posted December 17, 2010 09:21 PM            

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2OFNhVaIOTU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeEGczF1KME

i also go to a website called meet-asian.com..so i'v been honing my skill there too (it should be counted as a skill, lol)

posted December 17, 2010 09:22 PM            

and RASP that's pretty funny you asked about the dog...

posted December 17, 2010 09:25 PM            

@road warrior

posted December 17, 2010 09:32 PM            

cappy, leo moon here and people often see me as selfish, when in reality i am soo not...i'm a giver

posted December 17, 2010 09:37 PM            

LOL, mandarin is a dialect of chinese...its the most spoken dialect in china..there are a bunch of other dialects too...like cantonese

posted December 17, 2010 11:01 PM            

Cappy1277,
You have a really unique & interesting look.

NickiG,
["mandarin is a dialect of chinese...its the most spoken dialect in china."]

Not so. Actually there are about 8 Main "Chinese," languages in China. Mandarin being one of them. From these 8, branches out approximately 400 officially recognized dialects. Infact, "Korean," is within one of these 400 recognized. This is why for centuries Korea never had an Emperor, but only ruling Kings. Korea, Manchuria, Mongolia, Tibet etc, their kings all paid tribute & taxes to the Chinese Emperor. Korea proclaimed true independence & their first "Emperor," in 1897 after the immediate collapse of the Imperial Chinese Empire.

Anyways there's a huge distinction between what makes a Language, vs. what makes a Dialect that's formed from part of a root language. Mandarin was only chosen to be the country's official language around 1911? 1913 after the collapse of the old Monarchy. Prior to that, everyone spoke their own Languages or Dialects. If you visit the Forbidden City, you'll see temple & other building signs written in both Manchurian & "Hanzi" (Kanji). Manchurian text looks more like Tibetan or Arabic or something. Indeed it's one of the distinctive 8 Languages in China, and is NOT a dialect. The Manchurians were the last ruling dynasty (350 years) of Imperial China. They only adopted the use of the "Han" chinese language to rule china. Now to Westerners, they just see the Manchurian Emperor as "Chinese." However the "Han-Chinese," regard Manchurians as a separate race & NOT "Chinese." If you know anything about Chinese History, you would know the Great Wall was built by Han-Chinese to specifically keep out "Barbaric" races like the Manchurians & Mongolians.

P.S. I've been studying Mandarin myself...

[Copied this]-->
So how do we distinguish a dialect from a language? A separate dialect is a form of speech different than your own that you can still understand (intelligibility) and the speaker of that dialect can still understand you (mutual intelligibility), though sometimes with difficulty, or you may not recognize the use of some words. Dialects often appear humorous or fun, because you can still understand, but it just sounds funny. After some exposure, most people can imitate the speech of a different dialect without difficulty. Most recognizable in dialects is an intonation different than your own speech and the use of different vowel shapes in addition to some different vocabulary. But what makes a dialect not a language is that the grammar and syntax are pretty much the same. This is apparent between the main American and British dialects of English.