President Obama is known as 奥巴马 (ào bā mǎ) in Mainland China, but the White House wants to change that to 欧巴马 (ōu bā mǎ). An article on the WorldMeets.us website reports that the American embassy in Beijing believes the new name better reflects the American pronunciation of Obama, and will be his official Chinese name from now on.

But according to danwei.org, the Chinese may not agree this change:

"... a name transliteration that has been in use for a while cannot be casually changed; unless Xinhua changes its rendering, the Foreign Ministry will not agree to switch àobāmǎ for ōubāmǎ."

And the worldmeets.us article speculates about the hidden meaning of this change:

"So in wanting to make this change, it seems on the surface to reflect that the U.S. doesn't want to listen to China, the U.S. has its own ideas and so on. Of course, this could also mean that U.S. relations with China aren't as good as they appear on the surface."

In Taiwan, Obama is known as 歐巴馬 (欧巴马) - the version that the White House is proposing.

The Mandarin pattern 從/从 ... 到 (cóng ... dào) is used to say "From ... to (a place or time)."

Both 從/从 (cóng) and 到 (dào) are followed by a time word or a place word, and the complement is placed at the end of the sentence, as in these examples:

Cóng Běijīng dào Shànghǎi yào duō jiǔ?
從北京到上海要多久?
从北京到上海要多久?
How long does it take from Beijing to Shanghai?

Cóng jiǔdiǎn dào wǔdiǎn wǒ zài shàngbān.
從九點到五點我在上班。
从九点到五点我在上班。
I am at work from 9 o'clock to 5 o'clock.

See also Movement With Dao

Chinese writing has similar punctuation to English. The periods, commas, semicolons and colons have almost the same functions, but some of the symbols are different. Learn more about Chinese punctuation.

Watching Mandarin-language TV shows and movies can help you learn new vocabulary and capture the rhythm of the language. If you are just starting to learn, though, you probably won't understand very much.

But now you have the option of watching Mandarin videos with English subtitles. A recent post on the Mandarin forum tells where to find them.

The Mandarin Chinese 要 yào can mean going to or want to depending on the context.

Consider this sentence:

他要走
Tā yào zǒu.

That can mean either "He wants to leave" or "He is going to leave."

So if we add a time expression, does that make the meaning more clear?

他明天要走
Tā míngtiān yào zǒu.

It's still a bit vague. This could mean "He wants to leave tomorrow" or "He is going to leave tomorrow."

However, with a bit of discussion, we can find out what's really going on.

If we are talking about the future, we can also use the word 會/会 huì to mean "intend to". Read more about the distinctions between hui and yao.

The two official languages of multicultural Malaysia are Malay and English, but many other languages are spoken, including several Chinese and Indian dialects.

A Malaysian TV show called Mr. Siao's Mandarin Class provides a glimpse into Malaysian society and an idea of how these various cultures interact. The setting is a Mandarin language class, and the dialogue is a mixture of Chinese (Mandarin, Hokkien, Cantonese, Hakka), English and Malay.

Mr. Siao's Mandarin Class is entertaining and educational, even if you don't understand all the dialog. You can see it on YouTube.

I have a confession to make: I don't have a cell phone. So I don't know much about them besides texting and games. And up until today, I had just a vague idea that you can use a cell phone to browse the Internet.

So I was surprised to see that Google has a new cell phone app that allows you to search the Internet using voice input. Wow! This stuff is more advanced than I ever dreamed.

I don't consider myself a technophobe, being quite computer literate, but cell phones don't interest me at all. But I know that they are considered essential in some corners, so it's my duty to inform Mandarin students about the latest gadgets that can be used to learn the language.

This Google app recognizes English (in various accents) or Mandarin Chinese. According to the Google Research blog, "Mandarin Voice Search (is) a part of Google Mobile App for Nokia s60 phones. Google Mobile App places a Google search widget on your Nokia phone's home screen, allowing you to quickly search by voice or by typing."

Google plans to extend this technology to allow searches "in any language."

The BBC reports that we may soon be seeing Chinese characters in the address bars of our favorite web browsers.

Web addresses - anything beginning with http:// - are currently restricted to Latin characters. Considering that more than 50% of Internet users speak languages that use non-Latin characters, this domination of Latin based domain names is long due for a change.

There are lots of technical challenges to this proposal, but if all goes well, we should soon be able to use Chinese characters (as well as other scripts) for web addresses.

Just as there are many ways to say "can" in Mandarin, there are also many ways to say "to be".

The Mandarin 是 shì is an "equivalence verb" used when the subject equals the predicate: 我是美國人 / 我是美国人 / wǒ shì měiguorén (I am an American).

When it comes to adjectives, though, watch out. Many Mandarin adjectives are "stative verbs", which are used to describe a relatively static quality, such as "He is tall". Stative verbs already have "to be" embedded in them, so the correct translation of "He is tall" is 他很高 / tā hěn gāo (He very tall).

And yet a third way to say "to be" is with the verb 在 zài. This is a locative verb which also has "to be" embedded in it, so to say "He is in Beijing" we say 他在北京 / tā zài běijīng.

A recent New York Times article reports that in many of North America's Chinese communities, Mandarin is becoming more common than Cantonese.

Immigrants from China in the last 10 years or so have been primarily Mandarin speakers, so as their numbers grow, Mandarin becomes more prominent. William Wong in the San Fransisco Chronicle gives some of the history of Chinese immigration to the USA.

This predominance of Mandarin in North America is a good thing for Mandarin students, since they will have more chances to practice their language skills. But it also affects anyone interested in traditional Chinese characters. Since most new immigrants are from mainland China, we are sure to see an increase in the use of simplified characters. The written language of North American Chinese communities has always been traditional characters (which are used with both Mandarin and Cantonese).