You speak Chinese? Good. Wait.....
The official language of China is Mandarin although there are over one hundred dialects spoken. Many times, a specific dialect is only spoken in one or two small, usually neighboring communities. Sometimes the dialects are spoken in a much larger, regional area. Today was our first (and only) day in Wuxi and Dr. Li had trouble understanding the waitress during our lunch. Some of the words are the same or very similar in sound and meaning. In other cases, there are virtually no similarities in the phonetics of words in different regions. There are some regional differences in the United States as well, but one that speaks fluent English generally has no difficulty communicating in different areas of the country. As in China, there are a number of different accents that make understanding even more difficult in some situations. In da United States, up dare in Minnesotah, da people tink ve talk veird, but dare nuts, eh? Take off, eh? The point is that even if you are a fluent Mandarin Chinese speaker, there are still difficulties communicating sometimes even one or two communities away, let alone in the opposite end of the country. I would imagine that this makes travel somewhat difficult intra-country. Business travelers, students, vacationers, and others face a continual language barrier, much the same as our group does. The major difference is that most of us have little or no background with Mandarin. Knowing the complexity of the following proposal, I wonder how difficult it really would be to somehow achieve a more consistent, “base” language. Mandarin may be used as the base due to it not only being the official language, but also the most widely spoken. This process would take many, many years (perhaps generations), but would be useful in easing communication barriers both within China and also for foreign travelers.