About
One of 1.3 billion voices in China. Born in Shanghai to a hard-core Communist military family; schooled in Singapore and Australia since 14 years of age thanks to my entrepreneurial father. Now, host of ChinesePod, world’s leading Chinese instruction service which combines podcasts, online tools and teacher services. Represented ChinesePod in major international conferences including keynoting at the Learning 2007 Conference. Awarded the 2009 Australia China Alumni of the Year in New Media and ICT.
This blog is a space of observation and reflection on the happenings of China: the past, the present and how they might shape our future.
Contact: jennyzq@gmail.com.
20
April
2008
June 10, 2008 12:56 am
Hello Jenny: Great to visit your website! Look forward to your illuminating episodes and seeing you on video. My progress in mandarin is slow but steady. Chinese friends think my pronunciation is getting better, thanks of course to you! : )
June 10, 2008 1:38 am
Hi Siyao,
Really appreciate your support!
Keep up your great learning efforts!
jenny
June 10, 2008 7:39 am
Ah, Ms. Chu: you have know idea how much of an inspiration you are to all of us out here, struggling to learn Chinese. You have been a great help.
I’m too old for my Chinese to get as good as your English, but if I could ever get fluent enough to tell my friends in Nanjing “My bum is growing out of my couch” and “Visualize your chipmunk,” I could die happy.
Thanks.
June 10, 2008 10:02 am
Hi mo li,
Oh, my infamous ramblings. Thank you so much for the encouragement! I hope along with ChinesePod, this blog will help your learning. At the very least, you might learn to say ‘bum’ and ‘chipmunk’ here.
Jenny
June 10, 2008 11:42 am
Jenny: I recently received an open invitation to visit Shanghai again as my nephew is now working in the Pudong district. If I ever get back there, I will surely pay a visit to the ChinesePod folks and take tons of photos. Last time I was there, my speaking ability was zero, now at least I can express myself. I have a distinct fear of natives looking at me and thinking why this guy can’t speak Chinese since he looks like us! A lot of ABC’s seem to have this affliction…Oh yes, I need to learn my Shanghainese as well. When I was a child, my folks actually preferred my learning English although no English was spoken between them!
Siyao
June 14, 2008 10:37 am
I would like to read more about background!
June 19, 2008 12:18 pm
Hi Daniel,
I wrote a dozen or so drafts for the about page. Very hard to be subtly self celebrating. I guess that’s why publicists make so much money.
July 19, 2008 1:21 am
Hi Jenny,
Thanks for all the fun and learning on Chinesepod. We met last summer when my wife and I came to Shanghai.’
I have been contributing to the relief effort in Sizhuan province. I am concerned that my contibution is also going to other needs in Asia, which normally is fine, but with the great need in China I want to be sure it goes directly to the earthquake victims and the families.
Who would you recommend I send my donations? I have been sending them (online with credit card) to red cross,red cressent. f
Thanks again for everything. I hope to see you again in October when I bring my dental office team to Shanghai for a vacation. Please say HI to the team at Chinese pod. (my chinesepod name is leimengde.
Zai jian
July 21, 2008 10:24 am
Hi Ray,
Thank you for your support and comment! The overwhelming support from the world for earthquake victims is truly heartfelt here in China. Relief efforts are delivered. Although there’s still a long way to go, there seem to be promising improvements.
I am not the best person to answer your question. And I do apologize for that. I’d say that Red Cross is one of the safest ways to donate, notwithstanding your concerns. I sent my donations to the Red Cross. But to be honest, I always assumed it would go to the earthquake releif efforts. But we all should be more aware. You most probably already have the links to China’s Red Cross. It seems they don’t have a special account for earthquake donations published online. Maybe we can contact them?
http://www.redcross.org.cn/english/index.htm
Hope to see you in October, which is the best time to visit.
Jenny
July 23, 2008 12:07 pm
Hello Jenny,
Im Fred from Brazil and would like to thank you for the ChinesePods Lessons!
I really love the way the Mandarin and even the English sounds when said by you!
Everything seems like music!
Well, I´m a business man and I´m planning to move to Shanghai next year.
My listening of you will be very very helpful!!!!
Glad to write to you,
All the best,
July 23, 2008 2:03 pm
Hi Fred,
Thank you for the very kind words. Deeply appreciated. Hope you enjoy Shanghai! Maybe we’ll meet here?
July 24, 2008 6:45 pm
Hi Jenny, Thanks for the link to the Red Cross of China. Their process for donation is a bit different than the red cross-red cresssent. I will transfer directly to their bank account. I think this is probably a better way than the credit card transfer that I was doing. .
I am really enjoying your web site.
Best Regard
Ray
July 25, 2008 9:06 pm
Dear Jenny,
Meeting you there in Shanghai would be a great pleasure!
Lets keep in touch and I let you know.
I hope all is fine,
All the best,
Fred.
October 29, 2008 4:54 pm
会继续关注你，加油
November 4, 2008 4:16 pm
geecss,
谢谢你的鼓励！
November 27, 2008 12:51 pm
Hi Jenny, I started the chinesepod thingy on Sunday, and I have scores of characters memorized, and I have five dialogues learned. I am moving to China in about 9 months and figure that it would make sense to have even a very basic understanding of the Chinese language. Thanks for your contributions to the site.
November 27, 2008 1:10 pm
Hi gcharest,
Thanks a lot for your support! Keep up your study too. I hope you have a great experience in China!
February 5, 2009 5:16 pm
Hi Jenny,
I have enjoyed learning Chinese from you. Your professionalism is obvious and much appreciated. I travel to China every year and will be going again this May. Changsha, Shanghai, Beijing and back to Seattle. I have been doing business with China for the last 7 years. Do you by chance know any Mandarin tutors in Shanghai that could work with me during my stay there in May 2009? thanks much and keep up the good work, your very delightful…
April 14, 2010 7:44 am
Hey Jenny ^_^,
!!
Thanks so much with your help in Chinese!! I’m moving to Kunming soon for further schooling and your podcast have helped a lot!!!! You are doing an awesome job and are an amazing person
April 20, 2010 5:07 pm
Hey Jenny,
You make learning Chinese not only significantly less intimidating, but also a great pleasure. I think one of my favorite comments from Chinesepod was when you described steak as “festive and full-bodied”. Perhaps you should contemplate a side career in penning dish descriptions for extravagant restaurants…just a thought.
I saw from your blog entry that you might be pursuing an MBA. Do you have big business aspirations? Best of luck to you.
Take Care,
James
June 11, 2010 1:58 am
Hello Jenny! I’m from France and I like to study through ChinesePod.
I will be in Shanghaï in September and I wonder if I can take lessons for 3 weeks. I do not find any form to fill in nor the rates for 3 weeks lessons. I also don’t know anything about accomodation and how much it is. Please can you answer me ASAP as I have to confirm my flights to morrow. Many thanks and in case you need native French speaker I used to be a teacher and translator….
Sorry if I am on the wrong page for those queries…. and thank you for your time!
EVELYNE
August 6, 2010 11:38 am
Keep up the good work on this blog.
August 9, 2010 12:59 am
Best of luck with your blog site. Good to read impressions of locals about trends in Shanghai.
February 14, 2011 4:10 am
Nǐ hǎo Jenny,
I’m a big fan of ChinesePod and i listen and practice 2 hours every day.
I’m also a big fan of you and Ken Carrol…
Go on with your blog and ChinesePod! My Twitter is @JeroenZeijl
Zàijiàn
February 20, 2011 1:02 pm
Jenny, I thought it was interesting that “Jenny Zhu” pops up when I search for 琦 (for another reason) on the Yellowbridge dictionary. Guess it shows how popular you are!
http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/wordsearch.php?searchMode=I&dialect=M&word=362722
February 25, 2011 9:53 pm
Hi Jenny,
My wife and I lived in Shanghai for about 4 years as university English teachers. We returned home in 2009 to turn our help to the many Chinese that come to the U.S. for education and research. We are currently at the University of Florida working with visiting scholars and post grad students, helping them to adjust to a new culture and providing some practical helps like assisting with housing, transportation, English improvement, shopping, etc. I ran across your blog looking for information about childe birth in China.
One of my adult students in China had a boy and gave him the English name of “Little Tom” which was a great honor for me. Thanks for the info you gave of your own experience. It was very useful in my study. There are some similarities with the ancient Hebrews.
June 4, 2011 1:05 am
i am very interested in Chinese culture and language. I have been visiting China several times already and will go back soon again. Need learn better Chinese and any advise will be highly appreciated. Living in Atlanta at the moment. Keep in touch.
June 13, 2011 4:45 pm
Ni-hao! I am fascinated by China, i’m visiting China every summer. This year i’m going to Hong Kong. You have a beautiful and interesting site, i love it, and your English is brilliant.
Thank you for all of the usefull information.
I wanted to ask you, i want to have a nose job, a really small change of my nose, i heard it is much cheaper in China than anywhere else, what do you advice me to do? Are the services truth-worthy?
Thank you so much.
Alice
June 21, 2011 6:06 am
I love this site, just I wish it was about me! My name is also Jenny Zhu, but I am younger than you by a lot, for I’m only 11 years old! Can you reply to this comment? I am also Chinese, but my real name is not Jennifer, it is Jenny. How I found your site is I was just playing with my laptop, and I decided to type in jennyzhu.com, to see if it exists. When I found out it existed, I was astonished. 你好！我也姓朱！
June 21, 2011 6:08 am
Also， the only difference about you and me is I live in the United Sstates. How are you famous again?
June 30, 2011 6:39 am
hi
July 1, 2011 6:56 am
hello???????
July 1, 2011 9:48 am
Hi Jenny, as they say in China “我们五百年前是一家“。Thank you for stumbling upon my blog and hope you enjoy the posts!
August 13, 2011 5:56 am
hi jenny, i realley love your website. i have a friend named jenny too. i think that you are pretty and i am also chinese. Can you reply to this message please, i would love that, thanks. yiu look so kind too.
August 21, 2011 10:44 pm
Just out of curiosity, Jenny: how many marriage proposals have you received over the Internet?
October 28, 2011 12:28 am
I found this blog by following some other people on twitter. I really liked your recent post about Chinese characters with no translations. And then I find out that you’re the host of ChinesePod!!!! I think these are really great learning tools. Fun, interesting, podcasts for more advanced learners with specific vocabulary!
February 18, 2012 10:16 am
Hi Jenny,
This is Niki Fan from Taiwan. It is really awesome blog. I just came back from Washington DC and found out lots of people struggling at Chinese. Your blog and CHinesePod is truly resourceful. Will introduce your blog to more of my foreign friends.
March 12, 2012 10:51 am
Hi Jenny,
I hope this message is not taken as a spam but I would like to ask if it’s possible for me to run an ad on your site. I started a VPN business that helps people get access to blocked websites.
I worked as an English teacher and Chinese teacher for many years so I really enjoy reading your posts about language. Great work. I am glad that I hit upon your site.
Fan Yi