Customer Reviews

Instant Chinese: How to express 1,000 different ideas with just 100 key words and phrases! (Instant Phrasebook Series)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I am living in China and taking Mandarin lessons for the past 9 months - I bought this book on Amazon without having looked at it. It has a major flaw - the Pinyin (the a-b-c version of Characters) does not have the tone markings. This means that you will not be understood without the correct tone - I know that from repeated experience.

For instance "mai" can be pronounced 4 different ways each with a different meaning - pronounced in 4th tone is to SELL and 3rd tone is to BUY and 2nd tone is to BURY. Quite the variety.

Look at the learning dictionaries by Tuttle publishing with the author of Li Dong and then get a Rough Guide or Lonely Planet phrase book -they show Pinyin with tone marks. All have pronunciation guides in them and some grammar and phrases. The phrase books are pocket size with menu list and Chinese Characters-PinYin-English in them. I have a mountain of language books but regularly use the 3 by LiDong and my pocket phrase books.

A language DVD/CD and hand recorder to compare your voice to the DVD/CD would help you to match the tones very well if you are serious about speaking the language.

I just returned from China and this is a convenient and perfect phrasebook for a traveler. It has the 1,000 most used phrases logically grouped together into 100 categories that are easy to find. You will see the English phrase, Pignon translation, Phonetic pronunciation (not all books have phonetics), and the Chinese characters.

I practiced the Phonetic pronunciations with my Chinese friends and they understood me! The previous reviewer states that tones are not in the book, but I found that they were expressed in the English phonetic pronunciation. The book also has Chinese characters, so if someone doesn't understand you, you just point to the phrase in Chinese characters.

For someone traveling to China and not wanting to take a long class to learn the nuances of the language or a giant book of phrases to lug around (ie, Speak E-Z book), this book works fine. And you can slip it conveniently in a pocket, purse, or camera bag as it is the size of a wallet.

I purchased this book, and a few others, before going to China for a month. Not knowing ANY of the language, this book was by my side the whole time! It fits in pockets, purses, anywhere. Many of the phrases were used again and again...Especially when I was lost. It has the word or phrase, the pronunciation, and the meaning, as well as Chinese characters. Many of the Chinese language isn't translated into our alphabet or taught with the alphabet so even showing people the words didn't work out well. Having the pronounciations and some characters was the key to my success! A great book to have along.

With plans to study at Beijing University next spring, I thought that it would be helpful to purchase a Chinese phrasebook so as to be able to fully take advantage of all that Beijing has to offer. From what I have already read of this little, but surprisingly effective, book, I am quite confident that I will have no problems at all exploring the city.

The phrasebook is broken into several practical sections, including ones concerning greetings and introductions, eating out, shopping, doing business, and almost anything else imaginable. Do not be fooled by the book's diminuitive size; it certainly packs a punch!

Although this phrasebook is by no means a comprehensive guide to the Chinese language, it is extremely helpful for anyone wanting to gain a basic understanding of the language before venturing out to China for a trip.