User Comments - RJ
RJ
Posted on: Lao Wang's Office 14: The Finale
August 28, 2009 at 12:12 AMHi Jenny,
I do not doubt your comittment one bit. Not at all. Your work is 100% the best I have ever seen. You and some of your co-workers as well. The problems at cpod are far more systemic than that, and you deserve all the support you can get from upper management, at whom my constructive criticisms are aimed. At least I meant them to be constructive, rather than sarcastic or destructive. Sometimes its hard to offer tough advice without sounding cruel. Please take my words in the spirit they were given.
Posted on: Pinyin Sections 13-14
August 27, 2009 at 11:13 AMJohn
Go for it. I think a supplemental lesson would be helpful as was the entire pinyin series. The series was light on comments despite Matts attempts to draw friendly fire, but dont judge it by that. I think the pinyin program definitely had merit and many benefitted from them. I know I did. Thanks.
Posted on: Lao Wang's Office 14: The Finale
August 27, 2009 at 9:39 AMThanks bodawei, I believe it was defined early on, but evidently I remembered it wrong. I was thinking along the lines of "AMeSS" or "Another Mysterious System." ;-) Sorry guys, actually it could have been much worse.
Posted on: Dinosaurs
August 26, 2009 at 3:43 AMI never noticed there was any order to them. Perhaps this once you could cut and paste your own vocab list (good study itself) if it helps you that much.
Posted on: Dinosaurs
August 26, 2009 at 3:06 AMphil
By now you should have studied them all. Im having a hard time understanding why the order is so important. They have bigger fish to fry. No?
Posted on: Dinosaurs
August 24, 2009 at 9:10 AMHenning
that is a great age, when they like dinosaurs and are thrilled when you come home from work. Enjoy it, it goes so fast.
Posted on: 把 Humbug
August 23, 2009 at 5:14 AMBodawei
I have mixed feelings about preserving culture and becoming a global society in which we all understand each other. By understanding others we better understand ourselves. btw, what the hell is a tim tam? ;-)
Posted on: 把 Humbug
August 23, 2009 at 4:01 AMBodawei
An "ice block" would sound to me like it was very large as in a 50 Lb "block" of ice. What we call what I think you are referring to is a "popsicle". That is frozen flavored water on a stick. As for candy, that is a very generic term. Hard candy on a stick is called a "sucker" or can be called a "lolli-pop." Sucker is the most common term. Lolli pop is rather old fashioned. This is technically candy but so is a chocolate bar. Biscuits and cookies are very different things. A biscuit is not usually sweet, I would say its more realated to bread but cookies are sweet. Cookies are usually round and flat but biscuits are like tiny loafs of bread. We do call dog treats "dog biscuits" and these are flat like cookies but not sweet. (I dont think). Now all "soft drinks" (those without alcohol") that are flavored in some way fall under the generic umbrella of "Pop" or "soda" depending on which area of the US you live in. Myself I never use the word soda. Soda water is as you say, carbonated water like that used to make a scotch and soda. In South America (Chile for example) they have bottled water with and without "gas".
Its interesting that you say you can not bring yourself to say cookie or candy. I feel the same way about much of the Australian slang. It sounds so childlike to me. I would never say Ice lolly for example. I would never say lolly period. Its fascinating how strongly we feel about these small things.
Posted on: 把 Humbug
August 22, 2009 at 2:23 PMgo_manly
well, I dont know about all that, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn express last night. ;-)
Posted on: China Street Smart with John Chan
September 1, 2009 at 9:12 AMI agree with John that success comes to those that are hungry to learn and open to it. He also mentioned something that I have found to be very true- understanding the Chinese culture is not enough, the hard part is convincing your bosses back home what their expectations should be.
Phil
You are judging with very little factual information. Why care what other people do? I know plenty of ex-pats (and Chinese) that are quite "moral." This is a complex issue. All you can do is live your life the way you see fit. Comments such as yours only serve to spread bad perceptions about Ex-pats, and Chinese. In my experience, this behavior is not predominant.