cPod CANTON TRADE FAIR GUIDE PROPOSAL
matt_c
March 03, 2009, 02:04 AM posted in General DiscussionThe Guangzhou Trade Fair aka Canton Fair (广交会 guǎngjiāohuì) is coming up in mid April. The Canton Fair is the largest trade fair in China and runs from April 15th-May6th.
Having previously been involved in both trade and trade related interpreting activities, I'm aware of a need for linguistic and cultural information to assist attendees in their trade forays to China. I'm proposing to put together a Canton Fair survival pack, in order to help out big/small business operators coming to China for the fair to source new suppliers.
I feel that such a package would have to cover a range of topics and situations ranging from survival Chinese for taxis, subway, ordering food etc, to trade related language like 'minimum order quantity' and 'lead time'. A heavy focus the newbie level, but a drift toward the intermediate level for some essential phrases such as the aforementioned. I'm envisioning a selection of trade and survival related lesson sets. Some extra vocab that aren't found in the lessons combined with relevant expansion sentences for contextual adaption. Links to maps of Guangzhou, even business tips for how to deal with suppliers, and a range of sourcing and travel booking links would also be good.
As for the presentation I need to keep it as simple and accessible as possible for a variety of reasons. I'd really appreciate your feedback and suggestions on how we can make this as useful and accessible as possible. Please leave your feedback in the comments below. Thank you.
Matt Coleman
ChinesePod Product Manager.
http://www.cantonfair.com/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canton_Fair
matt_c
March 18, 2009, 06:12 AM@ javiervelasco Thanks for your input. I have to try to keep the survival sets as newbie as I want this to be accessible to everyone (paying and non paying users). When I do provide vocab/sentences from the series you mentioned, I'll include links to the series pages. :)
matt_c
March 03, 2009, 04:23 PM@19408 thanks for your tips :)
@Blue Alvarez I'm glad we'll be able to assist you. ChinesePod teaches Mandarin, and having just returned from Guangdong - it gets you around everywhere (the Cantonese themselves do speak with a cute lilt and twang when speaking Mandarin though - but you'll get used to it quick)
Anyone else got any opinions?
vlg1
March 03, 2009, 10:11 PMHi Matt, Good idea, I am at newbie level & think this will be very useful when visiting the fair. I would like to be able to talk to potential suppliers about quality control, packaging, colour, consolidation of products, etc. If needed i can email you a more detailed list, rather list them all here. Thanks!!
fangaili
March 03, 2009, 11:15 PMI think these are great ideas.
In general, I would love to see more business-related language on CPod.
matt_c
March 04, 2009, 01:59 AM@vlg1 Thanks for your suggestions. Please leave them in this comments section. In order to keep in accessible to the newbie audience (most people visiting the fair are newbies) we do have to keep a lid on the difficulty of the content - although a special section for more difficult vocab/phrases could be cool.
@fangaili thanks for your positive feedback :) Any ideas on what type of business topics you would like to see?
Also the search feature is fixed so if you'd like, you can to listen to our existing business/trade related lessons.
suxiaoya
March 04, 2009, 02:12 AMAlso, for existing biz content, you can check out the lesson sets.
Try 'Businessman Pete' but, be warned, the series' end is nasty!
fangaili
March 08, 2009, 07:21 PM@matt_c : Sorry I didn't see your response until just now. I've been looking through the lesson sets. I work in health insurance. I noticed that there are a couple lessons that mention insurance but perhaps not health insurance. A mostly-English lesson on the state of health insurance in China would be interesting. I'd also like to know if there is a Chinese word for "project coordinator" since that is my title. :) ChinesePod has "project manager" somewhere but that is not quite what I do.
(Health insurance is pretty dry stuff but might be of interest to a business person in the industry. Sometimes I try to think in Chinese and I wonder how to say coinsurance, deductible, premium, etc.)
Perhaps you could pick a career once/month and do a lesson on it. Say today's lesson is on "print buying". How do you say: Two-up, bleeds, two-sided, four color, die-cuts, inkjet, collation, etc. (I think about this stuff because I work with print buyers every day.) The downside to these kinds of specialized lessons is that they would only be useful to the business person who wants to learn how to talk about his/her business in Chinese.
How about lessons on often-used Microsoft programs: Excel, Word, Access, Internet Explorer? What are these called in Chinese? What are the common terms for "file, edit, cut, copy, paste" ? (I assume these programs are used in China. Microsoft practically owns the world. When I moved from Beijing back to the US, the only question the customs people asked me is if I had any Microsoft products in my bag. No joke.)
These are just some ideas. I don't know what direction ChinesePod wants to take. It depends on which type of user you want to cater to. There are those who are learning Chinese for business purposes, there are those who are learning for fun, and everyone inbetween.
fangaili
March 08, 2009, 07:36 PMGetting more on-topic regarding the Canton Fair specifically--
Survival Chinese would be a great start. Plus maybe something called, "Make a good first impression in Chinese." This lesson would teach them how to introduce themselves and their business: 你好，我是(insert profession). We would provide a long list of industries/professions. So even if they couldn't actually converse in Chinese, they could say *what they are doing there*.
I'm not sure what use specialized vocabulary would be to a person who has never studied Chinese.
Also--a quick primer on what to do, and what not to do, in Chinese culture, in regards to business.
In general, any material should be brief. In my experience business people tend to want to get things done fast. They might only have time to read one piece of paper. What would you put on it?
bluealvarez
March 03, 2009, 03:30 PMThis is so exciting! The whole reason I started learning Mandarin in the first place is because I work for a knitwear manufacturer and all our product is sourced and manufactured on the mainland. I am also trying to figure out when to go to China for the first time this year, and it would be amazing to wait until the autumn session and see the phase III booths at the fair - armed with this vocab I'm sure I'll fare much better than without it! 谢谢您帮助我们学很有用的语汇!
Just one question - will this be Mandarin vocabulary, or is the point of this to introduce Mandarin learners to essential Cantonese vocabulary? Either way, 太好了！
miantiao
March 09, 2009, 09:54 AMmatt
i think two sets would work well. you could design an elementary/intermediate set and a set for upper intermediate and advanced clients. i think many of those going to attend would be making their own specific language preparations, but a set of 6 lessons dealing with common encounters(airport, hotel, enquiries about puchase prices and minimum orders etc) for the elementary set and a more specific trade (purchasing, negotiation, taxes and customs, shipping etc) set for the more advanced client would work well, if you have the time and resources that is.
there is an abundance of material that already exists on cpod, it'll be difficult to decide which ones to use. perhaps a vocabulary list with example sentences of commonly used trade and business vocab could also accompany the lesson set as an additional tool.
bodawei
March 09, 2009, 12:09 PMmatt you have a great idea and you are getting lots of good advice here .. My suggestion would be to focus on culture and inter-cultural communication (with just a little language thrown in.) Last year I sat on a train adjacent to three men exiting Guangzhou who had made several trips to Canton fairs. I couldn't help eavesdropping. I was amazed at how little knowledge of the local culture was evident in conversation and wondered how this affects business endeavours.
matt_c
March 10, 2009, 09:22 AM@miantiao Thanks for your suggestions. What I'm aiming at is creating a post for the Canton Fair package, which will be accessible to everyone. Thus the main focus will be on Newbie lesson sets. My aim is to help people who are attending the Fair regardless of whether or not they are premium users (you never know - they may see the light ;> )
I'll be including a list of important words and some example sentences from the higher levels (with lesson ID referenced for stuff taken from existing lessons - so that our premium users can find the lessons easily)
@bodawei Cultural tips are key, do you have any suggestions as to what types of things would be helpful. :)
bodawei
March 10, 2009, 12:13 PMCulture manifests itself in so many ways - maybe choose a few areas that business visitors may not have encountered before. I think the Chinese workplace is a good one, the 单位 in its current form. You can talk about its attributes and how it got to where it is. Business people should be interested in how their counterparts work day to day. Discuss the concept of a diary in China! Then maybe topics like popular culture (fireworks, opera, acrobats, amateur music groups) and food (can't ignore food.) You can compare China with the West using dimensions like collectivist/individualist behaviour, problem solving and decision-making, and the concept of face. In these respects China and the West are extremely different and that's what makes it interesting. If you want a 'textbook' reference look up G Hofstede 'Culture & Orgs: software of the Mind'.
matt_c
March 10, 2009, 01:52 PM@bodawei I think your point here is spot on.
--You can compare China with the West using dimensions like collectivist/individualist behaviour, problem solving and decision-making, and the concept of face.--
The concept of the Danwei I'd be less inclined to discuss in the post but would be happy to link to.
Please keep your ideas coming :-)
And links too!
bababardwan
March 10, 2009, 02:05 PMMatt,
You have seen the video at the start of this bicultural business thread here haven't you? I think this was an excellent video and there were some other videos and discussions in that group that may be a starting point.I thought I'd post it just in case.There are so many threads I suppose it's easy to miss some.Good luck mate. :)
matt_c
March 11, 2009, 10:00 AM@Bababardwan thanks for the link :D
javiervelasco
March 15, 2009, 12:02 PMHey, it´s an amazing set, looking forward to it...
What about elementary level or intermediate level for this set?... like businessman Pete or Wang´s office level would be much better, there´s too much stuff to learn and try this set on newbie level might be hard and could lead to loose a lot of helpful tools and material.
Oscar
matt_c
March 09, 2009, 02:39 AM@fangaili Trade is a topic I'm deeply interested in, and I thank you for your constructive suggestions. :)
I agree that covering the survival areas of Chinese for the Canton Fair is key.
user19408
March 03, 2009, 03:08 PMArrange the meetings before going to the fair.
Arrange the meetings for non fair hours, especially when with companies you are already working with. This is because clearly companies cannot openly negotiate during the fair.