The Electrical Outlet

Trips to Hong Kong, Singapore and across the mainland are a mainstay of life for most foreign professionals in Asia. Couple that with the fact that many of the best jobs for mandarin-speaking expats are with smaller and mid-sized firms, and you've got a recipe for the need to work on the go. Say goodbye to life in a cubicle and hello to rushing to find a power outlet in rural Guangxi in order to make your conference call on Skype.

If you do business in Asia but are just learning to speak Chinese, join us in this lesson as we teach you how to ask for an electrical outlet for your laptop or phone. In addition to our regular Chinese podcast, we've also enabled our Speaking Practice hotline for today's lesson. If you're a premium subscriber, grab your personal ID number on our text page along with our telephone hotline number. Give us a call and practice reading the dialogue and vocabulary to us (add your own commentary, of course) and we'll get back to you in a day with personal feedback on how you sound.