Answer to One China Travel Question
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Q: I am told that mandarin is spoken in the Beijing area of China. How do I get some language words so that I can use when I visit in November?
| | A: Mandarin is the term used in the West to refer to the type of Chinese spoken in Beijing, which is also the official tongue of China. In other words, mandarin Chinese is the equivalent of King's English or Queen's English in Britain. In reality, it is a regional dialect declared to be the official spoken Chinese of Chinese. There are hundreds - don't know the precise number if there is one - of dialects in China, Cantonese is one of the bigger ones, spoken in the area near Guangzhou, Shenzhen and Hong Kong. (Canton is the old Western - Portuguese - name for Guangzhou, even though originally the term was used to refer to Guangdong, which is the province in which Guangzhou, the city, is located. That's why it's hard to see the similarity between Canton and Guangzhou whereas Canton and Guangdong do sound similar.)
As for getting Chinese words for places in the Beijing area. Do you mean Romanized Chinese words or Chinese characters? In any event, maybe you can find a dictionary. Names of some places are hard to find, however, due to the way they're translated. "Summer Palace" in Beijing for instance, refers to Yuanming Yuan, which literally means Harmonious Bright Garden. "Lamar Temple" refers to Yonghe Gong, which means "Solemn Unity Palace" (it is a palace because it was initially built as a residence for a prince in the Ming Dynasty; it was later used to house priests from Tibet). "Changcheng" is Great Wall. "Tiantan" is Temple of Heaven. "Jingju" is Peking (Beijing) Opera. "Beijing Kaoya" is Peking Duck (roasted duck). You can send us some terms that you have difficulties to come by and we'll help you with them.
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