HOW I STARTED STUDYING CHINESE LANGUAGE

It seems like yesterday but it has been 6 good years since I started learning Mandarin Chinese.

WHAT MADE ME CHOOSE CHINESE LANGUAGE OUT OF EVERYTHING?

I always say this to people that it’s a long story and it actually is and i guess it’s time to write it down. It all started after my 12th grade exams where I got my result which was 85.5% and definitely was not good enough to get admission for B.com hons back in 2012 and I always have a fixed plan on doing B.com hons, then MBA in finance and then working into banking sector (everything was planned) BUT everything changed with my result.

I got into B.com and with that, I really became hopeless with my life (I was dramatic that time) because it’s not really I was looking for but I had no option as there was so much lack of awareness on career options for me that time. But I didn’t give up. Once I was talking with my cousin and he suggested me to go for languages. As I have studied Sanskrit till 10th, I knew I always had a flair for languages and I love studying it too.

So, I started researching on languages and my first instinct was to remove European languages from my research, as I wasn’t much inclined to pursue any European language (though currently I am obsessed with Spanish). Instead, I searched for Asian languages and I saw 3 options Korean, Japanese and Chinese. Now I knew nothing about the country, history, culture of these languages. So I read a lot of articles and came to a conclusion to study Mandarin Chinese.

Why?

1. It is considered as world’s most difficult language.

2. It is also considered as world’s most spoken language.

3. Trade between India and China is huge irrespective of how government or media portrays it.

4. Highest pay was in this language in India, as there is a lot of demand but not enough supply

These reasons were enough logical for me to pursue this language.

My struggle in learning Chinese

Intially, I wanted to go to JNU to study this language as it’s the most popular place for learning languages but somehow I was under the impression that they have part time certificate course for the language and I do want to study it as part-time thing rather than doing graduation in it. However, they didn’t have it as part-time course. So because of the misunderstanding, I didn’t enroll in DU as well and my 1st year got wasted. Next in 2013, In 2nd year of my college, I started learning Mandarin Chinese at St.Stephens College, Delhi University. I studied from that old orange color Chinese elementary book and finished it’s 1st book. After studying for an year (6 hours a week), only thing I could do with Chinese is write and read efficiently (never got the hang of tones by then). My listening and speaking didn’t improve an inch. I felt so lost at that time that I planned to find some other place to continue my learning.

Later, I also got to know after studying for an year that the certificate I am getting from there doesn’t recognize by Delhi University as well. I was really devastated and felt like being cheated. I went to different colleges in DU for diploma program but none of them accepted me and I really didn’t want to continue in Stephens so I started searching for private Institutes which teaches Chinese language.

Back in 2014, there were only 2-3 institutes who taught Mandarin Chinese in New Delhi (unlike today where there are at least 20). So I landed up in one institute which I felt was pretty good and the teacher’s teaching method was different. [Though later when I started teaching and really got to know the language, my opinion changed as I realised I was taught via pinyin this whole time without even focusing much on tones and characters, it was a good way for a business man to learn Chinese but definitely not recommended for serious academic learners]

So I studied basic and intermediate chinese from there for about 7-8 months (started learning Chinese again from scratch) and during that process, I got to know that there are scholarship programs to study in China. I asked about it to my Institute teacher and my teacher from Stephens as well but the information given by them was very vague, equal to nothing. They never gave any information about anything – No website, no links, nothing. But I was still determined. So I googled it. I researched a lot and got to know about Confucius Institute Scholarship. (I still couldn’t gather any info on Govt. Scholarship)

Now, I got to know that in order get the scholarship I had to pass some HSK exam and that was August 2014 and there was only one exam that used to conduct in whole year and that was in October 2014. I needed to pass HSK level 2 and HSKK 1 in order to apply for CIS. So, I started preparing for these exams and went all the way to Vellore, Chennai to appear for it. I gave 3 exams in one day – HSK 1 (200/200) , HSK 2 (199/200), HSKK 1 (78/100).

After that, I applied for CIS in March. I felt like I was actually letting loose an arrow in the dark (अँधेरे में तीर चलाना) as there was NO SINGLE PERSON to guide me on how to apply for it, what’s the criteria for selection but I was persistent and I kept believing in myself and in my dreams. After a lot of sleepless nights, exchanging unlimited emails and taking help from unknown chinese people via facebook for my SOP (statement of purpose), I eventually got the scholarship to study in China.

What happened after that?

That’s a blog post for another day.