I've been in China for a little over five months now. Yes, my PuTongHua has improved considerably, mainly because I'm using it now. Back home of course, it would never occur to anyone to actually talk in PuTongHua, except maybe as a joke.
I tell people that one of the reasons that I came to China is to be forced to speak, therefore learn, the language. However, it is also very much possible to be here for years and not speak a word of it too. It would have been so easy to always have someone to go with you to buy things, pay the phone bill, or maybe have someone else do these things for you. You'd be surprised at how many people are willing to help. These, obviously, are suicide when it comes to learning the language. Of course it wouldn't hurt to ask a friend's help from time to time. But it's also advisable to just go out there and start talking to people. And not in English.
I am, of course, at an advantage when it comes to learning the language. I did not come here with a blank slate. Twelve years of Chinese education should inevitably leave a mark somewhere somehow. I've actually been thinking about it a lot these days. People are thinking that it is phenomenal that I learn Chinese so fast. Um, no, I had a twelve-year headstart.
From Kindergarten to High School, I was subjected to around three hours of Chinese classes every afternoon. And it wasn't just PuTongHua (it used to be called GuoYu. I found out a few days ago that GuoYu is what they call PuTongHua in Taiwan. Hmm, we've been influenced by Taiwan more than I thought.). It was PuTongHua and everything else the school could find a teacher for. Imagine learning Geometry and Trigonometry in Chinese. Imagine reading about current events in Chinese. Imagine learning Chinese history in Chinese. Imagine reading Chinese literature in Chinese. Imagine memorizing poems (and everything else, actually) in Chinese. Imagine writing compositions (zuowen) in Chinese. Imagine singing songs in Chinese! We also had Computer and Speech classes in Chinese! Wow, even I'm overwhelmed. Yes, all these and more if you study in a Chinese school in the Philippines.
How was I able to survive all those? The answer is I wasn't. Not really.
No, I never got to learn Trigonometry in Chinese because I failed Geometry which was being taught in third year. (Come on, it was hard enough learning it in English!) And because I did not attend summer classes (it was summer!), I had to repeat my third year Chinese. Trigonometry was being taught in the fourth year. Therefore I was a senior in English but took the afternoon classes with the younger batch, which was actually the most fun Chinese class I had. And Chinese classes were never fun. Ask anyone.
So I never got to graduate in Chinese. Ironically, look who's in China now? I'm sure this is someone-up-there's idea of a sick joke.
Tweleve years is still a long time (having graduated or not), the question is how come I know very little Chinese? Of all the things that I had supposedly studied, my brain has retained maybe less than 5%. That's because I never really studied (that's why I didn't graduate :p). Come to think of it, nobody really studied (hmm, how come they graduated?). Chinese classes in the Philippines were hell (I don't know how they are now. I sincerely hope they have improved). You were asked to memorize everything. As in everything. I wish they'd just let us study Chinese history and literature in English, then I would probably still remember something now. The 5% that are still somewhere in my brain are, I'm guessing, the things I learned in Kindergarten and early grade school. I was still trying to be a good student at that point.
Wait, I think I have an idea on how to improve it. The earlier generation of Chinese in the Philippines had Hokkien/MinNanHua as their mother tongue, therefore when GuoYu/PuTongHua was being taught to them using Hokkien/MinNanHua they were able to easily understand and learn it. Our generation would have benefited more if we studied these things in English, and maybe just a little MinNanHua. I need your opinions on this, fellow survivors. The even younger generation is not at all fluent in Hokkien/MinNanHua anymore. I don't really know what to do with these kids except maybe get rid of the current affairs, Math, etc., and really just focus on the language. And not just the language but the everyday use of the language. More like our Speech classes before. Come on, who's going to talk to me about right angles and coefficients here?
While I'm reflecting on my Chinese education, I'm also trying to compare how I learned PuTongHua in the Philippines to how the Chinese students here are learning English. I think everyone will agree that PuTongHua is definitely harder to learn than English, but it's still a foreign language to them. And when I say foreign, it really means foreign. And I'm not just talking about the language here. Sometimes, they seem to be totally removed from the rest of the world.
**Funny story: During my first month here, I was walking home with my students and they were asking what I like doing in my spare time. I told them I like reading, writing, surfing the net... One student was very surprised and asked me how good my Chinese was. Not very good, I told her. She said, and I paraphrase, "Then how are you able to use the Internet?! Everything's in Chinese!" She was very serious. She did not think there were websites in English and all the other languages. She did not think there was a world outside of China. And so I tried to explain, and I was not so sure if she understood, that you can actually find a lot, so many that I can't even fathom (no I did not use that word), of websites that are not in Chinese. She still looked at me doubtfully.
Whew. Going back... They've also been studying English for a long time, just as I spent almost half of my life learning PuTongHua. Once they step outside the classroom (even before) however, they'd naturally go back to speaking in Chinese. Sounds familiar... And no matter how many times I tell them to speak in English with each other, they don't. Maybe they forget. Maybe they just think it's too much of a bother. Maybe they're shy. And I've been through all those. I can understand. Perfectly. Sigh. I tell them, watch English movies, learn English songs, and talk talk talk in English!
Of course I have to follow my own advice. I've been listening to a lot of Chinese pop songs. I especially like watching them in videoke, that way I can see how the characters are written. I'm already on my third Chinese song. I can already sing the first one even when I'm sleeping. The second, I need to have my copy (with all the zhuyin, again a Taiwanese influence on us) in order to sing it. The third I have to have my copy that has romanized pinyin (although yes, I am definitely more comfortble with zhuyin) and I'm still finding it hard to unknot my tongue as I try to sing it. But I am making progress. And it is fun.
