Colloquial Mongolian

View other editions of Colloquial Mongolian.
View books by Alan J.K. Sanders, Jantsangiyn Bat-Ireedui.

This is could be a lot better - its a missed opportunity - Rated
If you buy this thinking it will be helpful, you ll be disappointed.
It s not well thought out and makes learning more difficult than it need be. I m assuming the publishers laid down what the book should be like. The recordings make no allowance for the fact that you need to to hear the spoken word somewhat slower than a native speaker would.

Teach yourself language courses are much more useful and user friendly (check out Hindi by Rupert Snell as a lesson in how it should be done)

Hard Work - Rated
I guess this course (perhaps in common with others of the series) is a sort of cross between a tourist guide and a serious language course. Summer visitors don't really need to go beyond Chapter 1 (saying hello with confidence) and even long stay folk hardly need the complexities of long division (Chapter 7).

The course is a bit uneven with chunks of pretty well incomprehensible written text (Chapter 5) interspersed with useful vocabulary (body parts in Chapter 9) and shopping (Chapter 8).

A literal translation of the spoken text would have been more than helpful (like essential) as the grammer is as wonderful as the country.

Overall the book gives a good 'feel' for the country even if most of the Ylaanbaatar eating places mentioned are now (thankfully) extinct.

I would start by listening to the poetry in Chapter 10.

Definitely get the tape - Rated
This book rattles along at quite a pace. I've looked at other language books which take their time more than this. It is definitely aimed at developing the ability to speak Mongolian quickly, which is probably a good idea as it's a daunting language.