[2022-10-24]Reddit讨论：你学习中文的动力是什么呢？

queenofhyrule
Living in China and my boyfriend’s family. They have been so welcoming and I hadn’t really taken learning the language seriously until he told me that his mom was practicing English on a language learning app. Specifically she was learning “are you hungry?” and “would you like some food?” I cried 😭😭 and then took learning mandarin seriously from then on out haha

住在中国，我的男朋友家里。他们非常欢迎我，但我并没有认真对待这门语言的学习，直到他告诉我他妈妈在一个语言学习APP上练习英语。特别是，她在学“你饿了吗？”还有“你想吃点什么？”，我哭了，然后从那时起，就开始认真学习汉语了 哈哈

marcusround -> queenofhyrule
Omg, that's so sweet, and so Chinese hahaha

我勒个天，太甜蜜了，太中国味了，哈哈哈

SimplyChineseChannel -> queenofhyrule
That’s really touching! Thanks for sharing!

真的很感人！谢谢分享！

False_Compote3081
I got interest in the Chinese language since I watched a dounghua called Heaven Official Blessing and it kinda make me fall in love with chinese language(although I don’t where I can learn the language with a teacher where I live) and I have interest in the Chinese culture and living in place where I can use Chinese most of the time and to read danmei in it original language, anyways I’m curious to know the reason why you guys have the desire to learn Chinese.

我看了一部名为《天官赐福》的中国动画，就对中文产生了兴趣，这部动画让我爱上了中文（虽然我住的地方没有教中文的老师），我对中国文化很感兴趣，并且生活在一个能大部分时间使用中文的地方，还能阅读原文的耽美小说，总之，我很想知道你们学习中文的原因和愿望。

Sereezus
I was motivated to learn Chinese because once at a friends house the mom talked poorly about me in Chinese in front of my face and I didn’t even know until my friend told me later on. As a joke I said I was going to learn Chinese so I could clapback but I took the joke too far and now im on HSK4. But yea I always thought learning languages was fun to begin with~

我学习中文的动机是因为有一次在朋友家里，他的妈妈当着我的面用中文说我的坏话，我甚至不知道，直到后来我的朋友告诉了我。作为一个玩笑，我说我要学习中文，这样我就可以回嘴了，但我把这个玩笑开过头了，现在我是汉语水平4级。但是，是的，我一直认为学习语言一开始就很有趣~

bradynotbrady -> Sereezus
But did you clap back?

但你回嘴了吗？

the_pikarmy
Danmei was also my motivator to get started, and now I'm thoroughly enjoying my Chinese learning journey on a purely linguistic level and I love how logical and structured it is! No gender, no conjugation, no changing word ending - only words and particles, which makes it feel so clean! Tones are definitely a challenge as this is my first tonal language, but it's one I love to take on ❤️
FYI I would rate myself an HSK4 / pre-intermediate level, how simple and clean (🎶) Chinese truly is!

耽美小说也是我开始学习的动力，现在我非常享受在纯语言层面上的中文学习之旅，我喜欢中文的逻辑性和结构性！没有性别，没有词形变化，没有词尾变化——只有词和小词，感觉非常干净！音调绝对是一个挑战，因为这是我学的第一种音调语言，但它是我喜欢的一种。
仅供参考，我给自己的评级是汉语水平4级或中等以上的水平，中文真的是很简单、干净(🎶) ！

nobaraotome -> the_pikarmy
What other languages do you speak? Just curious :)

你还会说其他语言吗? 只是出于好奇 :)

kirasenpai
I was trying to order Chinese food in Rome… they couldn’t speak English … so that was the trigger

我想在罗马点中餐... 因为他们不会说英语... 所以这就是导火索

KerfuffleV2
I'm interested in the perspective learning another language could give (I was monolingual when I decided to learn). I also find the idea of tonal languages pretty interesting.
I also liked the idea that Chinese is pretty regular, doesn't have a lot of exceptions, nothing like words with gender. I wanted something that seemed logical and made sense, was different enough from English to actually be interesting and had tones.
My reasons are pretty much only based on the language itself rather than culture, country or people.

我对学习另一种语言所能带来的视角感兴趣(我只会一种语言)。我还发现音调语言的概念非常有趣。
我也喜欢中文的规律，没有太多的例外，没有像带性别的词语。我想要一种语言，看起来有逻辑、有意义，不同于英语，实际上很有趣并且带有声调。
我的理由很大程度上只是基于语言本身，而不是文化，国家或人。

PopularPianistPaul -> KerfuffleV2
Chinese is pretty regular, doesn't have a lot of exceptions, 两

回复：中文很规律，没有太多的例外
“两”

KerfuffleV2 -> PopularPianistPaul
I did say pretty regular, not that there were no exceptions. Even constructed languages like Esperanto have some irregularities.
Compared to English (which is the only other language I really have in-depth knowledge of), Chinese seems a lot more regular/logical. I think part of it is because the government to some degree "designed" the language when they tried to unify stuff long ago.

我确实说了很规律，并不是说完全没有例外，甚至像世界语这样的人工语言，也有一些不规律的地方。
与英语(这是我唯一真正深入了解的其他语言)相比，中文似乎更有规律/逻辑。我认为部分原因是很久以前政府就为了统一规范，在某种程度上“设计”了这种语言。

takeitchillish -> KerfuffleV2
Much more regular than Latin languages. Just think about gender and verb forms.

中文比拉丁语要规律多了，想想性别和动词形式就知道了。

mauganra_it -> PopularPianistPaul
That's a quite minor exception though. And it occurs only with 2. Not with 12, 20, 22, etc., or any other numbers, or when used as an ordinal number.

不过“两”是个很小的例外。只能用在2上。不能和12、20、22等，或任何其他数字一起使用，也不能作为序数使用。

FruitSnackEater
High school required a foreign language and I knew I liked Chinese food. Easy choice. I chose it as my foreign language in college because it was familiar and I liked C-dramas.

高中要求学一门外语，我知道我喜欢中国菜。很容易选择。我在大学时选择了中文作为我的外语，因为对它很熟悉，而且我喜欢中国电视剧。

False_Compote3081 -> FruitSnackEater
Do you know untamed?

你知道《陈情令》吗？

FruitSnackEater -> False_Compote3081
The drama? Yes. Haven’t watched it though.

电视剧？知道，但我还没看过。

False_Compote3081 -> FruitSnackEater
Yeah that one

对，就是那个

Medschool_disaster
When I was 10 we got a boy in our class from China who didn’t speak our language yet. At that age I decided I wanted to learn the language but quickly gave up since my parents didn’t help me. Years later at 18 I met this guy again and he spoke my language perfectly and I still couldn’t speak any Chinese. That’s when I decided to learn Chinese but seriously this time since I was old enough to find my own teachers, resources,…

我10岁的时候，我们班上有一个来自中国的男孩，他还不会说我们的语言。在那个年纪时，我决定要学习他的语言，但很快就放弃了，因为我父母没有帮助我。几年后，在我18岁的时候，我再次遇到了那个人，他说我们的语言说得很流利，但我仍然不会说中文。那时开始，我决定学习中文，但这次是认真的，因为我已经长大了，可以给自己找老师、资源等...

SimplyChineseChannel -> Medschool_disaster
That’s a cool story!

真是一个好故事！

PSunYi
Dad is Taiwanese but never really taught me growing up. Want to be able to better connect to my heritage and family and travel alone to Taiwan confidently some day.

我爸是台湾人，但从小到大都没教过我中文。我希望有一天能够更好地与自己的家庭和传统联系起来，自信地独自去台湾旅行。

HomelessGreg
I started learning Portuguese because my wife is Brazilian. I enjoyed learning a new language. My new goal was to be able to speak with as many people as possible in the world so I opted for learning all the UN official languages. I speak French and English. Speaking Portuguese means I can understand most Spanish speakers if they speak slowly. So now I am working on Arabic, Chinese and Russian.

我开始学葡萄牙语是因为我的妻子是巴西人。我喜欢学习新的语言。我的新目标是能够与世界上尽可能多的人交谈，所以我选择学习联合国所有的官方语言。我会说法语和英语。说葡萄牙语意味着如果大多数说西班牙语的人说得慢一点，我就能听懂他们说的话。所以现在我正在学习阿拉伯语、汉语和俄语。

False_Compote3081 -> HomelessGreg
Oh cool, I’m Brazilian like your wife.

太帅了，我和你老婆一样都是巴西人。

SimplyChineseChannel -> HomelessGreg
Arabic, Chinese & Russian all at the same time? Wow! 它们都很难。

阿拉伯语、汉语和俄语同时学吗？哇！它们都很难。

Choucroute34
I've been sitting next to a nice Chinese lady at work for the past three years here in Belgium. She studied in Chicago and we've always communicated in English, to the point that while recognising she's Chinese everyone just thinks of her as an English speaker. A little more than a year ago, she started talking on her phone and taking notes in Chinese while I looked on, a little startled.
In need of a new mental challenge and after some thought, I decided to give it a go just to see if I could. Now I'm hooked and it feels like I have a superpower when I'm writing my gramatically poor homework and launching sounds such as zhe and xi. The poetry of the language and the challenge are more than enough motivation for me to keep going. There have already been some rough spots and my progress has been really slow compared with other languages that I've learned, but I think that I'm in for the long haul.

在比利时的三年里，我一直坐在一位可爱的中国女士的旁边工作。她在芝加哥学习，我们一直用英语交流，以至于在意识到她是中国人的同时，每个人都以为她是一个英语母语的人。一年多以前，她开始用汉语打电话和记笔记，而我在一旁看着，有点惊讶。
我需要一个新的精神挑战，经过一番思考后，我决定试一试，看看自己能不能做到。现在我被迷住了，当我在书写我语法不规范的作业，发出类似“zhe”和“xi”这样的声音时，我感觉自己有一种超能力。这门语言的诗意和挑战，足以激励我坚持下去。我已经遇到了一些困难，与我学过的其他语言相比，我的进步非常缓慢，但我认为我会长期坚持学下去。

HumbleSogeum
I work in an office in my cities Chinatown and I wanted to know what all the 汉字 I walk past on my way in is. Turns out the language is quite fun.

我在我们城市的唐人街的一个办公室工作，我想知道我在走过的时候，看到的“汉字”都是什么意思。结果发现这种语言非常有趣。

Lokar13
I randomly watched the Untamed one night about 22 months ago, I loved it so much I read the translated book over like three days.
Loved the book so much I immediately decided I wanted to learn to read Chinese so I read more books like it without relying on bad / sporadic translations.
It's been 22 months and I've read 7,705,109 characters of native books and countless cdramas. And i'm about 15% of the way through 魔道祖师 and looking to try to finish it by the end of the year.
Really, learning a language to read is a super powerful motivator!

大约22个月前的一个晚上，我偶然看了《陈情令》，我非常喜欢这部电视剧，以至于我花了三天的时间读了这本翻译过来的书。
我非常喜欢这本书，所以我立刻决定学习阅读中文，这样我就可以读更多类似的书，而不是依靠糟糕/零星的翻译。
22个月过去了，我已经读了7,705,109字的原著和无数的中国电视剧。我已经读完了《魔道祖师》的15%，希望能在年底前读完它。
真的，学习一门语言来阅读是一种非常强大的动力！

impostor2003
At first it was out of curiousity. However seeing the link in vocabulary between Chinese and my native language (Vietnamese) urged me to proceed. As a Vietnamese it's kinda easier to approach Chinese tbh, we share many vocabularies just like Japan and Korea

一开始是出于好奇。然而，看到中文和我的母语(越南语)之间的词汇联系，促使我继续学习。说实话，作为越南人更容易学习中文，我们有很多共同的词汇，就像日本和韩国一样

godston34
I one night had the thought that if I learn a word a day, in 10 years I could speak another language, no matter what language, so I chose between chinese and russian and picked chinese :) It's been 6 months and I'm at 430 characters that I can read and I made 1 chinese friend I regularly meet.
I always liked asian cultures but didn't want to explain every time that I don't watch anime. (except akira).

有一天晚上，我想，如果我每天学一个单词，10年后我就能说另一种语言了，不管是什么语言，所以我在中文和俄语之间选择了中文 :) 已经过去6个月了，我能读430个字，我还结交了一个经常见面的中国朋友。
我一直喜欢亚洲文化，但不想每次都解释说我不看动漫。(除了亚基拉)。

SimplyChineseChannel -> godston34
Made a Chinese friend that you regularly meet! Priceless!

结交了一个经常见面的中国朋友！非常珍贵！

WOw_SoHereIAm1
I started learning almost 4 years ago since I met my husband who is a Chinese citizen. I wanted to be able to talk with my husbands parents, they don’t speak English really. And also, i wanted to be able to understand things when I go to China.
I had learned Japanese in high school so at least I knew some of the characters but the tones still get me every time with Chinese

自从我遇到我的中国丈夫，我大约4年前就开始学习中文了。我想能和我丈夫的父母交谈，他们不会说英语。还有，我想去中国的时候，能够了解一些事情。
我在高中时学过日语，所以至少我认识一些汉字，但是每次用汉语读的时候，音调还是会打动我

mowgliho
My goal for a long time had been to learn to speak to as many people as possible - thus I wanted to learn English, Chinese, Spanish, and Arabic.
Cantonese came more naturally as my parents speak it with me. Mandarin Chinese, however, has been much harder. But still fun!

很长一段时间以来，我的目标一直是学会和尽可能多的人交流——因此，我想学习英语、汉语、西班牙语和阿拉伯语。
由于我的父母和我一直用粤语交流，所以粤语学得更自然。然而，普通话则要难得多。不过还是很有趣！

kjong3546
Stereotypical uncultured ABC. Also the only one of 4 siblings who wasn’t able to just pick it up at home. Thankfully that part is improving, I can somewhat follow. Caught my mom off guard when she tried to talk to my grandma.

我是典型的未开化的ABC。也是四个兄弟姐妹中唯一一个没法在家里用中文交流的。值得庆幸的是，这问题正在改善，我可以在某种程度上跟上。当我妈要跟我奶奶说话时，我让她愣住了。

False_Compote3081 -> kjong3546
ABC?

ABC是？

kjong3546 -> False_Compote3081
American-Born Chinese

在美国出生的中国人

False_Compote3081 -> kjong3546
Oh , I thought you guys used to call yourselves “Chinese american” only, also sorry for my bad English

哦，我还以为你们以前只自称“华裔美国人”呢，也为我糟糕的英语感到抱歉

Shenari -> False_Compote3081
Conversely I'm a BBC, British Born Chinese.
I'm slowly learning mandarin as that's my partner's native language, I only speak Cantonese. And my child goes to a bilingual (English/Mandarin) nursery so my aim is currently to keep ahead of them!

而我是BBC，在英国出生的华人。
我正在慢慢学习普通话，因为那是我老婆的母语，我只会说粤语。我孩子上的是双语(英语/普通话)托儿所，所以我的目标是保持领先他们！

False_Compote3081 -> Shenari
That’s cool, also is your wife from mainland China or Taiwan? Sorry for asking

挺好的，你的老婆是来自中国大陆还是台湾呢？很抱歉这么突兀地问

Shenari -> False_Compote3081
Neither, Singapore

都不是，新加坡的

Lillkatzino
Really wanna travel the transsiberian express and i need Russian and Chinese for that. My uni offered a free course for basics in Chinese so i started with that. So many opportunities for cultural exchange! I also love Chinese food so now I can look up recipes on 下厨房.

我真的很想乘坐横穿西伯利亚的特快列车去旅行，为此我需要懂俄语和汉语。我们大学提供了一门免费的中文基础课程，所以我从那开始学了。有这么多文化交流的机会！我也喜欢中国菜，所以现在我可以在“下厨房”里查食谱了。

Nulynnka
I attend a Chan Buddhist temple and our teacher encouraged us to learn Chinese. A lot of Buddhist texts were originally preserved in Chinese from Sanskrit and there are also a lot of writings from the tang and song dynasties. It helps me connect with my teachers, my religion, and the Chinese community. It's been very valuable. I also want to learn some calligraphy as a meditative practice.
I am also learning the Pipa and it helps with reading music notation and navigating websites in Chinese. I am falling in love with the music.
Also, it's a fun and rewarding language to learn!

我经常去一座禅宗寺庙，我们的老师鼓励我们学习中文。许多佛教文献最初是用梵文保存下来的，也有许多唐宋时期的著作。中文帮助我与我的老师、我的宗教以及华人社区建立联系。这非常有价值。我也想学一些书法，作为一种冥想练习。
我也在学习琵琶，中文有助于阅读音符记谱，以及浏览中文的网站。我爱上了这种音乐。
此外，这是一门有趣且值得学习的语言！

AmeriCossack
My linguistics degree required studying 2 foreign languages. I wanted to take a class in a language that’s really distant from the 2 Indo-European ones that I already speak, in my college it was Chinese and Arabic. Arabic wasn’t available so I signed up for Chinese.

我的语言学学位要求学习两门外语。我想上一门与我已经会说的两种印欧语系语言非常不一样的语言课程，在我们大学里，中文和阿拉伯语符合要求。没有阿拉伯语，所以我报了中文。

MagpieOnAPlumTree
Danmei is the sole reason for me to study hard every day! Luckily for me my current study plan is to read danmei and more danmei since I finally reached a level where I can comfortably read most modern stuff.
Currently working on my listening to understand all the danmei audio dramas out there! They are beautiful study material hahaha.

耽美小说是我每天努力学习的唯一理由！幸运的是，我目前的学习计划是读更多的耽美小说，因为我终于达到了可以轻松地阅读大多数现代作品的水平。
目前我正在努力提高我的听力，以听懂所有的耽美有声剧！它们是美妙的学习材料 哈哈哈。

LrnFaroeseWthBergur
I teach/tutor Faroese and Danish on Italki, and I always try to learn a bit about the language and culture of a student, especially if they intend to have regular lessons with me. I had a student from China and I decided to learn a bit of Chinese. I guess I liked it because I have been practicing Mandarin every day for almost three months now, with weekly lessons from a Mandarin teacher (also through Italki).

我在italki平台上教法罗语和丹麦语，我总是试着了解一些学生的语言和文化，特别是如果他们打算定期上我的课。我有一个来自中国的学生，我决定学一点中文。我想我应该是喜欢它的，因为我现在每天都在练习普通话，每周都有普通话老师的课（也是在Italki平台上），已经有快三个月了。

Annamay_Clark
盗墓笔记 exists, and I have a mighty need to read it.

由于《盗墓笔记》, 我急需去读懂它。

xtxsinan -> Annamay_Clark
Finally some Chinese literature people mention here that I actually heard about ..

终于有人在这里提到了一些我听说过的中国文学作品...

lizmny3
I fell in love with MDZS and when I was reading fanfics, a lot of the terms were super unfamiliar so I googled them. Having studied Japanese previously, I wanted to know more than just a few honorifics. I don’t plan to be really fluent. I have a passion for languages in general so I thought it would be a fun challenge and could probably be useful when I decide a career path!

我迷上了《魔道祖师》，在我读同人小说时，很多术语都非常陌生，所以我用谷歌搜索。我以前学过日语，我想知道的不仅仅是一些敬语。我不打算学得很流利。总的来说，我对语言很有热情，所以我认为这会是一个有趣的挑战，而且在我决定职业道路时，中文可能很有用！

Evening-Fox2724 -> lizmny3
After reading through this thread I feel like MDZS is doing a damn good job of making people want to learn Chinese :D

看完这帖子后，我觉得《魔道祖师》对人们学习中文方面，很有激励性 :D

spacewaffle4
My motivations are quite simple as well.
What got me motivated to learn Chinese was music (I like how it sounds in certain music) and like you, Heaven’s Official Blessing lol. I haven’t watch the donghua yet but I read the first novel and plan to start the next ones when I’m less busy with studying. I want to watch the donghua once I know a lot more vocabulary because I want to watch it without subtitles.
I’m far from that right now though since I only recently started lol
I also think it would be cool to read Manhua and play certain video games (Genshin Impact) in Chinese as well.
I want to be able to enjoy Chinese content in it’s original language. Games, comics, light novels, etc. I learn languages purely for entertainment, I guess I also like the writing system of Chinese. It makes me feel a little smarter lol
Don’t worry about your reasons being perceived as “lame”. The only reason I see as lame is learning a language purely to pick up girls or something lol But that’s none of my business anyway. Whatever reason that’s enough to motivate you to learn a language is typically a good reason so keep learning Chinese.

我的动机也很简单。
让我学习中文的动力来自音乐(我喜欢它在某些音乐中的发音)，还有和你一样，天官赐福 哈哈。我还没有看过动画版的，但是我读了第一部小说，并且计划在学习不那么忙的时候开始读下一部。我想在掌握了更多的词汇后再看动画，想看没有字幕的动画。
不过我现在还远远没到那程度，因为我最近才开始学 哈哈
我还认为，用中文看漫画和玩一些电子游戏(原神)会很酷。
我希望能够欣赏中文的原版内容。游戏、漫画、轻小说等。我学习语言纯粹是为了娱乐，我猜我也喜欢中文的书写体系。它让我觉得自己更聪明了 哈哈
不要担心你的理由会被认为是“无聊的”。我觉得无聊的唯一原因就是学习一门语言纯粹是为了泡妞什么的，但是这不关我的事。不管是什么原因，只要能激励你学习一门语言的，都是很好的理由，所以继续学习中文吧。

False_Compote3081 -> spacewaffle4
Japanese sounds good as well

日语听起来也不错

spacewaffle4 -> False_Compote3081
Japanese has got to be one of the funnest languages to learn because of all the fun resources they’ve got. I’ve been studying it two years and I never get bored :) Chinese is fun too so far but I’m still on the lookout for more learning resources. Right now, I’m mainly just using a textbook and some Chinese dramas.

日语一定是最有趣的语言之一，因为拥有所有有趣的资源。我已经学习了两年，从来没有感到无聊:) 到目前为止，中文也很有趣，但是我仍然在寻找更多的学习资源。现在，我主要使用的是教科书和一些中国电视剧。

HeYalan1997
High school taught French and Chinese. Was going to pick French at the end of the first two compulsory years but Chinese teacher got teary at the front of the room saying she didn’t think there’d be enough students for a Chinese class. Did Chinese, same teacher organised a school trip to China in my final year, asked if I had liked it, I said yes and next thing I knew she was presenting me with an application form to study at Uni in Beijing for for year. Filled in the form, sat the test and interview, got a place but not a scholarship. Decided not to go, then on the final acceptance date followed boyfriend into the city to pick up a book. Book turned out to be from a tiny manga shop in China town. Waited for him outside, looked around, thought China town is cool, China would be even cooler. Went to China for a year, added Chinese to my major back in Australia, then went back for a second year as a research student. Then… started work, had my kids, had nothing to do with Chinese for almost two decades and forgot everything - literally couldn’t understand or speak a word. Decided to go for a family holiday in China in 2019 (just in time!!) and figured it would be good if I could say a few basic things to get around. Discovered this amazing array of digital resources that just hasn’t existed when I first learnt - dramas, dictionaries, novels, italki etc etc. AND discovered it was like my Chinese was stored in a dusty cupboard in my mind - as I picked it up again, it was like switching a light on to illuminate the other things around it. Three years later with no more formal study I’m probably still a less confident speaker than I was back in the day but my comprehension is probably better!

高中教的是法语和中文。本来打算在前两年的必修课结束时选择法语，但是中文老师在教室前流着泪说，她认为没有足够的学生来上中文课，我选择了中文。在我毕业前一年，这位老师组织了一次中国学校的旅行，问我是否喜欢，我说喜欢，接下来她递给我一份在北京大学学习一年的申请表。填写表格，参加考试和面试，得到了名额，但没有奖学金，所以决定不去了。在最后的录取日期，我跟着男朋友进城去拿一本书。这本书原来是从唐人街的一家小漫画店买的。我在外面等他，环顾四周，感觉唐人街很酷，中国会更酷。
在中国待了一年，回澳大利亚的时候，我把中文加到了我的专业，然后又以研究生的身份回去读了第二年。然后... 开始工作，有了孩子，近20年没有拿起中文了，把所有都忘光了，一个字都不懂。
2019年决定全家一起去中国度假（正是时候！！），我想如果我能说一些基本的东西让大家知道就好了。我发现了一系列惊人的数字资源，这些资源在我第一次学习中文的时候还没有：电视剧，字典，小说，italki等等。然后我发现，我的中文就像是储存在我脑海中一个布满灰尘的橱柜里——当我重新拿起的时候，就像是打开了一盏灯，照亮了周围的其他东西。三年过去了，我没有再进行更多的正式学习，我现在的口语可能没有以前那么自信，但我的理解力或许更好了！

theduckislord
They added a Chinese course at our school and since it was new and I had some free time I joined it. It was really fun and I fell in love with the language so I kept it up after school too

我们学校增加了一门中文课程，因为是新课程，而且我有一些空闲时间，所以就参加了。这真的很有趣，我爱上了这门语言，所以在课后我也坚持学习。

Shin_Chan5
I love Chinese history , beautiful oriental buildings nd the most imp Novels..
That's why I want to learn Chinese to be able to read my fav novels in Native language.. cuz English can't show the amount of feelings emotions a Chinese line can convey..

我喜欢中国的历史，美丽的东方建筑，和最让人印象深刻的小说...
这就是为什么我想学习中文，以便能够阅读我最喜欢的原文小说... 因为英文表达不出中文句子所能表达的情感..

Lethal-Sloth
Several years ago, I had the opportunity to learn a language at uni, I wanted to learn German. Unfortunately all the spaces in German classes were taken - in fact the only class with space in it was Chinese (I would have probably gone for a European language). So I began to learn Chinese!

几年前，我有机会在大学里学习一门语言，我想学德语。遗憾的是，所有德语课的名额都被占了，事实上，唯一有名额的课是中文课（我可能会选择一门欧洲语言）。所以，我开始学习中文！

OkAstronomy321
I want to learn the six official languages of the United Nations. Since I speak English, Spanish, and French, I decided on learning a non-European one for my next one (sorry, Russian). So, it was between Arabic and Chinese. I was more interested in Chinese, so I chose it.

我想学习联合国的六种官方语言。因为我会说英语、西班牙语和法语，所以我决定学一门非欧洲的语言(抱歉，俄语)。所以，就在阿拉伯语和中文之间做选择。我对中文更感兴趣，所以选择了它。

OrthinologistSupreme
I didn't want to be monolingual anymore, I wanted a useful one (with how big their economy is, Mandarin is the language of buisness after English), and I have a bit of a god complex so when everyone harped on it for being the most difficult language, I took it lol
I also always liked the ancient china history lessons in school, really like Chinese food, and tbh mandarin just sounds cool

我不想只会一种语言，我想要一种有用的语言(考虑到他们的经济规模，普通话是仅次于英语的商业语言)，我有点上帝情结，所以当每个人都喋喋不休地说中文是最难学的语言时，我学会了 哈哈
我也一直很喜欢学校里的中国古代历史课，真的很喜欢中国的食物，而且说实话，普通话听起来很酷。

yuelaiyuehao
Came to China for a 3 month artist residency at a university in 2014 and never went home.

2014年来到中国，在一所大学做了3个月的驻院艺术家，之后就再也没有回过家了。

False_Compote3081 -> yuelaiyuehao
Wait so you live in China?

等等，所以你住在中国吗？

yuelaiyuehao -> False_Compote3081
Yeah, there's quite a lot of us in this sub currently living in China.

是啊，这个板块里有很多人现在都住在中国吧。

False_Compote3081 -> yuelaiyuehao
Oh, do you like it?

噢，你喜欢那吗？

yuelaiyuehao -> False_Compote3081
Yeah I'm very happy here

喜欢，我在这里很开心

undoundoundue
A girl.

因为一个女孩(开始学中文)。

False_Compote3081 -> undoundoundue
A friend or a crush?

朋友还是暗恋？

undoundoundue -> False_Compote3081
a crush haha. that was my initial motivation. I've since gained an appreciation for China's culture, its people, its (authentic) food, traditions, history, and arts.

暗恋 哈哈。她是我一开始的学习动力。从那以后，我开始欣赏中国的文化、人民、(正宗的)食物、传统、历史和艺术。

rafter_man -> undoundoundue
Same

一样的原因

undoundoundue -> rafter_man
nice. how'd it go?

挺好的，现在进展怎么样了？

rafter_man -> undoundoundue
We're both married now, but not to each other :)

我们现在都结婚了，但不是对方 :)

Dagger_Moth
I studied Chinese martial arts in secondary school, so that gave me great exposure to the culture and history. I’ve always enjoyed studying languages, and when I went to university I wanted to study a language that was very different from the ones I knew, so I studied Chinese. I’ve let my studies languish for about 15 years, but now that I’m older, I’d like to learn it again to read political theory in its native language.

我在中学学习中国武术，这让我很好地接触到了文化和历史。我一直很喜欢学习语言，当我上大学的时候，我想学习一门与我所知道的语言截然不同的语言，所以我学习了中文。我的学习已经停了大约15年，但现在我年长了，想再次学习，阅读其母语的政治理论。

rachaout
I took it in school because I wanted to see if I could prove to everyone I could actually do it. Ended up falling in love with the language; that was three years ago and I’m still going. :)

我是在学校学的，因为我想看看我能不能向大家证明我真的能做到。最后爱上了这门语言，那是三年前的事了，我现在还在学。:)

Oitgah
Chalenge. Train my brain to learn a whole different language from my mother tongue ( im Brazilian)

挑战。训练我的大脑学习与我的母语完全不同的语言(我是巴西人)

CaptainMarvel22
I was taking Spanish in high school and thought Chinese might be easier

我高中的时候学过西班牙语，觉得中文可能会容易些

Cosmoreptar
I am a Chinese Medicine practitioner and wanted to learn how to read medical texts in their original form

我是一名中医师，想学习阅读原始版本的医学文献

ConsequenceBig9616
First of all Chinese is very ergonomic. It takes only one symbol to display a written morpheme while languages with latin alphabet have to waste more space. I am very interested in Chinese culture, history from Three Kingdoms to Mao, Jiang Zeming and so on, music. The Chinese economy and military is growing rapidly. I am 70% sure that China will soon become global, or at least regional power and maybe even as Russia and USA get weaker, China will compete for its place and I expect investments to start flowing in Central Asia and maybe Azerbaijan too.

首先，中文是非常符合人类工程学的。只需要一个符号就可以显示书面语素，而使用拉丁字母的语言则需要浪费更多的空间。我对中国的文化、历史很感兴趣，从三国到毛、江等历史、音乐。中国的经济和军事正在迅速发展。我有70%的把握认为，中国很快就会成为全球强国，或者至少是地区强国，甚至随着俄罗斯和美国越来越弱，中国也会为自己的地位而竞争，我预计投资将开始流向中亚，也许还有阿塞拜疆。

jaxandan
去中国学习汉语是因为需要了签证（注：原文）

False_Compote3081 -> jaxandan
Oh I got it

哦，我明白了

bonvoyageespionage
Freshman year of high school I could either sit in study hall doing jack shit or I could sign up for Chinese class. And I have ADHD, so having five hours a week doing nothing would've led me down the path of building bombs, so Chinese it was.

高一的时候，我要么坐在自习室里无所事事，要么报名参加中文课。我有多动症，所以一周有五个小时的无所事事会让我走上制造炸弹的道路，所以选择了学习中文。

meihuashiliu
We have the same reason lmao what a coincidence. I also started learning Chinese because of TGCF. I don't regret it at all haha.

我们有同样的理由 哈哈，太巧了。我也是因为《天官赐福》开始学习中文的。我一点也不后悔，哈哈。

False_Compote3081 -> meihuashiliu
I haven’t started to learn to be honest

老实说，我还没开始学

meihuashiliu -> False_Compote3081
Oh sorry I misunderstood it. Good luck anyways 🥳

哦，抱歉我误会了。不管怎样，祝你好运

neverclm
It also started with a drama lol. I already wanted to learn another language and couldn't decide on any, randomly watched a c drama where speech was translated but their messages/anything written wasn't, so I had to use the image translator often and it got me into trying to understand Chinese characters! Also after a few episodes I started to catch on some repeated phrases and I became obsessed with the language.

我也是以从电视剧开始的 哈哈。我之前已经想学另一种语言了，但还是不能决定要不要学。我随便看了一部电视剧，里面的对话有翻译，但是他们的信息/任何文字都没有翻译，所以我不得不经常使用图像翻译软件，这让我开始尝试去理解汉字！也是在几集之后，我开始理解了一些重复的短语，然后我迷上了这种语言。

Evening-Fox2724
Same!!! I got back into learning Chinese after I finished The Grandmaster of Demonic cultivation. Wanting to read chinese novel is a huge motivation for me. I am much more motivated and disciplined than the first time I started learning Chinese. I studied almost every day for the last 10 months :) i can read some simple novels already and understand quite a bit when watching tv shows. (After approx. 780h of studying total)

一样！！！读完《魔道祖师》之后，我重新开始学习中文。想读中国小说对我来说是一个巨大的动力。我比我第一次开始学习中文时更有动力和自律。过去10个月里，我几乎每天都在学习 :) 我已经能读一些简单的小说，看电视节目的时候也能理解一些。(在大约780小时的学习之后)

KingMurphy15
Heaven Official Blessing is one the best Chinese donghuas/animes! I'm not surprised you fell in love after reading/watching it

《天官赐福》是最好的中国动画之一！我一点也不惊讶你在读完/看完之后就爱上了

calodero
Work, I work daily with Taiwan and i didn’t feel right that they learned excellent English when I had 0 Chinese ability. I don’t expect to ever conduct a business in mandarin, but I try to initiate conversation when I can

由于工作，我每天和台湾打交道，我觉得他们英语学得很好，而我的中文能力为零，这不行。我从来不指望用普通话做业务，但我会尽可能地主动与人交谈。

aaronschinaguide
After deciding to move to China. My friends all said unless you live in Shanghai or Beijing almost no one can speak English so you better learn Mandarin.

在决定搬到中国之后。我的朋友都说，除非你住在上海或北京，否则几乎没有人会说英语，所以你最好学普通话。

Noah93101
Chinese people and their civilization will be increasingly important in this century. I realized that I could not understand them adequately without knowing the language. They've learned a lot from the West, and now the West can learn a lot from them.

中国人和他们的文明在本世纪将会越来越重要。我意识到，如果不懂这门语言，我就无法充分理解他们。他们从西方学到了很多，现在西方也可以从他们身上学到很多。

preciousnabongs
I made a chinese friend at a music festival and he and his girlfriend started introducing me to their friends, which I am now also friends with. They all speak english pretty good, but they communicate in chinese amongst themselves, so I thought I should start learning it so I could also communicate with them in chinese, since they are more comfortable that way. Especially since we've been friends for 4+ years and everytime we get together, they invite more friends and some don't speak english very well.

我在一个音乐节上交了一个中国朋友，他和他的女朋友开始把我介绍给他们的朋友，我现在也是他们的朋友。他们英语说得都很好，但是他们之间用中文交流，所以我想我应该开始学习中文，这样我也可以用中文和他们交流，因为这样做他们会更自然。特别是我们已经做了4年多的朋友了，每次我们在一起，他们都会邀请更多的朋友，有些人英语说得不是很好。

WestEst101
OP, I really enjoyed reading everyone’s answers. Such varied responses, some quite personal, and all quite interesting.
Thanks for posing the question.

我真的很喜欢看每个人的回答。大家的回答各不相同，有些相当个人，但都非常有趣。
谢谢你提出的这个问题。

liquor_squared
I want to be able to speak to my wife's family as well as raise our children to be bilingual.

我希望能够与我妻子的家人交谈，同时也希望我们的孩子能够掌握两种语言。

False_Compote3081 -> liquor_squared
Where your wife family from?

你老婆家人是哪里的？

liquor_squared -> False_Compote3081
Her family is from Wuhan, but her and her parents moved to Guangzhou when she was little. So she knows Cantonese, but none of the rest of her family knows it (her parents never learned it). And her family often speaks the Wuhan dialect, but she doesn't really know it very well. So I'm sticking with Mandarin rather than trying to learn one of the dialects.

她的家人来自武汉，但是她和她的父母在她很小的时候就搬到了广州。所以她会说粤语，但是她家里其他人都不会(她的父母从来没有学过)。她的家人经常说武汉方言，但她并不是很熟悉。所以我坚持学普通话，而不是学方言。

False_Compote3081 -> liquor_squared
are you a westerner?

你是西方人吗？

liquor_squared -> False_Compote3081
Yes, I'm from Louisiana.

是的，我来自路易斯安那州。

False_Compote3081 -> liquor_squared
I’m a westerner too but from a lusophone country

我也是西方人，来自讲葡萄牙语的国家

relevant__comment
Married into Chinese family. I’m super nosey and want to know what they are talking about all the time.

我嫁入了一个中国家庭。我超级八卦的，想知道他们一直在聊什么。