i have a beginner level of chinese… basically book one of the practical audio series plus or minus othe stuff i’ve picked up just from living in taiwan for 2 years. i’m going home for the month of july… what is the best way to keep up with my studies? i don’t want to forget everything i’ve learned… should i bring tapes? i’m going to san francisco, should i spend an hour a day in chinatown to keep up my speaking?
how have you guys kept it up while overseas at home?
Bring a Taiwanese friend along. Bring the tapes, but do you really think you’d use them on your vacation? Chinatown might be your best bet.
I don’t think a month away will set you back too far. If you are worried, you could try organising a language exchange for when you’re at home. Otherwise how about concentrating on writing for a while, which you can easily do anywhere? Or just reviewing all the stuff from book one? It might be good to be in a less intensive environment for a while, where you have a chance to review stuff before starting again.
Try to get a language exchange. Many Chinatowns are full of Cantonese speakers, or people whose Mandarin isn’t…quite…well…you know. It’s not that all of them are like that, but many are, so be careful.
Failing that, tapes would probably be good, or a commitment to look over/listen to a certain proportion of a lesson evey day or every couple of days.
And for all of you who say just take a vacation: hey! A day without practicing your Chinese is like a day without root canal. Who would want to go without it?? 
i’m taking a summer break from my shida studies and, not wanting to forget too much, i’ve been looking for online message boards to chat and haven’t found any.
so i decided to make my own, which you and anyone else are more than welcome to join and lianxi zhongwen. there’s only a few people there now, but you are welcome to come if you’d like to practice at home. pinyin and traditional characters are both used. just some casual fun chat to keep the language in our brains! native speakers welcome too. so if you’d like to visit, huanying lai shuo yi shuo!
above suggestions of language exchanges are the best way probably. face to face conversation helps so much!
Watching local Chinese TV channel can also be an option while you are around in SF. You can find the programs from the website, ktsf.com
As you may know it already if you were from SF originally.