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 - Chinese Podcast - Survival Chinese - A Marriage Proposal

The suit cost him almost one thousand dollars and the tie was worth more than three hundred .He just came back from the hairdresser’s, feeling really excited. He was going to invite his girlfriend to an exquisite dinner and propose to her as well. He needed to look good and neat. The appointed time finally arrived. He waited impatiently in fron of the restaurant entrance. It was almost half past six and his girlfriend was nowhere to be seen. He was so anxious that he decided to ring her to make sure she was alright. The phone kept on ringing for 5 seconds before she answered. “你在做什么?” He almost shouted .” 我不能来了”. She replied, sounding quite uncaring.

His heart was frozen. He never felt such coldness casting every pore in his body. Disappointment, frustration reigned. He felt the world was turning upside down and he felt like everything around was meaningless. With trembling voice, he asked at the phone, “你什么时候可以来?” she took a pause and said quietly, “我会让你知道的”.

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 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 - 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 - Business Chinese - Introducing yourself to others

Chinese put a great deal of care to treat people with respect in the way they address each other. So as a rule of thumb it is rare that anyone will call you by your first name.

In this lesson, Weili and Xiaoguang meet for the first time, therefore they need to introduce to each other. Because they do not know each other they take a great deal of care in using the right words so that they treat each other in a respectuful way. Obviously once they become well acquainted they treat themselves in a more informal way, as you would expect friends to...

What is in this lesson:
- Introducing yourself to others
- Verb "to be"
- Simple ways to ask a question
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 - First day of school

The sentence order in Chinese is quite the same as in English, but Chinese verbs are very regular in form. This means that they do not change according to person, number or tense.

In this lesson, Alice (as a teacher) meets her new student - Zhaomin. Zhaomin never been to school before and doesn't have a clue what it is all about. Also his parents did not really bother telling him much about it. Otherwise he would have not brought this strange item to his first day in school. Are you curious? If you want to know please tune in to this lesson!

What you will learn in this lesson:
- Action verbs
- Indirect object
- Question word
- Naming

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.