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The Chinese Language
Chinese is many languages in one, indeed it has at least six variations, among which we find Yue, Pu-Xian, Min Nan, Min Dong, Hakka Chinese and Mandarin. Chinese is the language with most native speakers, as estimates say that about 1.2 billion people speak Chinese, a data which more or less corresponds to one fifth of world population.The Republic of China in Taiwan and People's Republic of China have recognised standard Mandarin as their official language. Mandarin is also one among the six official languages of the United Nations.
Dialects
Written Chinese is based on a single code, while oral communication is regulated by a great variety of forms (also called dialects), which can be mutually unintelligible one with another.Mandarin is the standard form of Chinese, it is the language of education and the official language of People's Republic of China. Guoyu and Huayu are the languages of education respectively in Taiwan and Singapore (plus Malaysia).
For some countries, TV language can be taken as a good example of standard and correct language...With Chinese, forget it all! Indeed, the media show a language that surely can't be defined as the purest form of Chinese. Beijing's anchorpersons when trying to imitate the standard dialect force their tone a little bit and sound unnatural. In Taiwan, the problem does not lie in pronunciation- anchors use a more natural tone-but in the kind of words which can be heard: often, tv folks use antique forms which are fallen into disuse in the modern language and sometimes they use the typical consonants of Taiwan, which are quite different from the ones of standard Chinese. Generally speaking, it can be said that professors of prestigious Universities are the only people who speak correct Standard Chinese.
Grammar
In case you decide to study Chinese, undoubtely the first problem lies in the script. Chinese script is based on isolated syllables, each of them corresponding to a word. What might be seem as a simplification, in reality can cause problems to learners. Indeed, as there are few syllables, many words sound very similar and a beginner might not be able to distinguish words between them. If Chinese script can be hard job for foreigners, the same can't be said for native speakers: indeed, the script is the only thing which unifies all dialects, as there is one single written form for all the different varieties. This universal status of Chinese script allows communication also between people whose dialects are completely unlike.If the alphabet has already frightened you, wait and have a look at grammar, which is totally different from that of romance languages. Let's start softly with conjugation and inflection, that won't be very complicated: verbs' conjugation is quite simple and is based on a single grammatical form. The same can't be said for syntax, that has some peculiar rules: Chinese is a "topic-prominent" language, so that the topic always comes at the beginning of the sentence. This structure allows bizarre constructions which are the equivalent of "Swimming I am the best" or "Today climb mountains, tomorrow camp outdoors".
The last curious construction we are going to look at is the "serial verb" construction, where two connected verbs, for instance "this movie I look-no-understand", are used to express two subsequent, different actions-the phrase would correspond to "I can't understand this movie (even though I watched it.)".
Idioms
Do you want to speak Chinese with an attitude? Here you will find a list of the most commonly used idioms, which will help you to boast all your knowledge of the language.Watch out from the "Hu Ja Hu Wei", that are weak people who pretend to be strong to harm others. In English it would be "Fake fox, Fearsome tiger".
And now, two expressions which will be very useful at work: one is "Bu Ru Hu Xue, Yan De Hu Ze", which literally is translated with "How can (we) retrieve the baby tiger without going into the tiger's nest?" and is used to describe an ambitious employee; the other is "Chen Feng Po Lon" (literally: "Ride the wind and Break the waves") and that can be translated with "Great Rewards usually require a great degree of risk".
..And the last expression is the easiest way to become rich and famous: it is "Ku Kou Pou Shin" (literaly "Bitter Mouth, Old lady's heart") and is used to describe those who tries VERY hard to persuade others.