Bigguy_33

http://video.pbs.org/program/mulberry-child/ This video was on PBS.org yesterday. It was rated very highly. It’s very interesting and in part explores why this Chinese woman, like so many other Chinese women, are very emotionally cold and have difficulties in expressing emotions of affection, love or support. “Storyline During the Chinese Cultural Revolution, millions had their lives destroyed...their reputations ruined. Mulberry Child is the story of the persecution and survival of Jian Ping's family during this difficult period. After growing up in Socialist China, Jian must learn to assimilate to a Capitalist world when she migrates to the United States”

Baloney …. This must have been written by someone who hasn’t learned Mandarin Chinese Now starting my 4th year of diligently studying Chinese, which includes 2 semesters of Mandarin Chinese in college, living in China for 2 ½ years, having a private Mandarin tutor, working in a Chinese Restaurant for 2 years to practice my language skills, and studying Mandarin Chinese anywhere between 30 – 40 hours each week. The above quote is nonsense. For tenses – Mandarin uses “change – of – state action verbs” For conjugations - Mandarin uses “Resultative suffixes with verbs” For plurals – Mandarin uses “frequency expressions” For gender – Mandarin uses numerous “kinship terms” depending if the person is older or younger then you and if they are related to you and whether they are related to your mother or father. Mandarin Chinese does each of the quoted points in a different manner and in most cases much much harder to learn.

Remember that old quote..... "We have met the enemy..... and he is us" I just don't know if he is any different than many other guys doing the same thing..... I've seen it many times here.....I bet you have too.

This guy (Steven) is embarrassing to watch ! Did you hear the line where the producer said to Steven after Sandy has arrived.. "She hungry ! You need to feed her !....."

http://video.pbs.org/video/2339246842 Here is the film itself http://video.pbs.org/video/2365001610 This is a film documentary that was on PBS yesterday. I think every man on this website, past and present, should watch this film about an American man seeking a Chinese wife. FYI, it is produced by a Chinese woman who was raised in the USA Many of the postings concerning situations in marriages and relationships, I’ve read on this website over the last 10 years are shown in this film. I watched it twice. I think it maybe a little uncomfortable for some of you to watch it since its like looking into a mirror a seeing your own reflection. (Sorry if this was posted before, I did try searching for it on CFL) One great thing, after studying Chinese everyday for the last 3 years, I could understand a lot of what Sandy was saying in Chinese. Here is some of the description from the PBS website. http://www.pbs.org/independentlens/seeking-asian-female/images/film.jpghttp://www.pbs.org/independentlens/seeking-asian-female/images/film2.jpghttp://www.pbs.org/independentlens/seeking-asian-female/images/film4.jpgSteven is an aging white man obsessed with marrying an Asian woman, dreaming of a devoted young wife. Sandy is the young, feisty, ambitious Chinese woman he finds online. This engaging documentary follows their tumultuous love story. For years, twice-divorced airport garage attendant Steven has been writing to numerous women through an online dating site that specializes in connecting Western men with Asian women. At times, his pursuit seems like utter fantasy. He falls for a 24-year-old woman across the Pacific entirely through pictures and email. When she eventually breaks his heart, he meets another Chinese woman, 30-year-old Sandy. They become engaged, and she flies to San Francisco to marry him. Steven and Sandy negotiate cross-cultural differences huddled around Google Translate as they try to communicate despite an enormous language barrier. While they attempt to work out the significant bumps in their relationship, filmmaker Debbie Lum finds herself becoming more than an outside observer: Steven and Sandy begin to rely heavily on Lum to bridge the large gap between their two disparate cultures. “One day Steven calls me in desperation,” Lum says. “He and Sandy have had a huge fight. I rush over to film them — but quickly become enlisted as translator using the broken Mandarin I learned in college. Finding myself caught in the middle of their tumultuous lives, I begin to see their complicated relationship from many different angles.” Sandy comes to realize that both Steven and life in America are not as ideal as she had expected. But as she confronts many of Steven’s bad habits, he begins to change. His obsession with many Asian women becomes a deep commitment to one — and he recognizes that in order to keep Sandy, he must learn how to be a caring, respectful, and culturally sensitive husband. Above all he must confront the reality of marriage — not to the sweet innocent girl he imagined, but to a demanding, strong-willed Asian woman

When someone who just started learning Mandarin via a CD system, say that they can understand some “words” of a conversation between native speaking Mandarin Chinese individuals, I respectfully doubt it. I mean no disrespect towards your efforts; 3 years ago, I was where you are now. I go back to my original comment about learning Mandarin, “You don’t know what you don’t know”. Anyone reading similar postings shouldn’t think you can get a CD system, and then within a few weeks understand parts/words of a conversation between Chinese people. YOU CAN NOT! PERIOD, END OF DISCUSSION. What you may have heard are a few “sounds” which were familiar, but what words they represented and how they were being used is far beyond the ability of someone just starting to learn Mandarin. It takes a few to several years of dedicated studying to understand “some words” with certainty, between native Mandarin speaking individuals. This lack of ability to understand is based upon several factors about Mandarin: a) Dialects used in China b) Paraphrasing used in English translations c) Syllables in Mandarin with numerous unrelated meanings d) Context is required for understanding e) No loanwords f) Tonal aspects of Mandarin 1) Dialects – There are approximately 10 major dialects used in China. Individuals new to learning Mandarin think there is just one – Chinese. People in Beijing can’t understand people from Shenzhen or the southeast coastal area. People in Shanghai have a difficult time understanding people in both Beijing and Shenzhen. Have you ever wondered why there are subtitles on all of CCTV broadcasts? It’s because there are so many spoken dialects, but they all use the same writing system so they need subtitles for everyone to understand. So, to think the conversation you overheard is the Mandarin which you are studying is not 100% certain by any means. 2) Paraphrasing – This is the main reason to get off those western based Mandarin teaching CD’s systems. After you have studied Mandarin for awhile and have developed a working vocabulary of several hundred words, you’ll notice that the English translation is no where near what the actual literal translation is. Therefore, those CD’s systems do a poor job of teaching the use of individual words correctly and accordingly you’re weak at forming and understanding sentences. The translation is paraphrased using English grammar rules, sentence structure and just some laziness. Someone new to studying Mandarin is not aware of this for a few years and it retards your ability to actually understand Mandarin because Mandarin sentence structure and grammar is so very different then English. So what you think you heard may have a completely different meaning, if you are a beginner. 3) Syllables – This is singularly what makes Mandarin so difficult. – Mandarin is made up of about 400 syllables which are mostly 3 – 4 letters long (using the pinyin system) to make up their words. By contrast English has about 2,400. To make up for the limited number of syllables Mandarin uses tones, but that still leaves Mandarin short. In English syllables can’t stand independently as a word, but Mandarin’s they can stand alone as a word. Additionally, Mandarin syllables can be part of several other syllables to form a completely new word very different then the individual syllable meaning. Syllables with numerous multiple meanings and uses, is what makes Mandarin so difficult to understand while learning. Take the word/syllable ‘yes’ in Mandarin (shi4). “Shi” is a syllable which can stand alone or it can be used with other syllables to form over 999 other very different words in Mandarin (it maybe more, but my computerized Mandarin dictionary by a Chinese software company max out at 999). Therefore when studying Mandarin, you need quite a large vocabulary just to start understanding sentences. Mandarin has a huge learning curve just to reach an elementary level before you can identify a syllable being used as a stand alone word or is the syllable being used as part of a group of other syllables to form a completely different word from the individual components. So yes you may have overheard a syllable in a conversation, but was the syllable being used as the word you “learned” or was it being used as part of 999 other words you don’t know yet? It is doubtful you understood the word being used. One last point about Mandarin syllables, many groups of them sound amazingly identical (zhi,chi,shi) or (keng, heng, ceng, seng, zheng, cheng, sheng) are just a few. So it’s extremely difficult to not only pick out of a group the correct syllable but also the correct tone you heard. You have no idea about this when you just started learning. Therefore, you have no way, as a beginner, to differentiate the use of syllables/words in Mandarin to understand parts of the day to day conversations which you overheard. Those CD’s systems don’t mention these facts because they don’t want you to be discouraged before you start. Rosetta Stone and Pimsleur instead want you to think learning Mandarin is a piece of cake if you buy their CD’s and give them your money. 4) Context is required for understanding. Words in English are precise and can be understood without knowing the conversation. But in Mandarin there are so many ways to use the same syllable/words you need context for understanding. Also in Mandarin a large percentage of their words, which sound, written the same in pinyin and have the same tone also have very different multiple meanings. Many words have over 12 very different meanings and the only way to separate out the correct meaning is to have context of the conversation or READ/UNDERSTAND the written Chinese script, not pinyin. Therefore, for non native speakers, you need the context of a conversation to understand what is being said. Consequently, this leads to another very steep learning curve, you just can’t understand a few words, but you need to understand a lot of what is being said so you can comprehend the context of a conversation and be able to parse out the individual words correctly. 5) Lack of “Loanwords”. Another facet about English which makes it great is we adopt words from other languages, known as “loanwords”, without a second thought. The Chinese hate loanwords because it makes their language/culture tainted. Yes, I know there are a few exceptions but generally no loanwords. The Chinese take their already limited supply of syllables and string some of them together to make up a new word that sounds similar to the foreign word. Their newly created word makes no sense, but it just sounds a little like the foreign words so they use it. The problem with this practice is it makes an even larger percentage of their vocabulary words sound the same. Take “Coke” for example. It is a brand name product available everywhere in China and around the world, so why not call it “Coke”? No, instead in Mandarin it’s “ke3 kou3 ke3 le4” then you have to worry about the correct tones and adjust the tonal based upon tone rules. If that is not enough there are measure words/classifiers which are required to worry about and if you want ice cubes (which Chinese restaurant NEVER have available) or a ‘can of Coke’ you could run the total number of words, classifiers and tones up to 18 things to remember and pronounce, all for a COKE ! In English - One word, one syllable, and no tones. 6) Tonal aspects of Mandarin. Everyone knows Mandarin is a tonal language, but there are 2 points that never get mentioned in these discussions. a) To understand a person speaking you really need to know all the meanings of the different tones of a single word and recall them instantly. That is nearly impossible for non native speakers. Otherwise if you don’t know the correct word/tone combination you will naturally think of the incorrect meaning based upon the only tone meaning you know. b) The other point is the main problems with tones. Most Chinese people will NOT make the “leap of faith” and get to the correct meaning of the word you are saying, if you happen to miss the proper tone. It’s the same damn sound/word but only a very slight incorrect inflection in your voice. But they still refuse to guess at the correct words by substituting the right tone. The Chinese refuse to “throw you a bone” to help you out. I faced this everyday while practicing my Mandarin. This problem was also pointed out extensively in a book “Dreaming in Chinese” by Deborah Fellows, a Harvard trained Linguistic Professional, who was studying Mandarin in China for 2 years. A Harvard language teacher couldn’t speak Mandarin after 2 years so what possible chance does a beginner adult, without a background in languages, have with a CD system? It’s IMPOSSIBLE! I haven’t even started talking about high speed and sloppy pronunciation, sentence structures, idioms & “set sayings” that Chinese people use all the time, which if you don’t know them, you can’t understand what is being said. One final problem is the inconsistency or lack of standardization of their language in teaching materials. As an example, many words are written differently and have different tone marks depending on what reference source you are using. All of the above I’ve mentioned, makes Mandarin a very difficult language to learn for non Chinese people. So for a beginner to say they understood “some words” between native Mandarin speaking individuals I doubt it. ֪֮Ϊ֪֮£¬²»ÖªÎª²»Öª English is referred to as “the language of kings” and Mandarin Chinese is referred to as “the language of the common people”. After studying Mandarin for several years, you will understand why and the differences. Once I’ve read the following about learning Chinese…. (“Someone once said that learning Chinese is "a five-year lesson in humility”. I used to think this meant that at the end of five years you will have mastered Chinese and learned humility along the way. However, now having studied Chinese for over six years, I have concluded that actually the phrase means that after five years your Chinese will still be abysmal, but at least you will have thoroughly learned humility.”) I fully agree and understand now as I’m well into my third year of diligently studying Mandarin. To think you can learn Mandarin Chinese via a CD’s system is absolutely ridiculous. Moreover, you can’t listen to a few CD’s when you are jogging, driving or biking and expect to learn Mandarin Chinese. To learn Mandarin as an adult, you need to have several Mandarin Chinese learning sources available and laid out ready for use (I’ve used about 20 over the years), be sitting at a desk, alone and be 100% focused for long hours at a time, which will then turn into days, weeks, months and years. You need to attend quality courses with a qualified instructor and have private tutoring sessions. Please note: just because a person speaks Mandarin, DOES NOT make them qualified to teach or tutor Mandarin. (Would you want George Bush (43) teaching your baby English?) You need to find people, who speak the correct dialect you’re learning, to practice with daily and continue to study everyday no matter what. Furthermore, you should translate each sentence in Chinese movies, videos and articles to understand how they express themselves and their current lingo. There are no short cuts in learning Mandarin. Men who have found a Chinese wife online; have always started off learning Mandarin for all the wrong reasons. Then they make a half ass and short lived effort at learning Mandarin. Simply stated, you have to dedicate your life to learning Mandarin Chinese because that is your passion in life. I’ve never read a posting, from even a single member, who has used either CD systems in an attempt to learn Mandarin; post that they’re now fully proficient or even proficient at even an immediate level at speaking, communicating and understanding Mandarin. Nobody, None, Zippo, Áã.

Are you the original poster? Anyway, when using flash cards, you should go from English to Chinese, NOT Chinese to English, which is much easier. You should also write the "tones" out too when you are answering the flash cards. It is very easy, but completely worthless, to learn some Chinese words without knowing the correct tones. Then after you get a better Mandarin vocabulary, you need to study Chinese grammar, for about 2 years, which is very different the English grammar or else you will be just babbling. I recommend “Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar: A Practical Guide (Modern Grammars) by Claudia Ross. It’s a little pricy at $118.00 Good Luck

Mr. Don, it has been 7 months since you posted this question. Are you fluent or at least at the immediate level in Mandarin yet or do you now understand what I was saying in my reply? I was just studying my Mandarin and thought about your posting.

I am very sorry, I did not get your message. I make sure my profile does not block PM FYI, I still have my $700 RBM's

³ÕÈ˳ո£

I thought I could help someone out, since it has been mentioned here a number of times how big of a rip off those currency exchanges are at the airports and in China are. Thanks for the suggestion, if no one is interested, I will just take a trip into Chinatown in Chicago to exchange it.

I have 700 RMB and 120 Hong Kong dollars remaining from my stay in China. Does anyone want to exchange dollars for RMB or HK dollars for their upcoming trip to China? We can use the current exchange rate. If you have any interest, you can PM or email me. I've been a member since Jan 04. Thanks.

It's a nice tool, but just so expensive for what you get. It cost only a few bucks to manufacture. I looked all over when I lived in China, but couldn't find a knockoff version. Its like that infrared paint remover tool for removing old built up paint. It's just 2 heat tubes, but it cost $400. I made one myself for $25. after reading a DIY article. Seems like you got a good deal from Kreg, for just a little work.

Carl, A few months ago, on Saturday morning at about 7:00AM , I was watching an info commerical for Kreg's pocket screw jig. There was a guy giving a testimony about the product and he sure looked like you. He even had a Chinese person near him in the commercial. Was that you??

When I was living in China, I was having dinner with an exceptionally beautiful woman and another woman, both who were professional and spoke English. Well, the beautiful woman asked if I was learning Chinese since I was there for more then a year. I replied NO and she then said I was a usual lazy American. I don¡¯t know if she was being rude because she was use to getting her way because of her beauty or it was just the normal Chinese¡¯ way of being rude, which I observed numerous times everyday while living in China. In any case, I was insulted and embarrassed by her boorish public comment. It was the straw that broke the camel¡¯s back. I then decided to learn Chinese. I started with a simple traveler¡¯s book ¡°15 Minutes Chinese¡± and ¡°Living Language Chinese¡±. These two books are worthless especially the ¡°Living Language¡± book since it doesn¡¯t have an index in the back for quick word lookup. I then moved on to both Pimsleur and Rosetta Stone. Again, these non Chinese companies, which are trying to teach you Chinese are hopelessly inadequate and a waste of money. Pimsleur and Stone have slick, crafty and clever advertising campaigns but lack any real substance on the language. I then took 2 college semesters of Mandarin which used the ¡°Integrated Chinese¡± textbook series and audio CD¡¯s. This is a great book and audio CD and gets into the nuts and bolts of the Chinese language. If you go this route, I must warn you, it requires a significant time commitment. There were a couple of US men there taking the course since they had found Chinese wives online. They were hopelessly lost after a few weeks. I would say 30 hours per week is needed. I then moved on too having a private tutor who was from Taiwan. Wow she is great and smart and very different then Mainland Chinese women. I then started to gain a better understand and amazement on just how inadequate the Pimsleur and Stone courses are. I also start working nights and weekends at a local Chinese restaurant just to be around people who spoke Chinese. I also teach the owner's two small kids who just started learning English and they teach me Chinese. My favor place for learning Chinese is at the CCTV website. There are several Chinese language series available there. The important difference between the CCTV series and Pimsleur and Stone is that CCTV series are designed and taught by Chinese, not a western company such as Pimsleur and Stone. The old saying ¡°you don¡¯t know what you don¡¯t know¡± is very true in learning and teaching Chinese. One additional point in CCTV language series favor over Pimsleur and Stone is CCTV is FREE ! My favor language series at CCTV are: 1 Growing up with Chinese ¨C 100 episode each 15 minutes long videos with lessons scripts in Mandarin, Pinyin and English. All are downloadable. 2) CRI Studio (China Radio International) - Over 300 audio lessons on numerous subjects about 5 minutes long each with scripts. The Chinese woman, Yajie, who is the main teacher, has the sexist radio voice I have ever heard. I just love this series. I also use Audacity to play all my lessons. Audacity is a free audio player and editor. It shows you the voice print just like Stone, but has many more features like slow play back and repeat segment playing. Another Chinese language series is on YouTube is ¡°PeggyTeachesChinese¡±. Peggy is a very engaging young girl from Taiwan and a great teacher. You need to start at the beginning for her series or else you will be lost. She is a sweetheart ! Finally, over the years I have seen a number of guys here, go out and buy the Pimsleur and Stone series thinking they will learn Chinese. Then within a few months, they give up and then ask if anyone wants to buy the CD¡¯s from them. It always surprises me how many men go out and find a Chinese wife, then expect her to learn English, while they don¡¯t make any attempt or just a feeble attempt at learning a little Chinese. I don¡¯t have a Chinese wife or girlfriend and don¡¯t have any plans for one in the future. But I study Chinese 2 or 3 hours daily. I am at the library now downloading some additional lessons from CCTV. To learn Chinese takes a substantial amount of effort. The older you are the more you have to study and practice. It¡¯s impossible to explain to you why it is so difficult. After all of this, I am only at the intermediate level now. But it gives me a sense of accomplishment that I never had before when I lived in China. Now, I love the language. I can¡¯t wait until I see that beautiful woman again, so I can tell her off in Chinese. Men in your situation should just learn a few expressions, from CCTV, and let it go at that. Don¡¯t waste your money on those fancy CD¡¯s courses.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/34958798/ns/wo...ific/?gt1=43001[/url] For anyone who thinks China is such a wonderful place to live based upon a few weeks of visiting.

FYI, you should be careful, sometimes dry cleaning in China a hit and miss proposition. Several times, when I asked and paid for dry cleaning what I got was nothing more then regular washing and it ruined my clothes. I have several long sleeve shirts which are almost short sleeves now, thanks to being washed in water and not dry cleaned as I asked and paid for.

This has been discussed several times before on this site. Crime in China I lived in China for most of 2 years and I disagree that crime rate in China is lower. Crime in China is just as pervasive as anywhere else in the world. You have kidnapping of women all the time in rural areas and in large cities such as Chengdu, the regional metropolis. At the labour market on Chengdu's Nine Eye Bridge it's estimated that 30 women go missing from the Nine Eye Bridge labour market every day. I would suggest anyone watch this video on kidnapping in China from Chengdu. http://www.insightnewstv.com/d08/ You have lots of low level type of crimes such as robberies, break-ins, purse-snatch, street attacks in the cities. Additionally spousal and domestic abuse and prostitution is off the charts in China. Not to mention other low level crime such as forgery, counterfeiting, bribery, paying off police and criminally building substandard and inferior building and consumer products which kills their own people. You should also remember China is executing about 8,000 people every year, almost 20 times as many as the rest of the world combined so that is another indication that your statement that crime rate in China is very low is not factual. If there was a low crime rate, then they would not be executing 20 times the number of people as other countries in the world combined. If you read stories here for a few years, you would also see many men have posted soon after they gave their girlfriends an engagement ring it was stolen on the bus or out of their house. It even happened again when the guy purchased them a second ring. Finally, if you look at low rise apartment building through out China, you will see bars on windows all over. It looks very depressing and those bars are not to keep mosquitoes out. There maybe is less killings with guns in China, but there is crime just like any other place in the world. Additionally, with the Communist controlling the media and newspapers there is not going to be the accurate reporting of any illegal activities or serious crimes which make them look bad. If anyone feels China is such a wonderful place without crime, then make yourself happy and move there and enjoy your life. Once you are there for a year or two you may change your mind. In one 6 week period I got robbed 3 times, and none of this was reported to the police. One of times I got robbed I was in a hospital getting treatment and was laughed at when I suggested calling the police. I was told by hospital employees, that the police do not want to hear about my robbery. It is very easy to sit back in good old safe USA and say the crime rate in China is low, but move there, and not just visit there for a few days and be lead around by the nose by your sweetheart who you just met for the first or second time, then you will immediately start to see the real depressing China. You can also watch this video in China of women getting the snot beat of them for their money. China robbery Low crime rate in China, what a joke!

What a bunch of crap....

They should spend a little more money on their own hospitals..... I spent the last 2 weeks in one of their hospitals in a large city, as an outpatient and it was awful there.......I ALSO GOT MY WALLET STOLEN TOO IN THE HOSPITAL!

http://candleforlove.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=32921 http://candleforlove.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=31666 http://candleforlove.com/forums/index.php?...c=28795&hl=

Wait, Wait and Wait some more! Babies are not like cell phones where you go out and get one just because all your friends are getting the newest and cutest one. Babies are human beings who need to be born into a strong, stable and solid relationship between two adults who¡¯s relationship will last forever because they fully know and understand each other. There should be NO consideration whatsoever given to the cost of a plane ticket or VISA requirements when talking about conceiving another human life. This board over the years is littered with men who have kids spread across 2, 3 and 4 marriages. Then you read about these same men complaining about why their in-laws in the US are not taking care of their grandkids like they do in China. Before you decide, read EVERY story in the ¡®Problems & Partings¡± section. Then look at those members who are divorcing or splitting up, and read their prior postings months ago. Time and time again you will read ¡°I am 100% sure this is forever¡± or ¡°Without a doubt I trust her 100%¡± or ¡°I know her better then I know myself¡±. You do not really know your girlfriend at all yet, so do not take a gamble with another human being¡¯s life. Wait ! If she does not want to wait with you or have the maturity to understand this, run! !

I disagree. There is a lot of petty crime (like bicycle theft) that goes unreported because the police ignore many crimes like that there. I agree with this. Crime in China is just as pervasive as anywhere else in the world. You have kidnapping of women all the time in rural areas; you have lots of low level type of crimes such as robberies, break-ins, purse-snatch, street attacks in the cities. Additionally spousal and domestic abuse and prostitution is off the charts in China. Not to mention other low level crime such as forgery, counterfeiting, bribery, paying off police and criminally building substandard and inferior building and consumer products which kills their own people. You should also remember China is executing about 8,000 people every year, almost 20 times as many as the rest of the world combined so that is another indication that your statement that crime rate in China is very low is not factual. If there was a low crime rate, then they would not be executing 20 times the number of people as other countries in the world combined. If you read stories here for a few years, you would also see many men have posted soon after they gave their girlfriends an engagement ring it was stolen on the bus or out of their house. It even happened again when the guy brought them a second ring. Finally, if you look at low rise apartment building through out china, you will see bars on windows all over. It looks very depressing and those bars are not to keep mosquitoes out. Yes there is less killings with guns in China because the Communist will not allow the public to have guns in China, but there is crime just like any other place in the world. Additionally, with the Communist controlling the media and newspapers there is not going to be the accurate reporting of any illegal activities or serious crimes which make them look bad. If you feel China is such a wonderful place without crime, then make yourself happy and move there and enjoy your life. Once you are there for a year or two you may change your mind.

One little problem with your thesis of yet another incredible Chinese feat of human accomplishments...... the Hong King airport was designed and build by the British. The Chinese were very much against it being built. http://www.airwise.com/airports/apac/HKG/HKG_07.html

I believe that is not accurate. You can buy the Iphone without the contract for $599. at an Apple store. I believe this was discussed before here. Just google 'Iphone without contract' and you will see several articles concerning this. Also, starting on Sept 7, they will be available at all Best Buys without the contract