mandarin

what are some good resources for a native english speaker to learn mandarin? i have pimsleur, but it obviously doesnt help with simplified chinese. i'm going to china for an indefinite period soon (too soon to be fluent), and would like a head start

>>10
No, the structure is different. For example to say "I tell you" :
wo gen ni shuo (you can't say directly wo shuo ni)
wo jiang ni