Languages I Have Learned—Episode 3: Mandarin Chinese (Part 1)

 

 

   Some could pick up languages quickly, like a brand-new tool, and use it immediately, while others, like myself, had to build the craft just to communicate, whether verbally or in writing. For those of you who are still learning, keep learning and see the small rewards you find along the way—a smile returned with a greeting, a flurry of words that are a progressing conversation, or just an odd look.

    After learning French for three years in junior high, I signed up for another year of French in high school, until I discovered Mandarin Chinese. In high school, I had Chinese friends whom we sat in the hallways in front of our lockers during lunch time and played card games. During these games, Chinese (Cantonese) bubbled from our conversations to the point I felt left out. Being Asian, I guess the group was so comfortable with another Asian that they forget I am an Asian who does not speak the same language.

    In another situation, I have heard some think that Japanese, Chinese, and Korean are all the same. Unfortunately, they are all different languages. When you ask a Japanese speaker what it says on the cover of a Chinese magazine, for example, it is like asking an English-speaker if they could read Russian because it had Romanized lettering similar to the English alphabet (for those who know; they use Cyrillic letters which look like the English alphabet but have distinct sounds for the letters). Or, when you ask a Japanese-speaker, while watching a Korean drama, what they are saying, it is like asking a Dutch person to translate a French dialogue.

    Much like these examples, I have thought that if I learned Mandarin Chinese, I could communicate with my Chinese friends; however, I learned that there are more than one Chinese language—and Mandarin Chinese is one of them. The language that my friends spoke was Cantonese (commonly used by Hong Kong Chinese). Mandarin Chinese is the most common dialect, that standardized form of Chinese used in China, Taiwan, and Singapore. The difference in not just in the languages, but also in the writing (Mandarin uses simplified Chinese characters while Cantonese uses traditional Chinese characters). It was until I learned Mandarin Chinese that I understood these differences.

    If you ask me how my Mandarin learning went, I did well—better than French (sorry, Francophones). I would like to say that my knowledge of kanji (Chinese characters used in Japanese) helped.

    For now, I will say that I was glad about my decision to expand my language borders by learning another language.

Languages I Have Learned—Episode 2: French

 

French is one of the two national languages in Canada.

I took French in junior high because I thought that was what a good Canadian student should learn in school. Sadly, my language learning for French continued until the first month in high school, but that’s another story.

During the time I learned the language, I felt I would not be hard thanks to the daily exposure of French programs on TV during my childhood (thank you, CBC). Sadly, it was not as simple as I thought.

First, French was very different from English; and second, I had trouble getting the pronunciations right.

I remember while studying linguistics (the study of how languages work) in university, learning a second language uses the knowledge of one language. In my case, I had two languages that I used (Japanese and English) to build towards learning a new language—in this case, French. What I have later learned, but not mentioned in linguistics, is that the earlier languages interfere with language learning.

For example, I was trying to remember my lines for a French dialogue. When I look at the original French, I want to make sure I understand the content of the dialogue, so I learn the meaning (in English) and then remember the lines in French. Then comes the part about the pronunciation. Some sounds exist in English (the French word for cat is “chat” where “ch” has a “sh” sound) where I note making specific sounds in a French word. By the time I was ready and stood before my teacher to do my French dialogue, the content is now in English with a smattering of French words and some Japanese phrases thrown in (I don’t know how those got in there, but they were there!). Then, upon seeing my blank face, my kind and very patient French teacher would encourage me to go back and review the dialogue in French again.

Despite those confusing and interrupting episodes, I have miraculously completed my French classes with a passing mark; and many years later, able to use simple phrases and even recognize some French word on a label during my travels.

The point of this entry? Yes, there will be interferences from previously learned languages when learning a new one; and no, not all language learning is for everyone (of which I will talk about much later in detail). Some languages are easier to learn (as I will talk about in my next entry) while some are hard to adapt. In conclusion, it is good to learn or try different languages, perhaps you could find one that is easier to apply.

Languages I Have Learned—Episode 1: Japanese

 

Being immigrants from Japan, my parents spoke Japanese at home; because we lived in an English-speaking country, my mother was worried about communicating with her children in Canada, so she had us attend a Japanese language school provided by the local Japanese community once a week.

The assignments from the language school were hard. We learned hiragana (the Japanese letters), katakana (Japanese letters used for words foreign to Japanese), and kanji (Chinese characters used in Japanese). We learned reading, writing, poetry (both traditional haiku, tanka and other forms), folklore, and essay writing. Because the community school used a curriculum according to the ones used in Japan, during Christmas and summer vacation we had homework (I could still remember how my Canadian friends from school looked at me weird when I mentioned I had to do homework during summer vacation).

The work was hard growing up, being different and learning something that others did not; but looking back, I recall I did not hate it as much as I thought I would. Yes, there was homework; double the amount if you count the ones I brought home from my local Canadian school. Yes, at the school they strictly enforced us not to speak English, even if we did, we got scolded for doing so, which was the extent of the punishment.

Despite of all the challenges and hard work involved, I would not trade it for anything else. It was a legacy that I polished for my family, knowing that one day I would use that language skill when I go to Japan or help others with Japanese. And those days came when I travelled to Japan to visit relatives, translated for Japanese visitors who visited Canada, and enjoyed Japanese novels, movies, and music.

Languages I Have Learned—Prologue

   Five years ago, I created a bucket list for myself. Of the things I listed, one of them was to learn a new (or previously studied) language. On the bucket list I wrote “learn one or more of the following languages” followed by a list of what languages I wanted to try: Hebrew, Urdu, Arabic, Greek, Korean, an indigenous language (Cree, Dene, Inuktitut, etc.), Russian, Turkish, and Swahili. Then threw in other languages I have studied (to some measure) that I would like to pick up again: French and Mandarin Chinese.

The languages I have studied, experienced, or even attempted to use were Japanese, French, Mandarin Chinese, Mongolian, Bengali, and Hebrew. In this next series, I will talk about the languages I have studied.

I hope it would be an encouragement for those who are learning a new language or struggling with the one they use in their everyday lives.