have fun
Living in a place where they speak the language and you get to use it on a daily basis is the best way to get your skills up, and I had some less than great experiences with the mainland, so Taiwan wins.
I am attempting to ward off allan hymers disease.
Hi Tetsuo, thanx for replying. I guess i didn’t make myself clear. I meant WHAT MADE YOU WANNA STUDY CHINESE? There must have been something that happened that made you go: “I’m going to Taiwan/China to learn Chinese!” So what was it? Is Chinese important? If it is, in what way? This may seem like a real dumb question to someof ya. But I’m Taiwanese and I’m asking from a Taiwanese POV. Anything would be greatly appreciated! Thanx again!
Well, in that case I can’t really help - I decided to study Chinese after living in Hong Kong for a year and falling in love with the place, culture, and language. Then I studied for four years in New Zealand, then came to Taiwan to put the polish on my skills. (Which have since proven to need far more than just polish).
As a general thing, though, I’ve always been fascinated by languages that don’t use the English alphabet, and Japanese was the only one available to study at high school. Then after the year in HK and finding my top choice university offered Chinese, I added that to the list.
Oh, and technically I didn’t come to study Chinese, I came for my job, in which yes, Chinese is important 
Yeah I noticed that your username is Japanese. What does it mean? So have you lived in Japan before? I’m also interested in Japanese. I’m planning to go there and study Japanese for a couple of years. 
Well first this is assuming everyone came to Taiwan to study Chinese. Which I don’t think is the case.
To make money, learn more about the culture, explore the world, study Buddhism, etc. are just a few reasons people come here.
I think it is natural that many of those that come here will at least try to learn Chinese - the main motivation appears to be the ability to communicate.
In general, people (outside of Taiwan) study Chinese for the same reasons people study any language…curiousity, availablity, desire to study something without an alphabet, etc.
Besides why wouldn’t someone want to study Chinese? 
Zhongwen you zimu.
edit
huh? :saywhat:
I like to study languages. I find languages that don’t use the Latin alphabet especially interesting. I don’t have any reason other than interest - I don’t think it’s going to help me get a job or anything.
Zhongwen you zimu = Chinese has an alphabet.
thanx gao_bo_han. i cant read pinyin. bob ur :loco: keep out of this thread. btw, Zhongwen MEI you zimu. its ㄅㄆㄇㄈ.
Why learn chinese - because you want to survive in Chinese society - pretty simple
Meiyou zimu ba? Weishenme wo meitian kan dao zimu. Wo you liang ge zidian. Dou you zimu. :raspberry:
it should be ‘ma’ not ‘ba’. its pain in the neck reading pinyin.
So bob…what are you actually trying to write here???
Is it ‘supposed’ to be Chinese? Of course without any indication of tones these roman characters can not really represent Chinese, now can they? 
(without the tone marks is it really pinyin??)
“No letters? Why do I see letters every day? I have two dictionaries. Both have letters.”
I guess 注音符號 does not really have letters in it, but I ask my students in the class to say "Chinese alphabet" when they want to say 注音符號, just so they have something in English to say instead of saying "Bo po mo fo".
Studying Chinese gives me more freedom. I can go out and handle stuff on my own, without having to bother my friends for favours all the time. Plus I like to destroy the "It's impossible for foreigners to learn Chinese" stereotype. :fume:well in English, u say ABC when refering to the English alphabet, too.
When I’m speaking English, I might, but usually only if I’m talking to children. When I’m speaking Chinese, I always say “英文字母系統”