Chinese/Tonal Languages

So I'm going to be taking Mandarin this Fall and I wanted to know if I'm going to have an impossibly hard time understanding and speaking with regards to tones. I've been playing this little game on the BBC language site and I can't recognize about half of the tones they give.

Also is there a consensus on whether or not asian language teachers are strict/mean/hard? The professor is a guy too if that makes a difference.

He will put his dick in your butt.

Tones take a lot of practice to get down. I took three courses in Mandarin and can't say I can always reliably identify the tones when spoken quickly. Though, tones are only part of the language and I don't think you need to master them in order to begin speaking and understanding. They'll improve as you progress in the language, as long as you keep practising.

I wouldn't say there's any consensus on the strictness of Asian teachers, at least in my experience. Out of taking Japanese, Korean, and Mandarin through University, I've have the full range on hardness and strictness, and never had any "mean" teachers. Although, I find Mandarin teachers tend to be higher on the hardness and strictness. I've had only one guy teacher: he was my Korean teacher, and he is possibly the most laid back teacher I've ever known.

Tones are VERY VERY important for tell one word from another.

Different tone means abosltely another meaning. There is ONLY 4 tones in Mandarin

Tones are important and are something you definitely need to learn if you actually want to be able to understand and be understand easily by others. One thing I noticed in my earlier days of studying Mandarin at university was that generally people who were better at music/were ok at singing spoke significantly better than those who weren't.

My advice to you is to first never give up on your tones. Some students in my classes just gave up on learning the tones of new words either because they believed they would just pick them up over time or because they thought they weren't necessary. Not bothering to learn the tones in a tonal languages is like refusing to pronounce 2-3 letters in all words and then expecting people to understand you- it's beyond moronic. So, don't fall into that trap.

Secondly, don't feel stupid overpronouncing your tones at first. Sure, you'll sound and feel a bit silly doing so, but placing emphasis on your tones when speaking at first will get you used to having to speak a language where your mother tongue's concepts of inflection and intonation are not applicable. It takes a while, but with time it will become natural. Your professor will probably devote some classes to tones, so I'm sure you've got nothing to worry about.

The only notable feature I found when it came my teachers and how they taught was they tended to prefer rote learning and memorisation, which is understandably necessary with a language like Chinese. I didn't have any particularly strict teachers myself.

actually there are FIVE tones in Mandarin, modal paricles like "ah" -- which in Chinese is “啊” -- , have no tones.

Potential mind fuck:

Punjabi is a tonal language.

I found that out after branching into the language from Hindustani (Hindi-Urdu).

For example 'house' in Hindustani is 'ghar', but in a dialect of Punjabi that I am studying it is called 'ka~ar'; with a peek in pitch located at the centre of the word.

Tones are fun, but slightly annoying, I study Mandarin and getting the tones down was not too hard, however when learning some Thai on a trip once I found the 7 tone system quite overbearing.

Fun times.