Great Start to China Experience

"I came to Beijing not knowing a word of Chinese and feeling very overwhelmed by the language barrier.

My plan was to do the 1 month Intensive Chinese Program before moving to a different city. I wanted to learn as much spoken Chinese as possible in order to communicate with people in my everyday life, focusing on topics such as ordering at restaurants, taking taxis, etc.

Those 4 weeks flew by and I completed the “Survival Chinese” course and covered even more topics! I have taken other foreign language courses before which were often very dense and had a rather boring structure. Startup China’s partner school, That’s Mandarin, mixes things up by giving students different teachers and various class structures. Instead of working through each exercise from a workbook like in many classroom settings, I often found myself having casual conversations with my teachers, slowing down when I didn't understand and learning new words and sentence structures along the way. This type of class was my favorite because it was all personalized to what I wanted to learn on a specific day. It made learning seem less like a forced effort.

I enjoyed every moment of my stay in Beijing, from my classes to living in the apartment that Startup China arranged for me. This living situation helped me meet other people my age who were also interning and studying Chinese."

I left Beijing feeling very prepared to start my next adventure in China and with a whole new group of friends. I thank Startup China and That’s Mandarin for the great experience!