THE HIGHWAYS and byways of Ireland could soon be ringing with phrases such as “ni hao”, “xie xie” and “bu yong ke qi” if Irish entrepreneur Ken Carroll succeeds in his plan to get the Irish to learn Mandarin Chinese.
The co-founder of ChinesePod, an online Chinese language learning centre with 250,000 users worldwide, is offering its service free of charge to Irish residents from now until May next year, when the Shanghai World Expo opens.
ChinesePod has an archive of more than 1,200 online lessons.
“I expect the people taking this up will be those who want to learn beyond the school walls: . . . people who have an interest in China, or with travel plans or business plans; or just those people who want to learn something different,” Mr Carroll said. “The service has been designed for absolute beginners . . . and anyone in the country can try it out for free.”
ChinesePod offers podcasts, audio and video lessons, mobile study tools and online teacher support. Users can access the service via their computer, iPod or smartphone.
Irish-based users will still have to pay for premium content, which includes exercises and other material, as Mr Carroll said he could not risk alienating existing customers.
“We don’t have many users in Ireland yet, though we’ve lots in the US. It’s mainly focused on private individuals though it can also be configured for groups,” Mr Carroll added.
While the offer kicked off on September 1st, it had a soft launch on Bloomsday in Shanghai at a reception hosted by Irish Consul Conor O’Riordan. The project also has official backing from Xu Lin, director of HanBan, the executive body of the international Chinese language council, which is affiliated with the ministry of education in China.
Mr Carroll will be a delegate at the forthcoming Global Irish Economic Forum at Farmleigh in Dublin aimed at coming up with ways to resolve the economic crisis.
Irish residents can activate their free subscription by texting “ChinesePod” to 57199 from an Irish phone to receive a voucher code (texts cost €1). They can then visit www.chinesepod.com/ireland to complete the sign-up process.
