Learn Chinese Online - Beginner Lessons

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - This is my friend

Someone knocked at the door early morning. Mike was not happy but he still dragged himself out of bed and opened the door. It was the postman who had an envelope for him, asking, “你的?” Mike took a glimpse of the name and nodded, thanked him and returned to his bed. Mike lazily tore the paper open, pulled the letter out and began to read it. It was a book fair invitation from one of his friends, who hoped that he could tag along for the fair book fair, 8 o’ clock the next day.
It was raining heavily when Mike set off. He waved a taxi to stop and told him the place. The taxi driver nodded to show he understood, started the engine and went off. It was silent in the first few minutes but the driver broke the silence by asking: “你是哪国人?” Mike replied proudly: “瑞典” “工作吗?” continued the driver. “我是留学生”.
The book fair was, fortunately, not cancelled. Instead the hundreds of books and tables were moved indoors. Mike managed to find his friend and they decided to take the eastern gate. Floods of people tried to stream through the small doors and everyone was squeezing each other in order to be the first ones to take a look at the books on sales. Mike was strong, but his friend was falling behind. When they found a quieter place inside the fair, Mike realized that his wallet was gone. Mike jumped up and searched around, complaining. “这是你的吗?” Asked a girl with a wallet in her hand. “Mike!” Yelled his friend to him ,as he said to the girl,” 不是我的，这是他的, 我朋友的”.

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Videos - Survival Chinese - Introduce yourself in Chinese

If you don't know how to introduce yourself in chinese people will not be able to know who you are and what is your relationship to them. In the same way if you can't introduce yourself then unless the people you meet in china know english, they will also not be able to introduce themselves to you. Or even if they did, you would not understand.
In this video lesson Demi teaches you the fundamentals - how to introduce yourself in Chinese. Learn how say "What's your name", "My name is..." and also learn how to ask general questions.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - What would you like to buy?

Friend Matt was born in Germany and grew up in France, moved to England at the age of 20 and spent seven years there before moving in China a couple of months ago. He can speak four languages but still is quite dull in Chinese. He once asked one of his friends how one should master this language that is full of complicated characters. The friend suggested him “买些中文杂志吧”. He accepted the advice and set off for the small stands in search of all kinds of Chinese magazines. It is necessary for foreigners to know how to get what they want, especially when the owners of the small stands don’t speak English. The lesson this time will talk about how to buy the magazines, books, newspapers you want on the small stands. After this lesson, you will be able to distinguish 汉语and 中文；the reason why we use 没有 not 不有 and…why don't you find out yourself？

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - Going to the restaurant

Ali can’t remember when he began to go to restaurants so often. Before a certain moment he was really obsessed with home-made food and liked, all the time, to cook each meal by himself. It seems that now, he was getting lazier. He only wants to sit in a comfortable chair, waits for the cooked food to be brought just in front of him. In fact, Ali is not alone.

With more and more restaurants opened everywhere in the city, people prefer to take a pause from the busy work and enjoy the food in restaurants. That makes everything easier. Of course, when we have the served food, why bother to ponder over about cooking? We can simply choose a restaurant, ask for the menu and order whatever that fascinates you to satisfy your grumbling stomach. Ali just returned from work, lay himself down on the bed, then called his girlfriend. He spoke in his lame Chinese, “想上饭店吗?” Then they started their short dialogue about where to go for the dinner.

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - I am not feeling well

Qin Zhe dragged herself all the way back home after work. It was another busy day for her. This 24- year-old girl made a living by being an interpreter as well as a writer, thus being tired out at the end of each day. She searched for the key in her messy handbag and introduced it to the lock, opened the door, stumbled into the room and slammed the door closed. Hardly had she dropped her overcoat into the sofa when she threw herself into the bed. In fact, she had been suffering from nausea and headache throughout the whole day and ran out the appetite to eat or energy to move. In a word, she doesn’t feel so well. So how do people say “One doesn’t feel well” in Chinese? Listen to this lesson to find out!

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - What day is it today?

It had barely passed 12 p. m when Detective Olsson was awaken by a noisy phone - it was his assistant —some man was found dead in a messy house. The Detective hurried to the scene, pushed the door open and glanced over the room. A man was laying in flood of blood with legs twisted, arms stretched. Besides he dumped a black notebook, whose pages were heavily crumbled .Olsson knelt down, picked it up and turned it up and down. He thumbed through the book, then ceased at the last page. He frowned and whispered to his assistant,

“What do these signs refer to?” The Chinese girl answered. “They are days, months, and years in Chinese characters.” She took a pause, pulled one of her hands out of pockets and pointed at them, as she explained. “星期一 Monday, 星期二” Tuesday, “星期三” Wednesday.

“Wait, wait, wait”, The detective interrupted. He slammed the book on the table and turned to his assistant. “I don’t think I can remember any of them clearly if you say them so quickly….” He stopped as if to think about something seriously, and then continued. “I guess it is the right time for me to learn those things thoroughly…and teach me some related words as well. It will definitely make things easier if I can comprehend what these words mean.” Then they began their lesson about how to refer to different points in time in chinese.

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Business Chinese - Receive and give compliments

One thing you will notice in China when you compliment someone is that they rarely will accept your compliment. It is quite polite to look humble and it is seen as presumptuous to reply "thank you!". Quite often you will hear a famous chinese expression that is used in that kind of situation. But we in the western world have a bit of trouble understanding that, so much that we are the subject of a popular chinese joke regarding our misunderstanding of this important cultural difference. Tune in to this lesson to find out...

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - I am tired

David is studying chinese in China and he has lots of home work to do, and lots of chinese characters to write every day. He almost can't take it. The homework is so much that he feels tired every day and has very little free time to do other things he wants to do. So he decides to complain to the teacher that enough is enough! Learn how David expresses in chinese that he is very tired. But is the teacher going to give him less homework? Tune in to find out....

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - How to haggle in chinese

This is the second part of our lesson on going to the market. In the last lesson David had to wake up early so that he could go to the market and still find fresh vegetables. This time he finds some really nice 胡萝卜(carrots). However he finds the price a bit expensive. He tries to do some haggling, but did he manage to get a good deal? To find out tune in to this lesson with our host Teresa Wu.

If you want to consolidate what you have learned, why not try the exercises for this lesson? Please Chinese test to try the exercises now.

Beginner Lesson - Bin - Strokes 2

You want to learn chinese characters and you don't know how to start? Or perhaps you think because you can't draw then you can't write chinese characters? Actually most people think that in order to write chinese characters you have to be good at drawing. That's wrong. In fact most chinese are not artists. But they can write chinese characters because they follow very simple rules. The only difficulty is that there are so many characters... tune in to this lesson to...