Mandarin in Taiwan

Taiwan speaks the same Mandarin you are learning. The grammar is the same and almost all the vocabulary is too. What changes is the name, the writing, some of the sounds and a handful of everyday words.

The name

On the mainland the standard language is 普通话 (Pǔtōnghuà), common speech. In Taiwan it is 國語 (Guóyǔ), the national language. Same 语言 (yǔyán), language, two names.

The characters

Taiwan writes traditional characters, as Hong Kong and Macau do. The mainland uses the 简体 (jiǎntǐ), simplified, forms you have been learning. Many characters are the same in both. Many others are not:

Once you know the simplified 字 (zì), character, the traditional one is often recognisable: 說 (shuō) keeps the speech radical, 學 (xué) keeps the child at the bottom.

Zhuyin instead of pinyin

Children in Taiwan learn to sound out words with 注音 (zhùyīn), also called bopomofo after its first four symbols, ㄅㄆㄇㄈ (b, p, m, f). It has 37 symbols plus tone marks, and it is the most common way to type Chinese on a Taiwanese phone.

The sound

The r-sound that Beijing adds to the ends of words, as in 一点儿 (yìdiǎnr), is very rare in Taiwan. In relaxed speech, zh, ch and sh often slide towards z, c and s, so 是 (shì) can sound like sì. And 和 (hé), and, can be said hàn.

Words that change

None of this stops a conversation. A Taipei speaker and a Beijing speaker understand each other perfectly well, the way a Londoner and a New Yorker do, and each will happily tell you how they say it at home.