Chinese Languages

In China are spoken A LOT of different languages. Among them there are Mandarin (the official language of the People's Republic of China), Cantonese (spoken for example in Hong Kong) and Taiwanese. Anyway, the writing system (Chinese characters) is the same for all Chinese languages; so the term Mandarin (or Cantonese) refers only to the spoken language.

Do you think Chinese writing system is complex? I do agree! But we have made it easy to learn. The secret is: focus your efforts and time only on the most frequently used characters! Click here for the list of the 1,000 most commonly used Chinese characters.

For example, consider the following Chinese text (the characters belonging to the list of 1,000 most commonly used Chinese characters are highlighted in yellow -
for the list of the most frequently used Chinese characters click here):

可是，“人爱上了清洁”只爱得很肤浅。企业家不久就把普通的肥皂改头换面，成为美容产品。广告也巧妙地令消费者相信，使用某些个人卫生产品，可以提升自己的社会地位，惹来艳羨。电视宣传手段，使这种观念更深印人心。可是，我们却很少在广告和肥皂剧中，看到那些成功和俊美的商界人士打扫居室、洒扫庭园、清理废物，或处理猫、狗的排泄物。

The text above is composed by a total of 139 characters. 119 of them (85%), highlighted in yellow, belong to the list of 1,000 most commonly used Chinese characters -
for the list of the most frequently used Chinese characters click here.

English translation:

This "love affair with cleanliness," however, apparently was only skin deep. It was not long before enterprising merchants turned the humble soap into a beauty product. Clever advertisements led customers to believe that using certain personal hygiene products would give the user social status that others could only envy. Television perpetuates this fantasy. The successful and glamorous people featured in commercials and on soap operas are seldom seen cleaning the house, sweeping the yard, picking up trash, or cleaning up after their pet cats and dogs.

List of different Chinese characters contained in the text above:

可是人爱上了清洁只得很肤浅企业家不久就把普通的肥皂改头换面成为美容产品广告也巧妙地令消费者相信使用某些个卫生以提升自己社会位惹来艳羨电视宣传手段这种观念更深印心我们却少在和剧中看到那功俊商界士打扫居室洒庭园理废物或处猫狗排泄

So, since there's only one writing system for all Chinese languages, our exhortation is: start now to learn how ALL Chinese languages are written, focusing on the most commonly used words and characters!