Language Barrier

What an interesting mural, the artist in me thought. What's this about? I wonder if there's some information. Oh, wait! There's a sign!

Oh, that's right! I CAN'T READ ANYTHING!

I spend 99 percent of my day having absolutely no idea what people say. I am trying to learn the language, one more thing I am figuring out in my new home. Sometimes I feel overwhelmed when trying to learn this language, but its starting to make sense -- albeit nominal sense.

The first few times I stopped at restaurants, I had no choice but to point to what vegetables I wanted in the stir fry and then point to the wok. On October 11, after nearly one month in China, I successfully ordered my first dish at a restaurant in Chinese.

"Wo yao yi ge qiezi." This is the pin-yin spelling for "I want one eggplant."

This sounds something like "Woh yeeow yee guh szche-eight-suh".

Here's the literal translation:
I (Wo)
want (yao)
one (yi)
(ge -- a qualifer with no Engish equivalent)
eggplant (qiezi).

First, I had to figure out what words Chinese words I needed. It took many conversations and flipping through my Lonely Planet Mandarin phrase book to get the right words.

Then I learned the pronunciation of each word and syllable. Pronunciation is hard because there are some sound combinations that we don't have in English, like this throaty "szch" sound for the first syllable in eggplant.

Now, add the the proper tones for each word:
Third low falling/rising (Wo)
Fourth falling (yao)
First high (yi)
Fourth falling (ge) (I think it's fourth falling.)
Second rising on the first syllable (qiezi)

Finally, I practiced this sentence over and over. I got enough of the the sentence correct because I ordered without having to point. They understood me, AND I could ask "Duoshao qian?" for "How much?" AND understand that "ba qian" meant eight qian (about $1.12 in American dollars).

Forget reading anything. Right now, I know the characters for people -- 人 -- and mouth -- 口. I can't yet recognize the characters for the city that I live in, Tongren.

It will be awhile before I can decipher enough of that mural sign to have any idea what the mural represents. Right now, it's a pretty picture.