Challenge Accepted: Mandarin

 
            My Mandarin class is made up of four students! With four students everyone has a one-on-one teacher interaction during most of the lecture to make sure we practice our pronunciation and a conversation. I think it’s fantastic because we all feel like our vocabulary is growing exponentially. Our teacher, Charles, is really good at bridging the gap between English and Mandarin. Without him we wouldn’t understand some of the culture behind some Chinese words. I also thought it was strange when he mentioned how hard it is for Chinese people to understand sarcasm because it is not a concept familiar to them in Chinese. Also, many times we take audio recordings to listen for later, with our phones, of Charles pronouncing words because the way things are pronounced is very important since some words could be easily mispronounced and mean something else. I’ve had trouble pronouncing words and often I’ll say something I don’t meant and get frustrated. But I’ll tell myself practice makes perfect and just stay focused. Also In the U.S., to have sophisticated vocabulary may make one seem intelligent. However, in China one sounds more intelligent based on how they phrase things because there aren’t many sophisticated vocabulary words in Chinese. Every day I am improving my Mandarin and I know it won’t be long before I can order my own food. It will happen!