By Kim Tae-gyu
BEIJING ― It is well known that President Park Geun-hye likes to study foreign languages, including Mandarin. She is apparently making the most of her language skills during her state visit to China.
Park spoke in Mandarin with Chinese President Xi Jinping and First Lady Peng Liyuan over a luncheon meeting here on Friday. The first five minutes of her summit talks with Xi Thursday was in Mandarin, the Chinese press have described her as a fluent Mandarin speaker.
Many people are unaware of how good her Mandarin is because she rarely uses it publicly
The public will have a chance to know how good her Mandarin language skills are today when she delivers part of her speech in Mandarin at Tsinghua University.
She will give the speech mostly in Korean and the audience will listen to her through translators.
"Park studied Mandarin on her own, in most cases during her spare time in the evening or during weekends. As you know, she neither drinks nor plays golf. Hence, she had relatively much time to learn foreign languages before she took office," an aide to Park said.
"She understands Mandarin quite well and can also make herself understood. In particular, her pronunciation is good, which is hard for Koreans. You will see how good she is over the speech at Tsinghua University."
On top of Chinese, Park is known to have a good command of other languages including English and French ― she can debate in the two tongues. She also dabbles in Spanish.
During her first overseas trip to the United States early last month, Park gave a speech to the Congress in English and shared opinions with U.S. President Barack Obama without the help of interpreters.
There were initial talks of her delivering her lecture at Tsinghua University entirely in Mandarin but that was abandoned. A Cheong Wa Dae official explained that "we checked the public opinion in Korea as well as getting advice from China to reach the conclusion that Park will deliver the speech in Korean." Adding that "Park will speak in Korean not because she cannot do so in Mandarin but we think that it is more appropriate."
BEIJING ― It is well known that President Park Geun-hye likes to study foreign languages, including Mandarin. She is apparently making the most of her language skills during her state visit to China.
Park spoke in Mandarin with Chinese President Xi Jinping and First Lady Peng Liyuan over a luncheon meeting here on Friday. The first five minutes of her summit talks with Xi Thursday was in Mandarin, the Chinese press have described her as a fluent Mandarin speaker.
Many people are unaware of how good her Mandarin is because she rarely uses it publicly
The public will have a chance to know how good her Mandarin language skills are today when she delivers part of her speech in Mandarin at Tsinghua University.
She will give the speech mostly in Korean and the audience will listen to her through translators.
"Park studied Mandarin on her own, in most cases during her spare time in the evening or during weekends. As you know, she neither drinks nor plays golf. Hence, she had relatively much time to learn foreign languages before she took office," an aide to Park said.
"She understands Mandarin quite well and can also make herself understood. In particular, her pronunciation is good, which is hard for Koreans. You will see how good she is over the speech at Tsinghua University."
On top of Chinese, Park is known to have a good command of other languages including English and French ― she can debate in the two tongues. She also dabbles in Spanish.
During her first overseas trip to the United States early last month, Park gave a speech to the Congress in English and shared opinions with U.S. President Barack Obama without the help of interpreters.
There were initial talks of her delivering her lecture at Tsinghua University entirely in Mandarin but that was abandoned. A Cheong Wa Dae official explained that "we checked the public opinion in Korea as well as getting advice from China to reach the conclusion that Park will deliver the speech in Korean." Adding that "Park will speak in Korean not because she cannot do so in Mandarin but we think that it is more appropriate."
