Inserting international characters/symbols into db

Okay super long story short:
Have Oracle DB w/NLS_CHARACTERSET = AL32UTF8
I am trying to test this database by inserting some Chinese characters -- problem is, I cannot figure out how to do this.

Any ideas on how I get SQL PLUS to display Chinese Characters (i.e. copy them over from Character Map)? Or how about the Command Line displaying chinese characters?

Or I've stored some in a file, but alas my knowledge of importing a file into Oracle is non-existent.

Spent the entire day reading on this subject and everything I've read today tells me conflicting things (or vague instructions that I can follow to a point and then get stuck).
Does anyone have any suggestions, ideas or other places to point me?

Thanks in advance,
BB

I don't think SQL*Plus can handle UTF8 characters, but did you try to set NLS_LANG to the correct value?
This might help you to get the correct NLS_LANG settings:

http://www.oracle.com/technology/products/oracle8i/htdocs/faq_combined.htm
http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96529/toc.htm

I had no trouble inserting russian and arabic UTF8 characters in an Oracle8 databse using a Java frontend which is Unicode enabled anyway. So maybe you want to have a look at Unicode/UTF8 enabled frontends to test your database.

A third solution could be SQL*Loader which can handle UTF8 as well. You will need to create a text file with the desired content, write the .ctl file and then import it using SQL*Loader

http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96652/part2.htm
http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96652/ch10.htm#1009945

Regards
Thomas

Thomas,
Thank you for responding. I am still having troubles but from my reading I can tell I'm not the only one.
Thanks for giving me some good resources...

I do have Toad installed on my machine - of course after researching, I don't have the newest international version (so that's my next option).

Tried SQL Loader as well - not compatible with my database because it doesn't recognize the characterset (it too is the "wrong" or older version).

So at least I have two other paths to take - it's just going to take some time to get there!

Thanks again,
BB

You should always install the version of the Oracle client that matches your server version.