Photo: David Boté Estrada / CC BY-ND 2.0
Discover the beauty of Chinese culture, with one of my courses.
嗨,你好吗?(Hi, how are you?)
Thinking of learning Chinese? The Mandarin Studio could be a good start.
I grew up in a bilingual environment where my first language is English and my mother tongue Chinese. This is due to Singapore adopting a bilingual education policy where English is taught as a first language in schools and our mother tongue as a second language. English to me, is like my bridge to the world; and Chinese, a connection to my roots.
I love books, music and films, and could shut myself in the cinema or bury myself in a book all day – fascinated by the characters and landscapes unfolding before me. Knowing two languages intimately serves me well – as I was able to access a vast body of literature and media programmes in both languages.
On top of that, this devouring of the media actually helped me with the simultaneous learning of both languages. I learnt a whole lot of vocabulary, accents, expressions from dramas, films, pop songs, books and magazines – the better I get with the language, the more I could understand the characters and stories I love – which made me even more eager to learn.
In the case of Chinese, It helps too that I was a student correspondent with Chinese paper Lianhe Zaobao when I was 16. The experience of writing for the paper sharpened my Chinese writing skills, and bonded me with a group of predominantly Chinese speaking media professionals. I later went on to be a radio presenter in Chinese – my first job after graduation.
For me, learning Chinese is one of discovery and exploration, where you can choose to learn from a range of activities that you enjoy – and discover yourself, and a whole new culture in the process. Pick your favourite medium, and dive into it. Immerse, express, practice and create.
That’s basically what we will be doing – if you decide to embark on a Mandarin journey with me.
准备好了吗?(Are you ready?)