Part 3: and the journey continues...

I found studypond.com...

     I think that is when I seriously began to  truly learn Chinese. Suddenly, having the opportunity to speak with real Chinese people, who didn't speak/write the best English, forced me to learn at least some very very basic Mandarin. 我 (wo) = I, 你 (ni) = you, and 他 (ta) = he/him/she/her. 是 (shi) = to be (copula verb, the closest equivalent of the "to be" verb in English). With that, I added a few extra vocabulary words, such as "xue sheng" (student), "mei guo ren" (American person), etc. Thus, I had some very, very basic vocabulary... luckily, the grammar was similar to English.

     For example: 我 (wo=I) 是 (shi=is/am) 美国人 (mei guo ren=American person). "I am American (person)." The same word order as english. Woohoo!

     With this, I find studypond.com, and it had some free lessons, as well as a "study partner" section, both of which I was interested in.

     The first person I tried to talk to, was a Chinese guy in Chengdu, who was an engineering student. He didn't speak English well at all, and I realized very quickly, that my very very tiny vocabulary and grammar wasn't sufficient to continue talking to him. We both became frustrated, and never talked after our second time. Strike one.

     The second person who I tried to talk to was a business lady in Shanghai, who said she was 31, unmarried, and wanted to practice her spoken English. When I tried to write in English, I she barely understood. Instead, she called me using msn, and we tried to talk. As long as I used very simple English, and spoke moderately slowly, she understood me. For me, with Chinese, I spoke terribly. My tones were terrible, and I didn't know how to properly pronounce the words. So, she helped me with my pronunciation, and corrected my tones. For that, I was grateful. However, I quickly got the feeling that she wasn't just interested in practicing language. She seemed lonely... I think she was looking for more than just a person to practice with, and I, being 17 at the time, was just a polite American kid :). Soon, she became busy with work, and began to miss our chat appointments. So, we fell away from our communication...I would like to think we both had a good, educational experience. She just seemed to be looking for more. Strike two.

     The third person I tried talking to, caught my eye with a picture of the side of her face staring at a computer. The look on the face seemed very determined, and that immediately looked both attractive and encouraging. So, I sent an email to her in both English and Spanish (she said on her profile that she was interested in Spanish, so I tried it.). She responded to me in both English, and all Chinese characters! (I, at this time, probably only knew 15 characters in total...it blew my mind). She said that she was a student, studying international business, and that she was excited to have an American person to practice her English with. With that, we began talking, slowly building an acquaintanceship. At first, we exchanged only very general information, and interests.

     I tried to use as much Chinese as I knew, but it quickly became apparent that she knew much more English than I knew Chinese, so that it happened we began to mainly use English. At first, I would give a definition for every other word that I used in English...slowly, though, I began to reduce the definitions, so that after two months, I would rarely use a definition, unless I thought that it was a completely new word. Still, she began to impress me with her views, ideas, and opinions. One thing that was fascinating, was when she would talk about her opinions of her own country... I began to see a different China, through the eyes of a Chinese girl. It was different than the news or movies in the U.S. would try to show it. The China she began to show me, made sense, was living and breathing, trying to heal itself, even as it battled different perceived sicknesses within itself. For the first time, not only was I interested in Chinese (Mandarin), but also the fascinating country and culture that spoke the language.

     Strike three... wait, there never was a strike three. Instead, I began to work hard to maintain the valuable relationship which I had accidentally come into, realizing before I knew it, that half my mind was beginning to live in China, the China as lived in through the eyes of this girl. 

And so, my journey continued, following an unexpected path. It was a path that began to change both my view of the world, and my plans for the future...