CLI in Guilin offers one-on-one Chinese immersion: 36,000+ hours to students from 35 countries in 2025, plus personalized lessons and cultural activities.
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36,000 hours of one-on-one Chinese lessons. Students from 35 countries. One community in Guilin, China.
In 2025, CLI delivered over 36,000 hours of one-on-one Chinese lessons to students from at least 35 countries: 23,000 hours in person at the CLI Center in Guilin and 13,000 hours online. That's 36,000 hours of meaningful communication, breakthrough moments, laughter over lunch, and friendships formed across languages and borders.
As we enter our 17th year, we're grateful for the students, teachers, pengyous (朋友, péngyou), and team members who continue to make CLI a place where connections form with the Chinese language as the medium.
Exploring Guilin's local markets. Immersion goes where you go.
50+ Countries, One Classroom
One of the things that makes CLI special is the diversity of its community. Since 2009, we have welcome students from more than 50 countries to study with us in Guilin. In 2025 alone, students traveled to Guilin from at least 35 countries across six continents.
Some came for two weeks, others for six months. Some were university students earning college credit, others were professionals on sabbatical, retirees fulfilling a lifelong dream, or heritage speakers reconnecting with their roots. Here are the countries and regions that were represented at CLI in 2025:
What Students Are Saying
Inside the Classroom
One-on-One Learning
At the heart of CLI's approach is one-on-one instruction. Every student is paired with three different teachers, each focusing on a different aspect of language learning: speaking/listening, reading/writing, and comprehensive Chinese.
With 20 hours per week of fully personalized lessons, students progress at a pace that group classes can't match. There is no hiding in the back of a classroom. Every minute is active learning, with speaking, listening, reading, writing, and real-time corrections.
CLI student and team member Natalie during one-on-one lessons with Nancy 老师 (lǎoshī, "teacher").
Student Voices
Nothing captures the CLI experience quite like hearing directly from students. Watch Imani and Blake share their stories.
榫卯(sǔn mǎo): The Art of Chinese Joinery
Language learning at CLI extends beyond the classroom. Each week, CLI's Student Activities Manager, Summer 老师, organizes cultural activities that give students hands-on encounters with Chinese traditions.
One such activity in 2025 was a workshop in 榫卯 (sǔn mǎo), or traditional Chinese joinery. This ancient technique joins interlocking wooden components without nails, screws, or glue. The 榫 (sǔn, "tenon") is a protruding piece designed for insertion; the 卯 (mǎo, "mortise") is a recessed cut designed to receive it.
Dating back over 7,000 years to the Neolithic period, 榫卯 became the structural backbone of Chinese architecture. Beijing's Forbidden City (故宫, gùgōng) and countless traditional homes were built using this technique. In 2009, it was inscribed on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list.
Students exploring 榫卯 joinery during a weekly cultural activity led by Summer 老师.
Activities like these are integral to the learning environment. When students learn the vocabulary for "wood" (木头, mùtou), "tool" (工具, gōngjù), and "to make" (做, zuò) while physically handling the pieces, the language sticks in ways that flashcards alone can't replicate. Over the years, CLI's weekly activities have ranged from tea ceremonies and calligraphy workshops to hiking Guilin's karst mountains, visiting local villages, and learning to play mahjong.
Students exploring 榫卯 joinery during a weekly cultural activity led by Summer 老师.
Farewell Dinner
Because CLI students can begin their program on any Monday of the year, the rhythm of community life follows a unique weekly cycle. Each Monday begins with a welcome dinner for new arrivals, and each Thursday ends with a farewell dinner for departing students.
This tradition has run nearly every week since CLI was founded in 2009. Farewell dinners are festive. They're held at favorite local restaurants, often a spot requested by the departing student themselves. The entire CLI community is invited: teachers, students, team members, and pengyous (朋友) from nearby Guangxi Normal University.
Scenes from CLI farewell dinners in 2025 — a weekly tradition since 2009.
Students often give short speeches, sometimes in Chinese, reflecting on their time at CLI, thanking their teachers, and promising to come back. These dinners capture something essential about CLI: it isn't just a place where people study Chinese. It's a place where meaningful relationships form.
Exploring Guilin Together
Guilin's karst mountains and the Li River have been celebrated in Chinese art for over a thousand years. The saying 桂林山水甲天下 (Guìlín shānshuǐ jiǎ tiānxià, "Guilin's scenery is the finest under heaven") dates back to the Song Dynasty (960 to 1279 CE). For CLI students, this landscape is the backdrop to daily life.
The Chinese Language Institute (CLI) was founded by a dedicated team of Western and Chinese educators in 2009. Drawing on years of combined personal and professional experience in China, they created an educational model that provides students a unique path to learning Chinese and understanding the PRC through a high degree of customization and complete immersion within a Chinese language environment. Based in the picturesque city of Guilin, CLI delivers a highly effective intensive Chinese Immersion Program, online one-on-one lessons, and custom travel programs for students of all levels and backgrounds.
- The CLI Team
Click "Read more" below for more Chinese learning resources from CLI!
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