Keeping My Mandarin Alive: Lee Kuan Yew's Language Learning Experience

Learn Mandarin while you brush your teeth or shave? Read how Singapore's Minister Mentor Lee Kuan Yew does it! A Prime Minister as an interpreter? Find out when and why MM Lee had to do it. For the first time, this towering figure of the island-state's politics gives a first-hand account of how he has learnt Mandarin over the last 50 years and kept it alive. He also tells when and why he decided to learn the language, where he got hold of the learning materials from, whom he practises his Mandarin with and what spurs him on. MM Lee goes beyond these 5Ws and 1H in Keeping My Mandarin Alive to share the agony of a mature Chinese language student and how he has overcome the difficulties—he strove to learn Mandarin only at age 32 (from 1955) and Hokkien at age 38 (from 1961). The comprehensive package also details how the English-educated MM Lee has been relating Mandarin to his master language in an effort to grasp the former and unravels how the latest technology has helped him in his quest. Edited by Dr. Chua Chee Lay, one of MM Lee's Chinese tutors.