I am not speaking nor comprehending Chinese as well as I initially hoped I would as I stand here at the seven month marker looking backwards. I can cruelly belittle myself over this fact, but like most people, I can also forgive myself with liberal leniency. (I love myself too much to stay mad for long.) But I think it’s beneficial for me to look over these last few months, admit where I have woefully (and willfully) embraced the path to certain forms of failure, and also realize the little victories which goad me on more than anything else.
I’m not a natural at languages. I know this because I still don’t understand 98% of the (Mandarin) conversations I hear about town. I think part of this is due to my profound love for English, and my years of reading, writing, and reveling in it. English is pretty easy to get fairly ‘good’ at, and maybe that’s why I am. But as for how this relates to Chinese, it’s a bit of a depressing story. I filter the Chinese language through the English language, which is natural and common, but also a practice which I most vehemently do not recommend. Chinese is abundant in shapes and sizes which will not fit through that filter. Not on your life! I admire and envy those individuals who never ever think of Chinese in terms of English. They are the few (the happy few!) who can see them as separate entities, and aren’t even tempted to combine them. (That’s why complete immersion is so beneficial when it comes to learning a language. You don’t have someone telling you the definition in your mother tongue. It’s much easier to realize that a tree is actually a “shu” when “shu” is the only word for tree that you hear. In fact, it’s the same method used for learning your mother tongue. Novel, I say. Novel.) I am still at the point where everything I am taught is immediately shoved through that English filter. Maybe gradually it will dissipate. I hope so, and I’ll let you know if it does.
It’s not just that I love English so intensely, but also that I don’t love Chinese enough. When my three hour class is over, I’m ready do something other than continue to study Chinese. Many people I know will go home and review all afternoon. I haven’t devoted myself to Chinese like I should have, but that was and has been a conscious decision all along. I’m not ready for it to be my life. I am enjoying Shanghai, my new apartment, tutoring Chinese people in English, cooking, reading really smart people’s blogs, watching TED videos, meeting other foreigners, listening to music, volunteering, going to church, Bible study, and yes, reading books in English. Maybe I should drop all those things and study Chinese like mad, but that sounds a bit dreadful, to be honest. I also value my “alone time” a little too much, and to think of spending time with giggly, girly Chinese females after a three hour class and a two hour tutoring session sends me cowering into a corner. (I really love Chinese girls, don’t misunderstand me. They are adorable, petite, pretty, cuddly, emotional, pouty, and crazy about shopping. These are all very cute attributes in their way, but I think the fact that the adjectives I would use to describe myself are extraordinarily different makes it harder for me to devote myself to serious friendships. On a related note, these listed attributes are the very ones that make it so easy for Western men to find immense satisfaction in spending time with Chinese girls.) But spending time with Chinese people is the sure-fire way to learn the language, so I better get started. (Western men are on to something.)
Not only am I not spending enough time with Chinese people, but when I do spend time with them, they frequently slip into Shanghainese. Despite China being very close in size to the U.S., it not only has many different actual languages, but even local dialects that sound nothing like Mandarin. One of these dialects is Shanghainese. Part of me is secretly pleased when Shanghainese is spoken in my hearing because it gives me an excuse to be ignorant. Another part of me realizes that this complicates things even more, and straining my ears to catch the “Mandarin” conversation that is actually a Shanghainese conversation frustrates me. The other day I was in an interview at the language agency I work for, and I was mystified when they all began talking in what I thought was Mandarin. Later the client asked “Ni hui shuo Shanghaihua ma?” (“Can you speak Shanghainese?”) He went on to tell me that that is what they had been speaking in the interview. I began laughing and answered “Bu hui!” (“I can’t!”) I was also tempted to say, “In case you haven’t noticed, my Mandarin is in dire straits, so why even bother to ask if I can speak a local dialect??”
This will be my last excuse, I promise. Chinese is (arguably) the most difficult language to master. There’s a brilliant article circling the web that says it better than I could ever hope to. If you haven’t seen it, here you are: http://www.pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html Please take a moment to read this. I like that the author is a master of Chinese, and yet still admits to its outrageous complexity. The few foreigners I’ve met who have pretty well mastered the language tend to downplay the complexities, therefore making us weak, feeble-minded students struggling to gain a footing feel that much weaker and feebler. (They say things like, “we have similar stupid grammar rules in English,” or “English has two words for that too.” Don’t listen to them. Chinese is harder.)
This post has been a lot of bad news, and a lot of my weaknesses have been exposed. But there is a bit of good news. I sit next to an intoxicatingly adorable Japanese lady in class (if I was male that would be even better news!), and due to her lack of English fluency, we converse entirely in Mandarin. And that doesn’t just mean saying hello and goodbye to each other. We have formed a wonderful, warm, conversation-packed relationship, and I know many facts about her life, all of which I learned through the use of Mandarin (and a photograph or two). She also knows a great many things about me. (I’ve even told her some things that I’ve never told another living soul because, sometimes, somehow, it’s ok to say it in Mandarin when it’s not in English.) We talk about life, hobbies, food, places, pasts and futures. I’m sure the grammar I use is often incorrect, my word choices less-than-perfect, and my tones not always impeccable, but I am speaking Chinese, and that was my goal when I began studying seven months ago.
Oh, and another bit of good news: I have hired a Chinese tutor, and our first session is on Monday night. It will be an hour of conversing in Mandarin. I’m very, very excited. And I can do it.
