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Snowflake’s Mandarin Log | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes  Studies: Mandarin | Message 657 of 740 11 April 2013 at 6:45pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've been having pretty major motivation issues lately. The other day I was skimming through my paperback copy of Pride and Prejudice (傲慢與偏見). The edition seems to be part of a series of western works translated into Chinese for Taiwanese university students. So the book was pretty intimidating at first. It's more approachable now even though there's a lot that I don't understand. Anyhow, I found myself sort of sinking into the story and my motivation issues sort of melted away.
I now have over 6 hours of Teresa Teng songs and about 45 minutes of remakes. Some of the remakes are the same song by different artists. The remakes are growing on me. I'm at about 1780 characters. Getting back into a decent routine will probably take a while as I'm starting a new job pretty soon. Not quite the same but the video below reminded me of the time that my mother, returning from the mainland, was stopped at customs with 5 bricks of fine snow white powder in her luggage. She told the customs agent that it's good for you, try some. It was very high quality arrowroot powder which evidentally is not available in this country. The arrowroot here which I've seen has been tan or pale grey tiny loose pebbles. Anyhow customs kept one brick, I assume for training purposes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IZD1Bx1yPRU Edited by Snowflake on 11 April 2013 at 8:14pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 658 of 740 21 April 2013 at 5:51am | IP Logged | ||
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Ramblings....started new job at a place where I previously did a project and recontacted some native Mandarin speakers there. Get to read/skim during my train commute now. Am rather behind in doing SRS reviews. Just ordered a book here in the US and am about to place orders in Taiwan and Hong Kong for a total of about 10 more books, mostly novels. Compiling a list of movies for when my friends can bring things back from the mainland.
Looking at the most recent SinoSpoon sign-up information, assuming I'm reading it correctly, the Mandarin Neutrino program is listed as being a maximum of 995 days. So I ran off a note to Khatz asking about that. It was 695 days when I signed up. I haven't heard back yet though also noticed that Khatz is starting up a Cantonese and Korean Neutrino program for a max of 995 days. I sort of wonder if that is to factor in people like me who move much slower. According to the original SinoSpoon schedule, I should have covered 1000+ more characters by now. Frankly given that I was totally intimidated by characters before starting Khatz's program, and knew at the outset that I would be unable to keep up with 15 new characters a day, going slower is fine. If all I get is 695 days of Neutrino/SinoSpoon, that's fine too as that's what I initially signed up for....no complaints here. Search in YouTube on "巧虎" for a mainland kids program.... I noticed some cultural behavioral elements mentioned in the Taiwanese kids program previously posted. This mainland one periodically covers practicalities of life such as how to get dressed, how to take care of DVDs, etc. Edited by Snowflake on 21 April 2013 at 5:57am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 659 of 740 30 April 2013 at 2:48am | IP Logged | ||
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Settling into a routine where I read/skim one book during the morning commute to work and do the same with a second book returning home. Each author, or translator, has their own preferred vocabulary and style of expression so alternating between two very different books is providing a nice cross section. Adding new characters and doing SRS reviews is really suffering though.
Delayed placing my book orders and now one item is out of stock. :>( It seems that culturally some Chinese consider it odd for someone to say that (s)he is adjusting to a new job. I said something like 我還在適應我新的公司 and the person, a mainlander, thought it was strange since the content of my job is basically the same as before. I asked my overseas Taiwanese chat partner about that. He said that yes, some would think my response was odd for the reason already given. He suggested being more specific to avoid that ....我還再適應我新公司的政策和文化, 我新同事的個性, 或我新同事的溝通方式 Edited by Snowflake on 30 April 2013 at 3:21am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 660 of 740 06 May 2013 at 4:41am | IP Logged | ||
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Placed the Taiwanese book order....needed some help figuring out the website. The exchange rate also changed enough that the increased amount was noticable. Still working on the Hong Kong order.
Generally feeling stressed about "my studies". I wonder how much of this is aggrevated by having a new job.... periodically wondering why am I doing this?! At todays' Mandarin speaking group someone brought in a painting, a copy of an original. He needed help deciphering the characters. There were about 9 people and they all were having difficulty....one person said they’ve been here too long. That person asked a university student, who came very recently, to help. The student didn’t seem to try. They finally did figure it all out. The signature was that of an artist from the Ming dynasty. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 661 of 740 09 May 2013 at 4:23am | IP Logged | ||
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My Taiwanese book order arrived today... talk about quick, less than one week! I initially balked a little at the slightly higher cost (compared to ordering from Hong Kong) but this was worth it! And part of it was wanting the experience of having to deal with a Taiwanese website.... I assume the Hong Kong book store site uses some non-standard words or phrases here and there.
My current schedule allows me to chat 2x weekly with my overseas Taiwanese language exchange partner....don't know how long this will last but it should really help since I've hardly spoken in Mandarin since Aug of last year. Probably an amazing thing is that we've been chatting with each other since Feb 2010 or so as most forum posts that I've seen seem to think that 9 months is a really long time with a given language exchange partner. 三頭六臂 sāntóuliùbì - lit. to have three heads and six arms (idiom) / fig. to possess remarkable abilities / a being of formidable powers 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 662 of 740 10 May 2013 at 3:42am | IP Logged | ||
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Spoke a little Mandarin to one of my friends at work....most of the conversation was in English. She mentioned that the larger Taiwanese book stores have warehouses in the US, including the place that I ordered from. So my book order probably shipped from either California or New York, not overseas. Anyhow I will do well to, every day, speak Mandarin face-to-face with a native speaker even if the majority of the conversation is in English...build a comfort level. I haven't met any native speakers on my floor, at work, yet. There seem to be a good number of Mandarin speakers on the next floor up. Edited by Snowflake on 10 May 2013 at 4:00am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Snowflake Senior Member United States Joined 5957 days ago 1032 posts - 1233 votes Studies: Mandarin | Message 663 of 740 22 May 2013 at 4:36am | IP Logged | ||
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Quick update....Ordered more DVDs from Amazon in the mainland, including the recent Hobbit movie. Slowly plodding through characters, still at 71% retention according to SRS stats which can be depressing when leaches are considered. The upside is that I was pleasantly surprised this weekend at how much I understood of the written material at my Mandarin speaking groups. Still so-so in terms of speaking. Listening comprehension... still have issues when face-to-face with a native speaker, especially while looking people in the eye.
Propping chin on hand; 在課堂上, 手撐著頭不是一個好的姿勢 … my Taiwanese chat partner said that this behavior is considered impolite, even with classmates. Unsure whether this is true for mainlanders. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jasoninchina Senior Member China Joined 5229 days ago 221 posts - 306 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, Italian | Message 664 of 740 22 May 2013 at 5:55am | IP Logged | ||
I've never heard of that being impolite on the mainland. The one thing kinda similar to that which I have heard of is crossing your legs and shaking the top leg. But even that isn't much of an issue. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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