Michael Phelps who claimed a almanac eight gold medals at the Beijing Olympic Games said it was harder for him to apprentice Chinese than to win pond races.
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Before the American came to China for the 2008 Games he actively took a few Chinese lessons. A accepted online video shows how harder he tries to imitate the articulation of a Chinese acquirements multimedia software in adage such basal words as "guo zhi" (juice), "nan hai'er" (boy) and "nu hai'er" (girl).
But still, the 23-year-old rated his Chinese accent studies as the alotof difficult affair he had approved in his life. "Learning Mandarin is even harder than acceptable eight gold medals in the pool."
In primary academy Phelps took French and German courses, but the pond ace said, "all the words, characters and pronunciations in Mandarin are so different. All of them are harder to manage."
He was not the alone brilliant amateur aggravating to apprentice some Chinese accent and culture. When aerialist Nastia Liukin accustomed aback home in Dallas, Texas, with5medals about her neck, the Russian-born albino appeared in foreground of her accession cutting a atramentous T-shirt with two big Chinese characters "Beijing" in the front.
"The Beijing Olympics accept brought apple absorption to the Chinese acculturation and added added the account of the Chinese accent worldwide," said Zhao Guocheng, the Office of Chinese Language Council International (OCLCI) agent administrator general.
He alleged the Games an befalling for the Chinese accent to accretion added acceptance and for China to be bigger accepted by foreigners.
CHINESE LEARNING AREA
As a absolute way for foreigners to accretion compassionate of the nation's ability and history, Chinese characters are assuredly the alotof accessible signs of the nation.
Some adopted assemblage who witnessed the Games' aperture celebration at Beijing's National Stadium were absolutely puzzled if aesthetic administrator Zhang Yimou presented a achievement showcasing the country's age-old apparatus of movable-type printing. The appearance featured a accumulation of some 900 men assuming the operation of a printer and creating the angel of the Chinese appearance "he," acceptation "harmony," in altered calligraphic styles.
