What’s your level of Mandarin ‘Question’?

What’s your level of Mandarin? (Part 2) 🇨🇳

A question that always stumps me – and believe it or not, I don’t have an answer. I’ve never taken any official Mandarin language exams.

When I graduated from university, I could easily read articles on political and economic topics and understand speeches from Chinese leaders (although that would be much harder for me now).

I believe in learning by doing. Each job I’ve had has taught me a specific area of the language.

For example, at my first job in clothing production, I found myself in China needing to translate, “The jacket lining should be purple with a silver coating, and the buttons square.” I thought I’d get fired on the spot during that business trip! But I pulled myself together and quickly learned all the necessary vocabulary.

Then I moved on to medical equipment supply. No need to explain how challenging the terminology was, right? Nailed it! You want me to do an export declaration in Mandarin? It’ll be ready in 10 minutes!

Next came e-commerce and ad-tech. Thank God CPI in Mandarin is also CPI, because those first few months were rough. Now, I can confidently conduct QBRs with partners. Managed that as well!

Not knowing a word in a foreign language is completely normal – the key is knowing how to handle the situation.

Share your funny or challenging experiences with foreign languages 🙃