Tracy,

to my little knowlegde in chinese it's very tricky since a lot of things are done in pronunciation. What we read as ma could have up to 5 different meanings.
(The version below seems to be the voicless short ma meaning question mark)

You even didn't know if they understand mandarin. The trick is do not ask vocaly. Try to get the text in chinese. Every chinese which can handle a book teaching chinese to english will understand the words if they are written. This (and thats what I like on the idea) is completely independent of the language spoken. China has around 12 languages that are much more different then german to english or russian, each with a lot of dialects. But if they do not spoke the same language they may cower down and draw signs in the dirt. The signs may even understand from a japanese,

Ni is simple you, and the phrase Ni hao (ma) is literally You well?. [Answer Wo hao, ni'ne is I well, you?].

HTH
Agnes

>>"Would you teach me Mandarin?" should be spoken as (in standrad mandarin, I think all Chinese should understand.)
>>
>>knee "chee owl" wall, wall yee, cur yee ma
>>
>>1) "chee owl" quiken the speak of the 2 words as like merging them into one.
>>2) the first "wall", drop the phoenitical effect of LL, you stop immediately before you are about to say the LL
>>3) cur, like curse without se phonetically. That is the curse become cur (or cur in curtesy)
>>4) ma should pronouce like ma in "Mars", drop the "rs", only the ma should be pronounced. Sort of pronouncing the word "mother" without the "ther"
>>
>>HTH
>>
>>IMOH, unless one learn Chinese or learn to speak in Mandarin at age 1 to 12, I don't see any chance to pick up the langauge later than 12.
>
>Thank you! She's not hoping to learn the language, just some words and phrases to be able to communicate better. I actually knew a couple of guys years ago (mid 80s) who learned it via an immersion course for 2 years. Of course, not many people can have that experience to learn a language like Mandarin. I have no idea where they are now.
>
>Thanks so much!
>
>I am curious of the ni (knee) since it is in 'ni hao' as well (hello)...