Xiaoma: The truth about learning Chinese vs Spanish

[@daysandwords]

It's funny: just as he mentioned that sometimes Chinese's difficulty can be overstated (and he mentioned getting to a conversational level within a year), I think the Euro languages can be understated. Matt and I talked about this too; sometimes even the similarity between your language and the target language can be confusing, even on the simplest things. e.g. It took me about 150 times reading the word "vinka" before I finally imbedded into my brain that it's "to wave" not "to wink".

[@storylearning]

Haha yes, but still, having tackled both, I'd take the false friends of romance languages any day over the job over learning Chinese characters!

[@ninoslanguagejourney6002]

Well I think it also depends on study type. I spent years learning chinese but I am very much relying on reading, writting and using subtitkes in videos online to learn due to a hearing problem. Even my mothertongue I just learned to speak age appropriately once I started to read in elementary school. I think therefore learning Mandarin is something I still think requires me more effort because I won't be able to learn it like someone like Ikenna who basically just learned it through listening and speaking. So for me learning to read and type was just a necessary evil and I love the language so i did put in the work. But now learning Portuguese which many call difficult took me just a tiny fraction of the time. I think my portuguese is now after a bit more than a year better than my chinese after on and off learning (and most recently intensive learning spending 8 months in china) since 2012 😆 I have no the confidence thou and the skill that I aquired due to learning that language that I could now learn any romance or germanic language within a year to a B2 level. Probably even slavic language..

[@spartan.falbion2761]

The Swedish tonal structure was and still is tricky for me to get 100%. Upon learning pinyin, I felt 'wouldn't it have been easier if something like this was available?' I didn't have trouble with vinka. Hidden difficulties are teachers who teach incorrect grammar - yes you heard it hear folks - and will argue their fictions, and get angry at the stubborn student who won't get in line. I don't know if you've studied in Sweden, Mr Days-of-French, but a Russian friend pointed out that the system belongs in the 1950s. There is a commited effort by the educational system to hold people back. At least that's how it was in Kalmar in the early '000s.

[@kristend344]

@@spartan.falbion2761 I had a German teacher like that, here in the US. I later realized, the teacher I'd had the previous year knew a lot more, and then that second teacher was telling me I was wrong. Then I took German in college from a woman with a PhD in German. . . yeah, that second german teacher didn't know what she was talking about - but she was a paid public school employee teaching students who don't know any better.

[@thenaturalyogi5934]

@@storylearning Gaaaah my Mandarin is in a perpetual intermediate level since I graduated high school and I'm having more progress in 5 months of Portuguese than 13 years of Chinese simply because I can read Portuguese easily vs Chinese.

[@DavidSinghiser]

I studied Spanish the traditional way in high school and college but learned Vietnamese through friends. I can still remember the shock and joy upon finding out that you didn't have to conjugate verbs - that one little word infront of a verb was good enough to make it future, past or continuous. After college I traveled to Mexico and realized that could buy a bus ticket or check in a hotel in Vietnamese but had no clue how to do so in Spanish. Now I live in Paraguay, and so my Spanish is much better than my Vietnamese, but Vietnamese is still more fun. I have similar reactions when I speak Vietnamese as Ari does, though he is much more fluent in Chinese than I am in Vietnamese. Great interview!

[@SuperHtownswag]

What do you think helped you the most when it came to learning spanish? I for one hated the whole boring intro to "grade school spanish" via "verb conjugation"

[@MetalSandman999]

Mandarin is the same way (at least at the beginner level where I am lol). It's also a bit of shock when you go from Spanish - which has far more extensive verb conjugation rules than English - to Chinese which has virtually none. I/you/he/she/we/they is all the same, and you use other words (or even just context) to change the tense. Hopefully I'll be able to shock people like you and Mr. XiaoMan one day 😎😎

[@tymanung6382]

Perhaps there is a Vietnam embassy or community in Paraguay (there are some Chinese) ?

[@tymanung6382]

@@MetalSandman999 Chinese has verb tenses, modes, aspects, but fortunately, it does NOT have no. + person conjugations. !!! Xie tian, xie. di!!!

[@ConnorWidmaier]

Xiaoma’s analogy with free markets and central planning hit me like a brick. Being able to think laterally like that is hugely insightful. The analogy has held true for my own language learning. Once I shifted to content based learning and away from heavily structured learning the growth I experienced was truly exponential. All this said, I do think there is some value in taking a structured approach at least to the A2 level.

[@bosanceros0172]

Where did he mention it? Sounds fascinating.

[@jen1963]

I’m Filipina, and my adopted son is Chinese. And we are learning Spanish together. I look forward to Spanish speakers being surprised by our Spanish one day. I do love when non Asians speak and appreciate Asian languages.

[@SinergiaAlUnisono]

Me encantaría escucharlos hablar en español. Saludos desde Argentina

[@AdrianCuyubambaDiaz]

Como va el aprendizaje? Saludos desde Peru

[@benl9047]

Really like the point about learning in a more relaxed way based on lots of input and speaking versus learning in a more controlled way using flashcards being like a free-market vs planned economy. I learnt Spanish and Chinese in an excessively planned way and with my third language (Russian) I'm trying to do a more "free-market" approach and I highly recommend it, I really think it's more effective in the long-term, but like Olly said it involves having faith that it works over time because maybe on some given days it's harder to answer the question "so what did I learn today?" very specifically. But sometimes a word pops into my head that I'd heard several days earlier, there really is a vast subconscious realm that might store these words even if we don't realise it consciously at first. This approach requires time, patience and consistency. By the way I spent 5 years on Spanish and 5 years on Chinese so I feel like I'm in quite a good place to compare them objectively. Spanish seems objectively easier for a native English speaker: the vocabulary, pronunciation and writing system are all much easier and whilst the grammar is harder, that doesn't come close to outweighing the difficulties in learning Chinese.

[@storylearning]

Thanks for the comment Ben!

[@luketruman3033]

Really enjoyed this interview. Thanks for sharing Olly. On a side on cultural notes, I find reading novels quite hard in Chinese because even fairly simple novels reference a lot of things and events that happened in Chinese history. I have read a few novels so far and still find it really difficult unless I select the book really well

[@ninoslanguagejourney6002]

Gosh even finding a book to read was so difficult for me based on that. I was like.. Why do I not understand every second phrase even while I literally understand the characters?! Then I was with that book sitting in a bus and a chinese guy was obviously curious why this foreigner girl is reading a chinese book and through him I found out that it was packed with references and set phrases I was like dugh 🤦‍♀️ No wonder it made no sense to me lol

[@luketruman3033]

@@ninoslanguagejourney6002 haha Chinese authors love Chengyu and their own history., add oil!

[@HingYok]

@@luketruman3033 I'm a native speaker. I guess it's because these idioms have become our daily vocabulary.

[@polyglotpengyou]

I agree with Ari, I got to a very good level of conversation in a year of learning chinese. in the middle of that i spent three months in china, not hardcore studying but definitely interacting with locals. Even though i can speak pretty much fluently in topics i am familiar with, theres so much more i feel like i don't know

[@ninoslanguagejourney6002]

I agree..! It is kind of harder as in there not being a point where you just learned the most common words and now you can make sense of a lot of what is being spoken just based on your vocabulary but you can get completely lost in a conversation once it hits a topic you're not very familiar with. I think that's what makes it much harder than any latine or germanic language passed the intermediate level.

[@letsseewhatwecanlearn9242]

Korean is fun. When you start, Korean is very easy. The longer you learn, the harder the language become to understand. The language is a language in which, once you finally understand a certain concept, a grammar form that is based off the previous verb form becomes known to you, and the confusion continues.

[@o_felipe_reis]

Hi there! I’m also a polyglot and I was surfing on internet and ended up here. Yeah our mother tongue influences a lot our learning progress in foreign languages. Best regards from Brazil 🇧🇷 Professor X here. Stay safe.

[@polyglotpengyou]

Professor X hi bro lol

[@SinergiaAlUnisono]

ahhhh buenísimo escucharlos a ambos conversar juntos. Me gustan los canales de ambos y me hizo feliz verlos charlar , saludos desde Argentina. Un abrazo !

[@justinhan286]

One of the most in-depth knowledge discussion about Chinese language from a non-native speaker, kudo to both of you! I also tried to learn Spanish. The hardest parts for me are ganders, verb conjugation, moods, and use of pronouns. English is much easier for me to learn, because English uses SOV structure in the sentences. Verb conjugation, moods are mostly expressed by having auxiliary words..

[@elvinmay54]

So, I have been binge watching your videos recently and am glad I came across this one. It kind of answered some of my previous questions. I want to use your method to learn Shona, however, I no absolutely no grammar. I have now decided to memorise as many core words as I can and then proceed to reading, listening and speaking. This may help me have a better foundation

[@diegrow1979]

wow cool interview, I enjoyed. I was interesting listen to the point of view of someone who's have as first learned language Chinese his experience in approaching Spanish

[@storylearning]

Thanks DieGrow!

[@osaevbiewoghiren2761]

great interview

[@Ymirheim]

Xiaomas argument that SRS is like central planning and going out and just speaking being like a free market economy is a bit of a fallacy though. It's not the flash cards that is the central planned economy in that example. It is the pulling your selection of cards off of a premade template like 1000 most common words, or the contents of a textbook. You can use SRS as a completely natural addition to your learning assuming you make your cards out of the sentences you encounter in tv-shows, books, comics, podcasts and what not that you are already consuming.

[@little_engine_goes_to_Thailand]

I speak Chinese ok - and there is a lot more to learn, you can say I have reached an OK plateau and I am fine with that. I am self-studying Thai at the moment as I will be moving there. Thai is also a tonal language similar to Chinese and I will give myself 1 year to be able to hold a basic conversation because that was how long learning mandarin Chinese took me. I have always wanted to learn Spanish - I find it such a beautiful language, but I always wonder if I should just be more focused on Asia and learn more Asian languages. I wonder if there are any people that specialize only in Asian languages. The reason is say I learn Spanish - when would I get to use it ?

[@ninoslanguagejourney6002]

Spanish is one of the most spoken languages worldwide so I think if you get into it you will "find use" of it. So many shows and movies are in Spanish and never even got an English dubbed version. Often you cna even find Portuguese Shows and Movies that are only dubbed in Spanish. And in the End I think every language does unlock a new perspective due to learning about the cultures that are connected to the languages. I think I'm at a point where I learn more and more languages for which I effectively don't even have "a use" for it in my daily life other than just loving it and loving to consume medias in other languages and once in a while I get a customer who is glad that they can talk to me in their mothertongue

[@UnimportantAcc]

weird.. exactly 1 year today, and i just got recommended this video

[@storylearning]

Like a fine wine, ages well!

[@SkillHunterEnglish]

We’ve hit that glass door in Japanese a lot ourselves Olly! Luckily it didn’t crack and we kept pushing on ~ I feel like the more one can get a grasp on the kanji and roots of them, learning new words (with kanji) it gets easier... now into my advanced studies I feel like the words without kanji are harder to memorize. But as Arie says in listening practice hearing an unknown word is really hard. I instantly try to stop a speaker when I hear an unknown word and say, what’s the kanji. Realllly good talk about the difference between the two languages.

[@theblackryvius6613]

Honestly this is why I hate learning adverbs. A lot of the time, they’re in pure hiragana and are generally more abstract than the kanji combinations. Interesting words, but maaaaaaaaaan.

[@sKiLlZs4you]

I have yet to see this video, but I hope Xiaoma surprises me. His clickbaity titles ruin all his content for me; but he really seems like a cool guy.

[@storylearning]

He's super fun to chat with!

[@olegabbatini7015]

He is just playing the KZbin game. If he titled his videos "Practicing Mandarin" they would get 1% of the views compared to "Clueless American white tourist shocks locals with perfect Chinese!!!" Just appreciate that he is bringing a mainstream audience who otherwise wouldn't be interested into language learning.

[@DoomCro1]

@@olegabbatini7015 Yeah but it also creates a combination of fake modesty and pretentiousness when you put a title like "Clueless american white tourist shocks locals with perfect chinese" and you proceed to tell everyone who asks in the video that you only speak a bit of chinese. He achieved a lot in language learning an there is no reason to undermine his achievements with that kind of aproach and blatant click bait. All of the most prominent polyglot youtube channels have some amount of clickbait because youtube's algorithms almost dictate it in order to succeed, but they don't sound cocky at the same time.

[@ConnorWidmaier]

Xiaoma is a genuinely good dude

[@rocknroll909]

@@olegabbatini7015 Totally. His content caught my attention and helped me get into the world of language learning

[@tusaludintegral]

Interesting, especially the point with anki

[@Lambert7785]

very useful exchange, thanks for sharing

[@ЮрийИванцив]

Good video! Thanks to the author for his good work! I'd like to recommend Yuri Ivantsiv's practice book Polyglot's Notes: Practical Tips for Learning a Foreign Language. This book has many useful methods for learning a foreign language, how to develop your memory, how to memorize words, learn grammar, quickly learn to speak, read and write. All recommend this excellent book! Good luck to everyone in learning a foreign language!

[@gogomaximoff4554]

Couldnt agree more on Anki talk and SRS, natural way is the best, no questions asked, and also, as he pointed out, you learn it in a way that you are mostly repeat the words that are used mostly which is the most important thing in any language. READ LISTEN READ LISTEN READ. I am reading books and texts in languages i know so i can learn more vocab and it works like a magic. Of all 4 languages i speak (except my own) cuz of reading and listening i am improving every day, exponentially... all thanks to Steven Krashens ideas and, of course, your books, Olly. Thank you for that!

[@sunj8346]

Cantonese romanization now does not have a standard. The most popular ones are Jyutping, Yale romanization, Cantonese Pinyin and Cantonese Transliteration Scheme transliteration. but in Hong Kong, we are not taught these romanization at school although we speak every day. It might be one of the reasons why foreigners struggle when learning the language. These however are getting more popular here due to the rise of localism.

[@annacoello7623]

I am learning both Chinese and Spanish. My husband is from Ecuador and I find that vocabulary has to come after learning basic conjugation. Memorization works more for Chinese where conjugation is not really necessary to understanding the sentence. Whereas you could learn many words in Spanish but then going to conjugate them both changes spelling and sound. Just my experience :)

[@tymanung6382]

For example, see strange not yet described journey of ziyou. For most of 20th c., this word, literally self direction, was foreign translation for freedom, but Chinese in Mainland, Taiwan, SE Asia defined it as anti people, "war of all vs. all", anti social, etc. People used zizhu, self rule, to mean freedom. But, in 1990s, every1 switched to Western definition of freedom. Who knew? Who could predict ?

[@SoulEscalator]

Great interview! Maybe not appropriate to ask in here, but really curious. What is the program he mentioned beside using your program? “Baseline” something..

[@storylearning]

Baselang - great company!

[@SoulEscalator]

Olly Richards thank you for letting me know. Look forward to try your Spanish course too. But at this moment, I’m focusing on my Japanese. Greeting from your Hong kongese audience.

[@reptileclub8681]

I've always thought it would be cool to order in a Chinese restaurant in Mandarin, but the language is a bit difficult... especially while learning Korean and going to college

[@Luboman411]

Pretty cool. I live in NYC and I know 小马. He's a friend of a friend. I'm also fluent in Spanish and I am still struggling to learn basic Mandarin Chinese. It's a hard language. Good for him for trying to learn Spanish.

[@humanbean3]

xiaoma is a likeable guy thats for sure. what sounds great is at least chinese has basically one reading per character and has SOV grammar. japanese is so weird to get used to ... easy to pronounce though i guess lol

[@tymanung6382]

Most people say that Chinese basic statement and question word order is SVO for unemphasized sentences while O emphases special word orders include OSV, SOV, S Preposition ba OV.

[@4himsanctified]

50% cognates with Spanish (in English), but also remember that our prefixes and suffixes are the same. I would say 60-80% btwn Spanish and English is understandable for the observant eye.

[@lizbethdelgado9103]

You've never really learned Spanish then... English is very easy compared with Spanish in terms of grammar and vocabulary. The only thing about English harder for a Spanish speaker is the pronunciation of some words

[@4himsanctified]

@@lizbethdelgado9103 oh I agree, an yes I have and do study spanish.

[@nfrankiksa4596]

@@4himsanctified take in mind that as a spanish native speaker the lacking of congugations in english sometimes makes confusing to know what exactly a sentence is refering to

[@yun1666]

@@lizbethdelgado9103 and remember the spelling.

[@cardzink]

Lovely conversation!

[@storylearning]

i loved it

[@sunj8346]

I'm from Hong Kong and my native (written) language is Chinese (learnt using spoken Cantonese). My poorest subject at school is also Chinese. :)

[@jimaanders7527]

I have a good friend at work (in Texas) who grew up in Hong Kong. He said he likes English better than Chinese because it's easier to read and write :-)

[@yun1666]

@@jimaanders7527 but is way too slow to read，compare to mandarin。比起普通话英语的阅读速度过于慢了。the same meanings sentences but the length is already significant. English just use too so many space. Imagine that works for all the sentences.

[@robinrainmaker7232]

Canadians are direct and sarcastic. People in WA state who live near the border complain about them. They are curt and bad at customer service. Of course there are good and decent Canadians….they tend to be shy outside of their home country….but in their country they don’t often fit the stereotype Americans have of them. I’m from Alberta.

[@aydenzinter2849]

You mentioned Esperanto as an easier constructed language to learn but there are better ones, Jan misali goes into this in his video about it. One of the reasons it's actually harder to learn is it includes a lot of phonemes that are only present in 1 language, that being polish. The guy who made it was polish so it makes sense but it is still rather silly since people speaking other languages would need to learn new sounds.

[@すずちゃん-r3h]

I’m in a bit of dilemma here. Currently I’ve been learning Japanese for over 6 years and know it decently well. However, I’m also considering possibly picking up a 2nd foreign language for casual study alongside my Japanese. And I’m torn between these 2 exact languages from the video. The thing with Spanish is that it can be learned in a fraction of the amount of time it takes to learn Mandarin, and even more so since I already learned it for several years back in middle and high school. I remember a lot of it but forgot some unfortunately as my focus has completely been on Japanese in recent years. Also the tones in Chinese is very intimidating, as I don’t have the ear to distinguish them and speaking has never been my strong suit. However, I am quite a bit more fascinated by asian culture in general compared to Latin American culture. I’d be more interested in visiting China/Taiwan rather than a Spanish speaking country. And lastly the third option is to just completely focus on Japanese so I can progress faster in it. What would you guys recommend?

[@davepazz580]

I suggest you continue on with Japanese or start Chinese because cultural interest is probably the most important motivating factor in language learning... it makes you overcome whatever difficulties the langue presents.

[@claudiaramirezsobrado9465]

Loved the video By the way, If there’s another language creators meeting you should invite NativLanguage and EcoLinguistic

[@sandydegener6436]

Why in this day and age are we calling a group of seperate dialects spoken by the people who live in the country whose capitol is Beijing: Chinese? If they speak Mandarin, say Mandarin, if they speak Cantonese say Cantonese, but not "Chinese". And PLEASE, no hyphenated names!

[@jrmcconchie]

That’s just how English works. We do the same with Arabic, Spanish and such. Dialects tend to be lumped into a general language family, and if clarity is needed, then it is made.

[@sandydegener6436]

@@jrmcconchie, it's called being "provincial".

[@jrmcconchie]

@@sandydegener6436 if there is no need to be “provincial” to be understood, then why do it? Other than to be pedantic?

[@sandydegener6436]

@@jrmcconchie , it's nice to educate those that need it.

[@santiag0hernandez650]

Spanish should be called castillian then, there are more languages from Spain like vasque, galician or catalan.

[@isaaclau7741]

I love learning languages

[@tongduoxu2170]

Maybe you guys don't know Mark Henry Roswell from Canada who speaks Mandarin and understand the depth of language better than lots of native Chinese people. I would give my respect to call him 'Teacher' or 'Master'

[@reptileclub8681]

In German it was pretty easy, because it's a lot like English, vs. Korean which doesn't even use the same alphabet, and has so many differences

[@banbangu]

It was extremely interesting and sobering!

[@nyclee9133]

They do that in China because Confucius is a big part of chinese culture and education

[@jrmcconchie]

It’s about like trying to learn English with no understanding of sports. At least in America, there are constant references to sports

[@polyglotpengyou]

greattalk！！！

[@michaeldemarillac9992]

I have a text book with 3000 Spanish words that are virtually the same as English words give or take a few letters. Very comforting.

[@dreamzthief4758]

Good questions Olly liked the video

[@sallylauper8222]

This week I'm going to learn Chinese sentences based on the 1000 most common words, then I'm gonna switch to ikdontknow like Japanese,,, Vietnamese....

[@nicedog1]

I love his videos talking Chinese to people in the street.

[@nyclee9133]

Your right Japanese kept there culture lol where ever since the culture revolution a lot of old costumes are lost such as respect and speech and old ways that mao ze dong said was backwards and old do he let go of those principles aswell as made the Chinese language simplified

[@MrSherwin0116]

小馬 減肥囉

[@FoB39]

Took him 3 years but he took your advice

[@patrickcampillocastaneda7752]

I would say that both are pretty useful ,but let’s be realistic ,few westerners would be able to master Chinese or at least reaching a point when they become conversationally functional ,so considering that the best choice beetwen those two might be Spanish .

[@Kojitsu]

Learn the one you love because its the one you will learn. I can't imagine the willpower it must take to succeed in learning a language you don't care for.

[@alexfield866]

Shon the disbeliever!

[@OutNaBoutYallahBiNa]

Xiaomao..kuch wazan kam kijiye!

[@izzzu90]

Hahaha kya haraami banday ho

[@OutNaBoutYallahBiNa]

@@izzzu90 Aap ne kya bola chuttiya? Chup raho

[@donbenjamin6459]

Me gusto mucho la charla sobre china. El español esta lindo pero no lo recomendaria para aprender :v ( latinoamerica es lindo y hermoso para visitar. Pero todas las economias salvo 3 paises estan reventadas. El crimen y la corrupcipn es rampante y el sueño de cada joven es irse a un lugar mejor :P . Y bueno si lo hacen por españa suerte con el aprendizaje xd )

[@OutNaBoutYallahBiNa]

You should learn Arabic and urdu (Panjabi). UK will be a muslim country in the future. It is going to be handy. UK mustaqbil mein ek muslim mulk hoga.. Effective communication ke liye, Arabic aur urdu seekne bilkul bahut zyada aham hai. Also, on a practical level, UK mein bahut sare pakistani log hai. Islie, practice kerna kafi asaan hai.

[@roberto-cb3pn]

No it won’t hahah don’t be ridiculous, I’m not saying it won’t be useful as I have lots of Asian friends (Pakistani and Kurdish)but it won’t be a Muslim country

[@a.r.4707]

As a Muslim I should probably make hijra to UK then fisabilillaah.

[@anitamccoll1865]

The fresh drug ideally brush because halibut causally mug amidst a scarce decision. merciful, necessary dry