Tones part 2

In the last post I explained what's with the pronunciation  of the tones. Now let's talk about the differences that these lovely tones bring once you get them  wrong :) . And you will  , you can be sure of that :) but as I learned from my own experience the most embarrassing mistakes are your best teacher :)
Tones change the meaning of the word and it also changes the character it will sound almost the same ( to a newbie it will sound the same ) but the character and the meaning are going to be totally different , you have here an example :

Now imagine calling the ''mother'' of a friend a ''horse'', or instead of saying a horse you swear :))))) 

Tones are not an easy obstacle to overcome , but not impossible. I find it easy to learn a new word and   not mix up its tone by repeating it the moment I learn for about 30 times out loud and that does the trick ;)                                                                                                                                                       

                                                                                                                                            

Tones

TONES

Let's talk about tones......the bit that makes Chinese so God Damn difficult :) the bit that gives you nightmares :)) Mandarin or the north dialect and also the official language in China had 4 tones .Some say that it actually has 5 the fifth one being the toneless one. I say there are 4 tones. Tones get attached to almost every character. Now to make it clear for you ''words'' in Chinese can have 1,2 or 3 characters. For ex: 花 has one character and it means ''flower'', 水果 has 2 characters and it means ''fruits'', 洗衣机 has 3 characters and it means ''washing machine''.
Let's take 水果 ; it has 2 characters 水（ 3rd tone) and 果( 3rd tone). So each character gets a tone except a few which are toneless.
Now bellow you have a picture of how tones in Chinese look like and a reference for each to know how to pronounce it :

• Now let's take the 1st one : it sound like the sound you make when you say Ahhhh... so it long . 
• The 2nd one  it sounds like the sound you make when you ask What? ...just say What out loud and take the sound you hear and attach it to every character that has a 2nd tone.                                      
• The 3rd one sounds like the sound you make when you say Well.... it's long   with high and low pitched fluctuation in the sound                                                                                                    
• The 4th one, the one I say perfectly cause I tend to get angry easily it sounds the same as the sound you make when you say No! , it's short                                                                           

 Don't get scared, if you get a teacher and you practice each and every one of them for like 30 times you'll get it :)
My Chinese friends told me foreigners always mix up a tone or two once in a while but they understand from the context so as long as you are able to pronounce the Pinyin right they will get it. My advice is ask someone to pronounce it and you repeat after him/her 30 times that way the brain gets familiar with the pronunciation of that character and you won't think of the tone so much .  Don't get stuck in the tone phase even if you make mistakes in the beginning you will correct them in time.
Just give your best .....and keep going !!!! You'll get there!!

下次见
See you next time !!

Introduction into the world of Chinese

Ok people , after 8 years of Chinese here is what I managed to wrap my head around :)
Chinese is difficult like crazy ( it really is) I am not joking but it is so interesting and so different that everything else that you will just fall for it. We had something that we said to all the new Rockies who came to Beijing ,, you will love or you will hate it , you do not stay in between, you might learn to tolerate it but never love it :) ) I LOVED it , still do :) ( don't get me wrong I loved it but still hit my head on the wall a dozen times or so )
Now back on Chinese :) you need to be honest with yourself  , do you really want to learn it , cause it's not going to be easy, you will have to literally glue your butt to the chair at your desk every day and memorize a bunch of characters. They won't make any sense in the beginning, and I am not even gonna start talking about tones, Chinese has 4, you change the 1 into 4 and you will swear instead of saying ''mum'', Different are the sounds as well , you get one wrong you might tell you friend that she is a'' pretty cow'' instead of a'' pretty woman''.......yeah not nice.....:) I actually said once that I was a ''cow ''not a ''woman''......laughing so loud now !!!!!
So people, please believe me it's difficult you will have to go through the whole process of learning and memorizing by heart how to write step by step , the tones and the pronunciation. I am not trying to scare you just give you a heads up :) If you do manage to hold on and stay fast the feeling you get after you memorize your first few hundred characters and your basic conversation.....it's ......complete pride and awesomeness :)
Chinese it's very difficult but NOT impossible to learn, you just need to be stubborn like a mule and not give up. It's worth it , so worth it!!!!
VERY IMPORTANT GET A TEACHER WHO IS PATIENT AND NICE ..........Chinese will seem way less difficult :)
晚安
Good night !!

Why Chinese ?

Most of the people are asking me why Chinese and how did Chinese help me ?I will try to answer those question as best as I can :)
Why Chinese?
I always wanted to do something special with my life.I grew up in the country side where people are not as nice as you would think. I was put down by people who didn't really knew me or accepted me , by teachers who were supposed to help me reach my potential.....instead they said I was a mediocre , I will never do anything special or important because ,'',.....She is hard working but not smart enough.....''. So I decided to show every single one of them that if I want to ,I can do anything I want . And boy I AM STUBBORN , I won't take no for an answer. With tons of ups and downs with hours and hours of encouragement from my mom I did it. I am a teacher ...... My kids love me ....just ask them, I will never do to them what my teachers did to me ( I do have to thank 2 very special teachers who gave me wings when the others were trying to cut them off : My Romanian teacher from middle school Mrs Sofia Anton and Mrs Tomescu, my biology teacher, thank you ladies you are awesome). So Why Chinese................ because I wanted to be awesome. Passion came after....:)
How did Chinese help me become who I am ?
Oh boy .......for foreign languages junkies like me the answer is not difficult to understand . A foreign language changes the way you see the world, the way you analyse a problem , it even changes your personality . And Chinese ......my God changes you completely. I see what other people don't, I understand a ton more than many of them about this world., And I am more understanding than the majority........I got to see so many different situations and so many results that everything forces you to really look at a problem from all angles before you  pass a judgement . I had so many friends from so many cultures and they all imprinted a little bit of them and their culture on me . I had such an amazing time and I know I was spoiled , amazing people like that come only once in a lifetime . ( I will talk more about them later). So culture changes your way of seeing things and ;language changes your way of thinking. It is scientifically proven that learning a new language opens new synapses in your brain.....in my brain it was a Chinese New Year Celebration!!!!!!!!!(you need to be there to fully understand what that means :)  ) I get people telling me that I see things completely different than they do ......well my darlings that is all Chinese .....;) . And I do get a nice sum of money every month for using it :)
Curious about anything ??? ask away ;)