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lately because of Incrowrimo I have been trying to send some letters to people outside the US and write people from other countries and cultures. I ran into a little internal struggle though on what I should do in regards to using Cursive or Print when I write someone in a country that English may not be their first language. In my mind I think maybe it would be better to write in regular print to make it as easy as possible for someone not fluent in English to understand. I obviously love writing in cursive but I do not want to make it hard for anyone to read my letter. Have you ever thought about this before? What do you do when sending letters to countries where English may not be the primary language? Appreciate any feedback or suggestions.

I was wondering if anyone here has tried this system for learning to read, write and speak Mandarin. TED TALK The basic system - if I understand it correctly - is that you learn 8 characters and their meanings, and then 32 compound phrases made from those eight. When you have them you grab another 8 characters and so on. Mandarin seems to lend itself well to this kind of vocabulary building. I think I read somewhere on the originator's website that if you learn 200 characters you will have the language capabilities of an 8 year old Chinese child. Well I don't know about anyone else but my ambitions are small. If I could speak Mandarin like an 8 year old I would be well pleased! I combine the above method with some basic rules for the order in which pen/brush strokes should be made when writing the characters. This generally helps me to retain the meaning and form a little easier. There are books and flashcards available, and these are fine tools for sure, but I need to write it down to drive it home in my head. So, anyone have any thoughts or experience with this system?