Personal introduction, speaking English, Mandarin and Cantonese

[@mishaslilbae828]

Your madarin is as fluent as native...Amazing

[@thelightkeeper8705]

I'm grateful for your videos, I'm just getting started with chinese!! I love it!! I really wish that we had the option of learning it at my high school instead of Spanish. I'm not sure why I'm so intrigued with chinese, it's so fascinating I can't stop studying it!! You are a true inspiration for me!!

[@JerettFranklin]

inspirational as hell

[@Expresso98]

Wow, yet again you've impressed me greatly, Chris, thanks so much for your video. It's really inspiring to see people who are so proficient in second/third languages. In my homeland (Australia), the attitude to learning other languages is appalling : it's commonly "Why bother, they (foreigners) will speak English", lazily ignoring the fact that "they" put great effort into so doing!!

[@wonder2364]

真的太有天赋了！我也是对学习语言有浓厚兴趣的人，真心觉得你是我学习的榜样~ And this video is so inspiring !! Thank youuu! :) 加油！

[@furyvideo1]

you are very good in both dialects

[@emmapu9707]

看了你的各种分享学中文心得的视频，很受鼓舞，你简直就是正能量小天使，哈哈哈

[@samuraidapreguica7825]

Thanks for the video Chris! It was really inspiring and you are a real inspiration for mandarin and even cantonese learners.

[@robinajong]

impressive! I feel totally lose, when saw you speaking Mandarin so fluently. Nice to meet you! i am an indonesian chiness but not quite good speaking mandarin. Thank your for sharing!

[@18aaronjames]

this is so inspirational i am learning all three and i love it keep up the good work i am not having much difficulty because i consider it hobbies

[@shk00design]

Great inspiration for people learning languages. I know someone who is Cantonese who took Mandarin lessons. After 6 months gave up on it. Once again the problem is that Chinese learners tend to learn words & phrases by rogue memorization and the amount of effort taken to learn to pronounce words properly discourage them for continuing. The difficult part of Cantonese is the intonation because there are a few more. There is at least 1 spot you were pronouncing a Cantonese character in a Mandarin way and then switched over. There level of Mandarin is very native but there is still a bit of stuttering when speaking Cantonese. A few years ago there was a TV commercial for Ford Motor Co. in Hong Kong. In it was the actor Mark Rowswell originally from Canada now living in Beijing and goes by the name 大山 (Big Mountain). As a fluent Mandarin-speaker you can tell his Cantonese was a bit weak but still understandable. Many foreigners tend to start with Mandarin first before moving to Cantonese. I recently came across a CCTV 4 program call: 外国人在中国 (Foreigners in China). A number of people from Europeans to Africans were featured. Some got married to locals and they are all fluent in Chinese at some level. I was hoping to find you in one of the episodes. 加油。继续努力！

[@shk00design]

***** Many people including myself occasionally get mixed up between the 2 dialects as well. 1. Cantonese especially the HK version uses English loan words such as 巴士 (baasi) for bus instead of 公车, 的士 (diksi) for taxi instead of 出租车, 士多 (sido) for a store instead of 商店 and 士多啤梨 (sidobelei) for strawberries instead of 草莓, etc. 2. Nouns with different words/phrases: 太空人－航天员 astronaut, 冷气－空调 air conditioning, 单车－自行车 bicycle, 矮瓜－茄子, eggplant, 朱古力－巧克力,chocolate, 粟米－玉米 corn/maize, etc. 3. Characters with the same pronunciation: 练习 (linzaap for practice) & 杂志 (zaapzi for magazine) in Canto 习&杂 (zaap) sounds the same but in Pinyin the first is xí and the second is zá. 容易 (róngyì for easy) & 记忆 (jìyì for memory) the 易&忆 in Pinyin is yì. In Canto 易 sounds like 二 (ji for number 2) while 忆 sounds like 益 as in 利益 (leijik for benefit). It's like people speaking 2 similar languages like German & Dutch and unconsciously mixing words & phrases.

[@mattice9083]

I felt the same as you!! I wanted to learn something abstract and off the wall. Spanish is kinda boring in that it's something everyone is learning

[@Freeman1889]

兴趣是最好的老师，在你身上我看到了坚持与天赋，继续努力继续加油，或许下一个像费正清一样的汉学家正在成长~

[@UnclePolyglot]

Thank you for this inspirational video. It's great to hear you talking Cantonese again! Your accent has noticeably improved since your last self-introduction video in which you spoke a bit in Cantonese. I've also been studying quite a bit of Cantonese lately. During the past few months I've been trying to improve my accent by watching Hong Kong movies and television programs. Given that my Mandarin is a lot stronger, my Cantonese accent and choice of vocabulary is still heavily influenced by my Mandarin, but I have been improving bit by bit. Hope to be able to converse with you in Cantonese one day. Looking forward to watching your next video in Cantonese soon! :-)

[@brammetje2283]

Nice. howlong you speak now chinese?

[@MiamEggTart]

I'm impressed, props to you!:)

[@TheKandelia]

I am very impressed! Cantonese is not an easy language to pronounce but I think you have mastered it very well. Keep it up. The difficulty in learning Cantonese is that we write and speak in different ways. Not sure if watching Hong Kong movies will help your conversational Cantonese???

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Yanick PKL Yes I think I could watch a lot more Hong Kong TV and movies and that would probably help me to improve conversational Cantonese.. It's just that I haven't really had time to do that recently...

[@jiunglee1905]

Wow.........how come an american boy speaks mandarin so well like this......????? I really envy your multi language ability!

[@ToshuoVids]

How do you work on your phonics? Cantonese has a lot of really alien sounds.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+ToshuoVids Hey Mark. I have a lot of books and videos with recordings of the sounds and tones in Cantonese, most of them are Chinese books for people who already know Mandarin. One of the videos that was really useful to me was this one: v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMjQ4ODk5Mzky.html

[@mikaelenfrancais1179]

Awesome! I've studied some Mandarin linguistics for fun. Maybe someday I actually learn to speak. It's weird when I speak with Chinese people and I know some stuff foreigners don't usually know, or I can pronounce some words well, but then still cannot even introduce myself in Mandarin.. :)

[@jxshino]

哇哇哇，厉害啊！

[@2391jessie]

Yes, the video was enjoyable. When you think in Chinese, do you feel there is a difference to thinking in English? When you read Mandarin (or you see Native Chinese reading) is it slower of faster than in English?

[@2391jessie]

***** For reference. drrajivdesaimd.com/tag/left-brain-and-language/ There are studies that prove that languages shape how people understand causality. Some of them were performed by Lera Boroditsky (vide supra). For example, English speakers tend to say things like “John broke the vase” even for accidents. However, Spanish or Japanese speakers would be more likely to say “the vase broke itself.” In studies conducted by Caitlin Fausey at Stanford University, speakers of English, Spanish and Japanese watched videos of two people popping balloons, breaking eggs and spilling drinks either intentionally or accidentally...

[@2391jessie]

2391jessie From the same link - "If people learn another language, they inadvertently also learn a new way of looking at the world. When bilingual people switch from one language to another, they start thinking differently, too".

[@davidcheung4355]

Chris, although your Cantonese is not as good as Mandarin, i think you did an excellent job on the introduction in Cantonese. I have to admit Cantonese is not an easy language to learn. I am lucky that i know all three languages, and i am just start getting into the interpretation field. 加油

[@18aaronjames]

***** how do you get into the interpretation field theirs too many info and i am running in circles

[@18aaronjames]

thanks

[@s0uljae]

Wow how you did you learn to speaks Chinese so fluently? Do you practice. Everyday? You give a good example to Chinese that they can learn to speak a new language lkke English even if they aren't native ...

[@RayfilWong]

Awesome ! Keep posting !

[@lukewarren9696]

Which university did you study Chinese at

[@insanehoney]

Impressive!

[@shiminhuang2417]

I believe u can totally nail it! I am a Cantonese, if u wanna help, please feel free to contact me.

[@兽族张飞]

chirs 你的中文真的很棒，我在northampton学习 真的很难提高英文 无法融入本地的生活

[@Phipfire]

Your Mandarin is impressive, and your Cantonese is great as well. Although, you might want to practice a bit more cantonese.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Jia Cheong Yes, I need a lot more practice in Cantonese. One thing to aim for!

[@Trenacetate43]

Chris how long have you been studying chinese? Have you taken any chinese language proficiency test before? I'm overseas chinese（华侨） and have studied for 1 year in Guangzhou but my chinese is still far from yours. Could you give me advice on how to improve my speaking because I really want to focus on it. By the way how did you learn Cantonese? I'm curious that is just very impressive

[@Trenacetate43]

***** Too bad I'm not in China anymore. I can't buy those books, maybe do you have recommendation about good websites for learning cantonese? Thank you very much, you've been a great help.

[@s0uljae]

***** watch Tvb?

[@wangping1411]

Hi !You still live China or want back to UK. I think you are very smart student and a good role model for any who want learn Chinese language.

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Wang Ping I still live in China..

[@matthewdavies269]

Hi Chris, I am trying to find a video that you made, I thought it was this one. You comment about using course books in learning, but also you mention the important phrases you need to learn and you listed them in the comment box below, it was those kind of Skype conversation starters

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

I can't remember what video that was either. Was it called 'how to learn to speak fluent Chinese' something, was it that early one?

[@yimingli2354]

You British accent is interesting~~~ very impressive Cantonese. My mother language is a kind of southern china dialect. I can speak fluent Mandarin, but I can't speak Cantonese, though I lived in Guangdong province for 2 years.

[@yimingli2354]

You are right. Because In many people's opinion, unless they can speak Cantonese fluently, they prefer to speak Mandarin. For Chinese non-Cantonese speaker, local Cantonese speaker would not be as kind as them treat a foreign speaker. Besides, many non-natives may not sure whether they will stay at Guangdong province for a long time, so they don't have the motivation to "learn" it.

[@hoanglam4469]

你的中文很好

[@shiminhuang2417]

Why when you speaking Cantonese, it's like, you were carrying a strong mandarin accent? LOL.... That's sooo funny! But it's great! I'll be rooting for you!

[@funbingbing07]

respect....

[@whatsimportant.]

Dude, you have a beautiful voice... no homo.

[@normancao2333]

兄弟，你太厉害了，继续加油！

[@goodkanga2275]

I also can speak Mandarin and Cantonese and English, but English is not native language for me, so I need more practice. Hopefully we can help each other.

[@holmesjack9339]

其实你也可以尝试继续学普通话的衍生方言，比如上海话，上海的方言，如果你感兴趣的话，因为你已经有了良好的汉语基础，学起来会容易很多。顺便一提，我对你的英国口音很感兴趣。 Are you from London? or other part of the UK?

[@Yunita_Wanasiri]

厉害厉害

[@ericzhong5482]

赞啊，中文说的这么好，汗颜。 Gute gemacht

[@liu4453]

我想提高我的英语水平。你太棒了。！我来自中国广东

[@liu4453]

***** 会的。哈哈。但我主要是讲广东的客家话。恐怕还没你讲的好。

[@lynako2546]

你好，我是温州那边的， 据说温州话是中国最难懂的方言，你可以挑战一下。

[@Bozewani]

我爱中国文化历使语

[@yiwang4184]

I admire you that you can speak different foreign languages very well. I am Chinese and now work in Japan. But I cannot speak Japanese very fluently ,especially high level of language ability is required when at work. I have lost my interest in Japanese as you said in some video interest is the best teacher. Now compared with Japanese, I would rather learn English everyday. of course I am also interested in English .but I guess that learning another language instead of Japanese is the way of escaping reality which I need to face with. Have you had some similar situations since you started learning Chinese?

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+yi wang Well I am luckily because learning Chinese is not only something I need for everyday life, but I am also interested in it. Being forced to speak the language due to work/life etc can help a lot in getting you going to learn it, but it's best if you can manage to get interested in it too. If you keep on learning it, you might enjoy it!

[@yiwang4184]

Fluent in Mandarin thank you for answering me so quickly. Actually I was very interested in Japanese culture when I was a child. When at university I began to learn Japanese by myself and looked forward to living in Japan someday.now I have been living in Japan for 3 years since I graduated from university.but something is not really like what I thought about before .Then I realized I could not adapt to the culture and the life style of Japan. Maybe that's the main reason why I lost my passion in everything of Japan.

[@edwardlo4167]

you can speak every language i can speak. What kind of language should i speak if i wanna fool you?! JK Good job bro

[@randomname931]

Your Cantonese is 1000x better than the British TVB actor that's been in HK forever lol

[@shiminhuang2417]

Haha... I mean, it's kinda cute!

[@mr.johndoe.]

廣東話都講得唔錯

[@tianhao9744]

你这三语的自我介绍真是逆天了~ 话说你能看懂中文小说吗？比如金庸的武侠小说？或者其它任何形式的小说？你觉得有意思吗？因为就我个人来讲，我完全看不下去像指环王，冰与火之歌，这类的小说，就算我能认识里面的单词，我也不觉得有意思。但是我还是很喜欢看电影的。你有看过中文小说吗？你觉得有意思吗？ Hope you can understand what I mean, but if there is any confusing sentence or word please tell me, I can translate it in English if necessary. thanks

[@tianhao9744]

你还看过一些古文？有没有觉得像是看天书？每个中国学生都要学古文，因为高考必考古文阅读，但实际上除了研究历史有用，平时一般人根本用不到，更别说让一个外国人去学古文，纯粹是浪费时间。给你推荐几个中国作家，你可以挑自己喜欢的看，韩寒，老舍，刘震云，余秋雨。再推荐一个新闻网站，南方周末。至于怎么找我就不细说了，google吧。网上盗版那么多，哈哈。

[@holmesjack9339]

纠正一下，应该是官话的衍生方言。

[@hongxinyin1539]

你一直在北京生活和工作，怎么听起来还是很像南方人的口音呀，都没听出来北京口音哦~

[@hongxinyin1539]

***** 哇，呵呵，那你的语言天份还是挺强的喔~不错，继续加油吧~

[@AndrewWong1995]

Holy, how? Mandarin is my native language, but I can't even understand cantonese. btw, English is such an easy language.

[@mynameisnonnynonny2008]

You look alike Conan team coco

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+Nonny Prinyanusorn thanks。I guess...

[@sintin9419]

我覺得你學完普通話再學廣東話會係會破壞左廣東話個原本性。 求其舉一例，條片你用普通話講''學過法語''，但廣東話你又話你''學過法語''，其實應該講學過法''文'' 廣東話唔係我口寫我心，普通話先係。我覺得學廣東話發音差小小都唔緊要，但用字方面一定要準確，如果唔係只會流於講左一口流利既''普通話式既廣東話''。

[@atse1910]

Cantonese could use some work. I don't hear much accent in Cantonese. Almost 99.99% no accent in Cantonese. No joke. But grammar could use some work. When you said, "I started studying Chinese in 2006" in Cantonese, you used the word "is" (Ngo hei 2006 hulk zong mun). That's incorrect. It should be Ngo Heong 2006 hulk zong mun. (Heong = from). But not bad Cantonese. Your Cantonese is a lot more understandable compared to others. I can actually understand it without flinching and giving the stink eye. This coming from an second-American American born Chinese, spoke Cantonese most of his life since he was born in 1988 using it to communicate with overseas relatives, and born and raised in California speaking also English.

[@jailbirdx0x]

Your Cantonese is highly-influenced with your Mandarin accent.

[@ZKay-wh1vx]

cantonese?好厉害，很多中国人都不会粤语

[@啦啦啦玩魔兽的妹纸]

是一般都不会哈哈哈哈

[@soniclyk]

你瞧，虽然普通话和广东话同属汉语，一旦掌握其中一个，很难准确掌握另一个--更别提外国人。能把广东话和普通话说得互不带口音的人一定是非常聪明的人。

[@xiaxiaming5917]

I am Chinese, I can't speak Cantonese!!

[@choualexander4861]

你粤语说得比我还好

[@amateurbadminton6312]

你为什么这么屌？

[@FluentinMandarinDotCom]

+王比尔 haha

[@fiona734]

我觉得你根本没有理由去学广东话，这只是一个方言啊 你怎么不去学上海话？香港就那么点点大啊....

[@michaelfelix9492]

Chinese is Cantonese only, don't learn the Mandarin, dear Chris.

[@tiramisu10001]

Impressive!