baimanzhi

Story
I've been taking Chinese for almost a year now. After a few weeks, my Chinese teacher gave me a Chinese name. It took him a while to think of because in China names are very important. It should tell something about the person or what the parents hope the child to become. After a couple of weeks he came up with bai man zhi. These words in Chinese are readable in English and called pinyin.

In Chinese names the first name is the last. So bai is my last name in Chinese. He picked bai because of my legal last name Blair. My other name is man zhi. Man means full and zhi means intelligence/wisdom/knowledge. So my name literally means: White, Full of Intelligence. My Chinese teacher (Li Zhengrong or Mr. Li) gave that name to me because he said that I am a fast language learner.

Pronunciation
Bai is in the second tone which is the rising tone. You would say bai like you wuld say what? in English. So you'd say Click Here to hear the correct pronunciation.

Man is the third tone which is the falling then rising tone. You'd say it like the word huh? in English. When you say huh? You go down and then up. Click here to hear the correct pronunciation.

Zhi is the forth tone. The forth tone sounds like the English word no. Imagine yelling at your dog no! and you'd have the forth tone. Don't think its silly to almost yell this tone but thats how it is. A friend of mine's mother said that she hears Chinese people talk and it sounds like they are yelling. Its true though, it does sound like yelling. Click for the correct pronunciation.

You can't change your tone of voice to expresss emotion in Chinese. If you ask a question with a question tone like English speakers, Chinese people would scratch their heads and wonder why you just said a bunch random words. You chould have said: How are you smart fish? So, be careful if you speak Chinese or immiate it.

I covered 3 for the four tones so why not finish. The first tone in Chinese is a high flat tone. It sounds similar to the Ahhh! sound when the doctor tells you to open your mouth. Here is a little example of the four tones using the word ma.

First Tone: Click
Second Tone: Click
Third Tone: Click
Fourth Tone: Click

There is another tone but it doesn't qualifty as a tone in some of the Chinese eye. This tone is called the neutral tone and sounds like the name. If you were to say ma in the nuetral tone you'd say ma very light and soft unlike the other tones (numbers behind the pinyin is the tone 1-4).
Mama1 ma2 ma3 he2 ma4. This means: The mother bothers the horse and grasshopper.

I hope that helps and don't get too confused. But that's my name! :)

PS -- > My Chinese name in characters: