck with it. It has to be natural in my view otherwise it feels "forced".