Introduction

Globalization has made familiarity with other people, cultures, and languages not only preferable but also essential in the 21st century. With the help of the Internet, reaching out and touching someone on the other side of the earth has become as easy as clicking a mouse or using a smartphone. And yet nothing quite beats the excitement of a face-to-face encounter with someone who hails from the other side of the globe in his or her own language. Communication in cyberspace doesn’t even come close.

Whether you’re an inveterate traveler, going overseas for business, about to study overseas, interested in frequenting Chinatown, befriending a Chinese-speaking classmate or coworker, or just plain curious about China, Chinese For Dummies, 2nd Edition, can help you get acquainted with enough Chinese to carry on a decent conversation on any number of topics. You won’t become fluent instantly, of course, but this book helps you greet a stranger, buy a plane ticket, and order some food. It also gives you some invaluable cultural tips so that you can not only rattle off those newly acquired words and phrases but also back them up with the right behavior at the right time.

I designed this book to help guide you toward the successful use of one of the most difficult languages on earth. Chinese should also just be plain fun to learn.

About This Book

The good news is that you can use Chinese For Dummies, 2nd Edition, anytime, anywhere. No mandatory class sessions, no exams, and no homework assignments to dread. Need to get to a new city for a business meeting? Just turn to the chapter on travel to find out how to buy a plane ticket, get through customs, and get to the airport on time. Have to make a sudden trip to the doctor? Turn to the chapter on your health and figure out in advance how to tell your caregivers exactly what ails you.

The beauty of this book is that it can be all things to all people. You don’t have to memorize Chapter 5 before moving on to Chapter 6 if what Chapter 6 deals with is what you really need. Each chapter provides you with different bits of information about the Chinese language and highlights different parts of Chinese grammar. Read as much or as little as you want, as quickly or as slowly as you like. Whatever interests you is what you should focus on. And remember: You’re discovering a language that simultaneously represents one of the world’s oldest civilizations and one of its fastest growing economies in the 21st century.

Conventions Used in This Book

Pay attention to a few conventions that can help you navigate this book’s contents:

Chinese terms are set in boldface to make them stand out.

Pronunciations and meanings appear in parentheses immediately after the Chinese terms. The English translations are in italics.

This book uses the pīnyīn 拼音 (pin-yin) (Literally: spelling the way it sounds) Romanization system of Chinese words. What does that mean? Well, if you go to China, you see signs in Chinese characters all around, but if you look for something in English, you may be hard pressed to find it. Whatever signs you see in Roman letters will be of pīnyīn, the Romanization system developed by the Communists in the 1950s, so seeing pīnyīn in this book is good practice for you.

In this edition of Chinese For Dummies, Chinese characters have been added in many places and appear after the initial transliteration from the pīnyīn. Chinese characters are fun to try to decipher. The Chinese have been working at precisely that for thousands of years, especially for the more complicated characters that took as many as 20 separate strokes of the traditional Chinese writing brush to create.

Lucky for you, many of the more complicated Chinese characters were simplified in the early 20th century to make them easier to read and write, and these are used in mainland China today. (You can read more about Chinese characters in Chapter 2.) The original (or traditional) characters are still used in Taiwan. In this book, simplified characters appear first, followed in parentheses by the traditional characters. Characters that were never simplified don’t have any separate notation in parentheses.

Another thing you should keep in mind as you begin to understand Chinese is that many of the English translations you see in this book aren’t exactly literal. Knowing the gist of what you hear or see is more important than knowing what individual words in any given phrase mean. For example, the Chinese phrase meaning so-so literally translates as horse horse tiger tiger even though you’re not actually talking about animals. Whenever I give a literal translation, I preface it with “Literally.”

The following elements in this book help reinforce the new terms and phrases you’re studying:

Talkin’ the Talk dialogues: Nothing beats seeing and hearing an actual conversation to learn Chinese, so I intersperse dialogues throughout the book under the heading “Talkin’ the Talk.” They show you the Chinese words, the pronunciations, and the English translations, and I often put cultural do’s and don’ts into context, which should come in handy. Many of these dialogues appear in the accompanying audio tracks so you can practice the sentences after you hear how they should sound. With the tonal nature of the Chinese language, this feature is indispensable as you learn Chinese.

Words to Know blackboards: These boxes come after the Talkin’ the Talk dialogues and highlight important words from each dialogue.

Fun & Games activities: Working through word games can be a fun way to review the words and phrases you encounter in each chapter. This element is a great way to gauge your progress and tease your brain at the same time. Look for these activities at the end of each chapter.

Foolish Assumptions

Some of the foolish assumptions I made about you while writing Chinese For Dummies, 2nd Edition, are that

You don’t know any Chinese, except for maybe a couple of words you picked up from a good kung-fu movie or the word tofu, which you picked up while grocery shopping.

Your goal in life isn’t to become an interpreter of Chinese at the U.N.; you just want to pick up some useful words, phrases, and sentence constructions to make yourself understood in a Chinese-speaking environment.

You have no intention of spending hours and hours memorizing Chinese vocabulary and grammar patterns.

You basically want to have fun while speaking a little Chinese.

How This Book Is Organized

This book is divided by topic into parts, chapters, and appendixes. Each part focuses on one aspect of the Chinese language, and the chapters cover different useful topics, such as how to dine at a restaurant, how to handle emergencies, or how to plan a vacation. The following sections tell you what types of information you can expect to find in each part.

Part I: Getting Started

This part familiarizes you with some basics of Chinese: how to pronounce words, how to create the proper pitch (also known as tone) for each word, and so on. Because Chinese is a tonal language, if you pronounce a word with an incorrect tone, you may say a whole different word. Sometimes the only way to know whether you’ve said something you didn’t intend is by the look on the listener’s face, so you should pay particular attention to the tones as you speak.

Part II: Chinese in Action

In this part, you really begin to use Chinese. Instead of focusing strictly on grammar, this part helps guide you through everyday situations that you encounter while meeting people, eating at restaurants, going shopping, or yakking on the phone.

Part III: Chinese on the Go

This part of the book gives you the tools you need to use Chinese in any number of practical real-world settings. You find out how to change money, how to ask for directions, how to book a room at a hotel, and how to tell a doctor what ails you. Whether your travels take you all the way to Shanghai or just to your cubicle at work is up to you.

Part IV: The Part of Tens

This part begins with some tips on how to learn Chinese quickly, and it offers reminders of what not to do in a Chinese setting.

Part V: Appendixes

This part contains helpful references that you may want to refer to occasionally as you snoop through the rest of the chapters. Appendix A is a handy mini-dictionary of both Chinese to English and English to Chinese. Feel free to check this section when you encounter unfamiliar words on a need-to-know basis. Appendix B contains a useful verb list, which can help in any setting. Appendix C provides a list of the audio tracks that come with this book. This appendix comes in handy when you’re ready to hear a selection of the Talkin’ the Talk dialogues from the book. Finally, Appendix D contains the answers to the Fun & Games exercises at the end of each chapter.

Icons Used in This Book

Cute little icons occasionally appear in the left-hand margins, next to sidebars, and with the Talkin’ the Talk dialogues throughout this book. These beacons shed light on what kind of information you’re looking at and can help you locate certain types of information in a hurry. The six icons used in this book are as follows:

The bull’s-eye appears wherever I’ve highlighted a great idea to help make your study of Chinese easier.

This icon, appropriately showing a string around a finger, should serve as a reminder about particularly important information concerning Chinese.

The bomb in this icon should act as a stop sign in your mind. It warns you about things to avoid saying or doing so that you don’t make a fool of yourself overseas or with a new Chinese-speaking acquaintance.

This icon clues you in on fascinating bits of information about China and Chinese culture. Knowledge of a culture goes hand in hand with knowledge of a foreign language, so these icons help light the way as you embark on your journey.

This icon highlights various rules of grammar that may be out of the norm. Even though this book doesn’t focus primarily on grammar, your successful execution of the language can only be enhanced by paying attention to little grammatical rules as they pop up.

The audio tracks that come with this book give you the chance to hear native Chinese speakers so you can better understand the way Chinese really sounds. This opportunity proves especially helpful because of all the tones you have to keep in mind. This icon indicates the basic sounds and Talkin’ the Talk dialogues you can find in these tracks. Note: If you’re reading this text in an electronic format, please go to the table of contents for access to the additional content.

Where to Go from Here

Chinese is often considered one of the toughest languages in the world to master. Don’t worry. The good news is that you’re not trying to master it. All you want to do is be understandable when you open your mouth so that you don’t ask for the men’s room when you really want the ladies’ room. All you have to do now is keep listening to and repeating the words and phrases you find in this book. Turn to whichever chapter piques your curiosity, listen to the accompanying audio tracks at home or in your car, and keep practicing your favorite Chinese phrases when you’re with your family and friends in Chinatown.