Jin Tian shi xing qi er, er ling yi er nian, qi yue, san hao. Ming tian shi qi yue si hao!
That’s right. I’m learning Mandarin. This says that today is Tuesday, July 3, 2012, and tomorrow is July 4th! It’s written in pinyin, which is an English way of writing in Mandarin. If you look at the subway sign below, you can see that most text here is written in characters and pinyin, which shows how to pronounce the characters. And if you’re lucky, signs like this one are also written in English.
In just two lessons, I’ve learned how to say lots of useful phrases, such as “bu la” if I want to tell a waiter not to make my dish spicy, or “Wo shi mei guo ren” if someone is wondering where I am from. I can also ask for dumplings (jiaozi), OJ (cheng zhi), or noodles (miantiao). It’s very exciting!
Anyway, unfortunately my Mandarin is not strong enough for me to use to write about my day, but here are a few photos of one of the highlights, paddle boating on a lake called Hou Hai, in the Hutong Area. It was really nice.
Categories: China
Innovation on Earth 
This looks like fun!!!!
You’re a fast learner for Chinese Pinyin Ms. Krakauer!! It’s almost all correct in the beginning, but instead of “liu” which is “6”, it’s “qi” which is “7”. (For June and July.) But otherwise, it’s all correct!
The dumplings and noodles’s Pinyin were correct!! But you should change the OJ (orange juice, right?) part.
Instead of “cheng zhu”, you need to change the “u” in “zhu” to “i”, making it “zhi”. Then, if you want to be more exact, there are 4 different sounds in each Chinese word. I can’t really explain it here in my comment, so I’ll just show you.
For example:
For the OJ one, add the number “2” to “cheng”, making it “cheng2”. then add the number “1” to “zhi”, making it “zhi1”.
You can ask your teacher for more information.
Finally, I love your pictures of your trip in Hou Hai!! They’re beautiful. I remember when I went there with my mom. We saw a man fishing, and he caught a HUGE fish!!
Did you see anyone fishing? Wasn’t it fun to paddle in the boat on the water? Did you see any ducks or geese?
Best Wishes!!
😉 ~ Anna
Thanks for the tips, Anna. I will fix these. And yes, we saw a few fish, but no ducks. Very fun to paddle!
its really cool that you’re learning Chinese Ms.Krakauer! I was trying to learn Chinese calligraphy, but it’s really hard!
It also looks really fun to go in a paddle boat in china!
Wow! It must be fun to learn Mandarin! The pics are also amazing! 🙂
You’re learning fast! I was just wondering what is that building in the 1st and 3rd pic? Have fun on your trip! 🙂 😀