Browsing at Borders

Out on the town with friends last week. We ended up at Borders. He had to return an item so I wondered up to the Foreign Language section. Ahh, the Chinese books, dictionaries, and flash cards.

We had a coupon for 30% off and I let my wife pick. She chose this:


The front shows the character and a few phrases or words containing the character, the back has the pinyin for the character and the phrases listed on the front. I wouldn't say they were anything extraordinary but they have inspired me. I've been taking them out and reviewing and enjoying it. Today while working I had them on my desk and went through a few between calls. I was copying the characters over and over on my legal pad.
Here are the few for the day:
字 “zi"
什么 "shenme"
你 "ni"
名 "ming"
I've purposely been avoiding characters but this has been invigorating. Let's see what I can accomplish tomorrow.

In the meantime I've been contemplating this book: Reading & Writing Chinese-Simplified Edition. I've read mixed reviews but having reviewed it in the store I was impressed. I'll be the first to admit I don't know enough about characters to know a "good" book from a "bad" one but I liked what I saw.

I also wanted to say thanks to everyone who commented recently. I was very encouraged by the comments. I was wondering how so many people had found the blog so quickly. Tonight I was reading Ken Carroll's blog and found out why. Ken, if you see this, thanks for everything you do.