My first lesson of Chinese, I hope not the last!

If China needs 15 years to overtake American economy, I do have 15 years to learn Chinese, I guess it is the minimum.

The first lesson is "Hello". That, I learned already a long time ago in Beijing, but today I learned it is composed from "You" and "Good"; so you greet your Chinese neighbors saying "Are you good?" or more western "How are you?".

This is easy, I should learn how to say "Good bye" in the same lesson but I chose first to learn how to write it. I am lucky, Chinese simplified their traditional alphabet in the 50’s with the Pinyin alphabet!

To write Hello, you do not have to write: 你好 anymore but the much easier: 你好. I don’t see much difference! Fortunately, I am not the only one trying with this very important language so a system is given.

First “you”: Ní

And then “good” : hǎo

I knew it would be too much to learn “Good bye” in the same day but I was starting to wonder after learning “you” if trying “good” wouldn’t be overestimating myself either?

Then I discovered that what you learn to write is different from what is printed and actually the printed is easier

Then “you” should be written

but is printed






I like to say man prevails the machine but there are some exceptions! In the printed I can detail some characters, lines and curves that I can’t do in the written. Of course at the end, if you want to have just a little conversation, the transcription is enough and look very easy, it is just a tone situation!

Les Tons

Le Chinois Mandarin possède quatre tons plus un ton "plat".

Ton	Marque	Description
1er	dā	Haut et constant
2nd	dá	Commence par un ton médium et monte vers le ton haut
3ème	dǎ	Commence par un ton bas, descend vers les graves puis remonte vers le ton haut
4ème	dà	Commence par un ton haut et descend sèchement vers les graves
Neutral	da	Plat et sans expression

Variations de Tons

Un 3ème ton suivi immédiatement d'un autre 3ème ton se prononce comme un 2ème ton.

Nǐ hǎo = Ní hǎo

Is it really necessary to write if you can’t do it properly? The speaking is different; in international conversation the meaning is sometimes not as important as the will to show your respect for the culture of the interlocutor. So you say some unexpected politeness in the language of the other and then you are allowed to switch to English.

It was so hard to learn today how to write 你好 but so easy to learn to say “Hěn gāoxìng rènshi nǐ” which means “Please to meet you” or the even nicer “Ravi de faire votre connaissance”; and then I recognize the same nǐ as in Hello.

I knew it, it is all about you!