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Lorinth’s log - 劳伦的博客 | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| lorinth Tetraglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4262 days ago 443 posts - 581 votes  Speaks: French*, English, Spanish, Latin Studies: Mandarin, Finnish | Message 241 of 408 20 February 2014 at 3:33pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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Yesterday, I've worked on an interesting "slow Chinese" podcast about 剩女 and 恐婚, i.e. people in their 30s who are not married yet, because they don't find an appropriate enough partner of because they fear marital life, and who face some real pressure from parents and friends to join the ranks ASAP. Though I'm not that familiar with today's Chinese society, I have the impression that that pressure is hard to avoid. Even in the cartoon 大耳朵图图, there's an episode on that very subject, with a happy ending where 大耳朵图图 finally converts a 恐婚 to the idea that getting married and having kids is not that awful. The girl leaves absolutely enthusiastic about the idea of starting a new life with a husband and children.
The two shows form an interesting counterpoint. SlowChinese podcast 大耳朵图图's episode on Youtube -- I've kept on reading 鬼吹灯 but, for some reason, while I've read over 80% of the text, I'm now confronted with extracts that seem much more complicated to understand. One possible reason is that these parts are objectively more difficult or technical: one of the characters (胖子) seems to talk in slang, I often don't get what he says; there are parts with lots of technical vocab related to 风水; there are some detailed and impenetrable descriptions of buildings. So, though I've been able to read this book with relative ease up to now, I can see, once again that, while studying Chinese, nothing can ever be taken for granted. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Expugnator Hexaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 5154 days ago 3335 posts - 4349 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Norwegian, French, English, Italian, Papiamento Studies: Mandarin, Georgian, Russian | Message 242 of 408 20 February 2014 at 7:02pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I'm on the same river, even though my boat is floating miles behind at an A2 level :).
I've been doing a lot of blind-listening, and now I do start to make some progress. My whole routine has audio now, I have no reading-only activity ATM. I'm always taking, downloading and/or bookmarking nice suggestions from you guys, Ninobo and lorinth. They all give important insights into the Chinese culture. If I manage to enjoy such material while learning the language and making use of transcripts, subtitles and all crutches, that'd still be a victory for me, as most of my Chinese journey has been of low motivation and high frustration. Thanks for calling up 大耳朵图图 once again, lorinth. Now that you gave me the hint that it deals with contemporary issues on the Chinese society, maybe it is time for it to finally replace XiYangYang. EDIT: While we're at it, how do I get to the beginning of 大耳朵图图? That is, Season 1 episode 1. I've noticed different characters being used for season and for episode. Edited by Expugnator on 20 February 2014 at 7:06pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| lorinth Tetraglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4262 days ago 443 posts - 581 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish, Latin Studies: Mandarin, Finnish | Message 243 of 408 20 February 2014 at 7:11pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Thanks for the kind words, Expugnator.
Well, considering that 大耳朵图图 is advanced sociology would be a bit of a stretch :-) However, I do believe that this cartoon is more interesting than 喜羊羊, that the subjects are more relevant (for kids, of course, but sometimes also for adults, e.g. the show we've been discussing. There are also episodes concerning diets, questions raised by kids about birth, etc.) and that the language is easier and somehow more realistic. And, it's simply more funny in general. But of course, it's a matter of taste. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| lorinth Tetraglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4262 days ago 443 posts - 581 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish, Latin Studies: Mandarin, Finnish | Message 244 of 408 20 February 2014 at 7:14pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Hm, I don't know. I've watched them randomly up to now. Maybe you could try "大耳朵图图 第1季 第1集" as a search criteria in Youtube or Youku. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Expugnator Hexaglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 5154 days ago 3335 posts - 4349 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, Norwegian, French, English, Italian, Papiamento Studies: Mandarin, Georgian, Russian | Message 245 of 408 20 February 2014 at 7:25pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I found numbers 1 and 2. The problem i find with watching them randomly is keeping track
of what has been already watched. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| Crush Tetraglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5853 days ago 1622 posts - 2299 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Mandarin, Esperanto Studies: Basque | Message 246 of 408 21 February 2014 at 3:12am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I've found that there is a lot of pressure for people to get married in China. My friends in their mid-20s would tell me how whenever they go back home their family would try to introduce them to people and ask them when they were going to get married. Like Expugnator, i'm also looking forward to the day where i can read a Chinese book or follow a movie, even if it's with subtitles.
I'm also finding lots of interesting shows and books that i'd like to read/watch later in both your and Ninibo's logs. Btw, i just read in your first post that you were considering the EuRom5 method. I bought it in Spain (if you know how to search the internet, you can actually find all the texts with audio on their site. It's actually much more convenient that way as you don't have to flip through pages in the book to find grammar info. Let me know if you want help finding where to search). It was nice, but i honestly enjoyed EuroComRom more. After going through both, i felt pretty comfortable reading in Italian and Portuguese. I was already pretty comfortable reading in Spanish, French, and Catalan, though. I can also work my way slowly through a Romanian text, but that was much more difficult than the others. It did make me interested to learn it (as well as Sardinian), i'm not sure if that's a positive or negative thing though :P There was also mention of an EuRom 8 (pdf in Galician) focusing on "catalán, español, francés, galego, Italiano, occitano, portugués e romanés". I'd be really interested in taking an actual course based off the method to see what the (supposed) best way for studying it would be. EDIT: I just watched a couple episodes of 大耳朵图图, i think this is the first time i've ever understood about 95% of what was being said :D Thanks for mentioning it! Edited by Crush on 21 February 2014 at 3:53am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| lorinth Tetraglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4262 days ago 443 posts - 581 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish, Latin Studies: Mandarin, Finnish | Message 247 of 408 21 February 2014 at 11:57am | IP Logged | |||||||||||
Hello, Crush, thanks for the detailed comment.
While CCTV live online was playing in the background, I've seen (rather than "watched") a bit of the show referred to in the beginning of the SlowChinese podcast (我们结婚吧！). As far as TV dramas go, it looks like an interesting take on that subject of 恐婚 and 剩女.
I think you can do that long before you actually understand Chinese. I really believe it's worthwhile to watch subtitled Chinese TV and movies or to read translated Chinese literature, while waiting to be able to do the same in the original language. I like literature, so even before I'd contemplated, let alone started, learning Chinese, I'd read many ancient and modern books translated from Chinese (plus books about China or the Chinese language). It helps to get acquainted with the culture or even to pick one character or two words here and there.
Thanks. In my opinion, most learners could and should start early, with readers, see my post about the sequence I followed in this thread: Link
Yup, I've bought the book and, the day after that, I found the site. Ah, well. At least, it's nice to contribute financially to such an interesting project :-) I've only done two lessons in each language. The main problem, for me, is that the time I can devote to language learning is severely restricted by family and professional life. Last year, I had decided to limit myself to Chinese (mainly), plus some Finnish, Latin and Spanish, dumping Dutch, Italian, etc. However, last fall, when my 4th kid was about to be borne, I made a conscious decision to focus on Chinese only. Plus, as far as Italian is concerned, my elder daughter has started learning it, and I don't want to place unwelcome family pressure on her if I start to study it myself - Italian is hers :-) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||||||||
| lorinth Tetraglot Senior Member Belgium Joined 4262 days ago 443 posts - 581 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish, Latin Studies: Mandarin, Finnish | Message 248 of 408 21 February 2014 at 3:17pm | IP Logged | |||||||||||
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I've read an article in Chinese about the uses of the expression "他妈的" (damn! f***ing!), notably to disambiguate 有歧义的句子.
Link Yesterday, I forgot to mention another reason why some parts of 鬼吹灯 are harder than others: the text is packed with expressions, not all of them 4 character chengyus. I tend to consider them just like words, i.e. I add them to my daily lists until I have 15-25 items on a given day. However, I have noticed that very few of these expressions are repeated in the text: the author possesses, as far as I can tell, a very wide range of such expressions. I've logged 9h30-10h00 of listening this week. Just about right on target. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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