The Chinese language

The Chinese language is as diverse, colourful and challenging as China itself. Chinese language is the key to understanding Chinese culture and economy. Knowledge of the language is important and useful for China's position as a world power, but it can also bring a different perspective to our lives. Modern Mandarin is very far removed from Indo-European languages, both in terms of technical features and structure, so there is little to draw on in Chinese class from our previous studies of English, German or Russian. In learning the language, we need to pay attention to several things at once: stress, tone, punctuation, the order of the lines of the character, the combination of the elements that make up the character, the pronunciation and basic meaning of the character, and, in the case of a multi-syllabic phrase, the recognition and understanding of the meaning of the additional syllable or syllables associated with the initial syllable. However, it is a great sense of achievement when, after a semester or two, you can easily hold a conversation with Chinese colleagues or order lunch in Chinese. Learning Chinese requires determination, humility and perseverance, but less logical ability. Learning Chinese can open a new chapter in your life. It is definitely worth learning Chinese if you can make nine hundred and twenty million friends in one go.