Chinese Community Center partnering with
business for Chinese Language Studies
 Adult
Class Schedule
Mandarin Chinese is becoming one of the hottest foreign languages on the
plant and experts agree, could become the language of the world within
the next decade.
Also, over one-fifth of the world’s population speaks Chinese and that
number continues to grow as American business partner and work with
Chinese companies.
“China is a hot spot for the oil and gas industry and Houston companies
are opening offices there, or sending staff over for weeks or months at
a time. Business between Houston companies and Chinese companies is
booming,” said Bonnie Wei, educational coordinator, Chinese Community
Center, Houston.
As business begins to boom, China’s 1.3 billion people are gaining
income, and the domino effect will be they’ll demand more products and
services. Dr. Penelope Prime, an economics professor and director of the
China Research Center at Kennesaw University said, “China’s economy will
to some extent drive the global economy. It’s not just an economy that’s
growing, but rather it’s one that’s very large in size.”
“As this trend continues, many American schools, from kindergarten to
high schools are steadily offering Chinese language classes. However, to
fill the gap for adults, we are offering Chinese language classes on
Saturdays and Wednesday evenings,” said Wei.
Companies such as oil companies, oil field service companies, suppliers,
manufacturers and others involved in business in China are beginning to
realize they need basic Chinese language skills, at least survival
language skills when traveling through or staying in China on business.
However, with the 2008 Olympics being held in Beijing, many people are
interested in learning enough Chinese to shop, order food or ask for
directions.
Yet, as many major corporation are investing in China, the younger
generation understands the ability to speak Chinese would add points to
their resume when seeking employment.
Fourteen-year-old Claire Johns said, “China is becoming a lot bigger and
more important in the world, and the other languages may not be as
important anymore, so I’m taking Chinese.”
According to Wei, many people believe Chinese is a very difficult
language to learn or to speak but it isn’t. In Chinese, there are no
gender specific words or masculine and feminine words like in Spanish or
French, which makes it a little easier.
“We work with many companies teaching their employees survival Chinese
language, to cover the basic needs while working in or visiting China.
Adults who are serious about learning Chinese, we offer 17 week courses
on many different levels such as beginner 1, beginner 2, beginner 3,
intermediate 3, and intermediate 4. We also offer Chinese Conversation
and Applying Chinese which is for those who speak Chinese fairly well.
These two advanced classes help refine their conversation skills,” Wei
said.
According to one adult student, Murtuza Babrawala, “Learning Chinese is
not that difficult, once you understand a couple of the basics. First,
there are four levels of sound, and each level means something
different. The written language is similar to hieroglyphics so after
learning the basics it becomes easier. One thing about Chinese that is
different than English is you need to memorize the words.”
For more information on Chinese Language Classes, visit the Chinese
Community Center, 9800 Town Park, Houston, Texas 77036, or call
713.271.6100 x 160 or 0 or visit
www.ccchouston.org
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