Expert: John J - 6/2/2007

Question
hello,

I am currently learning japanese, but i really want to learn chinese afterwards.  I was just wondering, in japanese and chinese they use kanji.  in japanese, they can put Furigana on top of the kanji to help pronunciation and so you know how it sounds if you forget or whatever. (the furigana is just hiragana or katakana, two of the other alphabets above the kanji).  I was just wondering,  in chinese, what is there to help you if you forget a kanji? or you dont know the pronunciation? is there pinjin on top or anything?  thank you very much for your time!

Answer
hi there!
thanx for your trust.
yes! we do have a "pinjin" system to help you learn the pronunciations.
it consists of 25 english letters(a-z except for "v"), a "u" with two little dots above it(like some german letter) and four symbols that indicate tones(yes, there are 5 diff tones in chinese, the 5th one is without a tone symbol). helped with "pinjin"(in fact, put it correctly it should be"pin yin")and a proper software, we are able to input chinese characters with english keyboards, that's how we chat online.(FYI,when typing, we use "v" instead of the "u"with two dots, 'cuz there isn't the german-like letter on the keyboards)
however, there's another whole different "pinjin" system adopted by Taiwanese, they look like Furigana to me.

we usually don't put pinyin above characters("hanji", we call it "hanzi"), only books for little kids or foreigners  and dictionaries may have it. sometimes you can also see it in some ads or banners, but more and more they are replaced by English.

i hope i made myself clear, if not, pls feel free to fire away.

yours,
pj