User Comments - ajr1

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ajr1

Posted on: Preparing for Pain
December 13, 2011, 05:13 AM

云南白药 on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yunnan_Baiyao. 

Posted on: Preparing for Pain
December 13, 2011, 04:55 AM

芬必得 is a brand name, according to my hasty internet research.  If I went into a pharmacy in China and I asked for 布洛芬, which also seems to mean ibuprofen, would they know what I'm talking about? 

Posted on: National Stereotypes
December 12, 2011, 01:30 PM

The recent Thanksgiving lesson also had Greg(?) doing some voice acting.

Posted on: The Seven Year Itch 3: Extramarital Involvement
November 30, 2011, 01:13 PM

谢谢您！

Posted on: The Seven Year Itch 3: Extramarital Involvement
November 29, 2011, 01:57 PM

Same problem here - the exercises for this lesson seem to be down.

Posted on: Visa Issues
October 19, 2011, 11:01 AM

Question about the word 签证。Is it a verb/object, a noun, or both?  I have heard people say: 我还没签过证。 Are both of these correct: 你有签证吗？and 你签证了吗？ If they are both correct, is there any difference in meaning?

Posted on: 英国皇室婚礼
May 22, 2011, 03:49 AM

I really like the Media lessons centered around video clips for (1) the practice at listening to native speakers in a real context, (2) the variety of topics, and (3) the chance to take a look at how the Chinese media looks at events.

Given that, I also feel Mark's pain - they are harder to study and review.  With some extra work this can be overcome.  There are various programs that can download Yokuu and other video clips.  For this lesson, the video even comes with subtitles, which would make transcription easier and perhaps a useful (but perhaps time-consuming) exercise.  

If transcription is too time consuming, it would be easier to edit the file and create an audio file for use in class.  I'm not sure about Chinese copyright law, but I suspect that using a video clip for that purpose would be a fair use under U.S. copyright law on the student's part.  

That leads me to a few comments for the ChinesePod Team:

1.  Is there any way you can put the audio used in the lesson into a small file as the Lesson Dialogue?  I don't expect your team to transcribe the video, but it would be helpful to have a audio mp3 of the short section of the video clip used in the lesson.

2.  When taking from a large video clip, can you please post the the time index of the sections you used in the lesson?  For example, for this lesson the first clip was roughly from 00:32 to 01:17 on the Yokuu video, the second clip was from roughly 15:30 to 17:18.

Posted on: 5000 Years of History
May 06, 2011, 05:26 AM

Well, 差不多 four times as old - but the point still applies!

Posted on: 5000 Years of History
May 06, 2011, 04:54 AM

I feel for you, American-in-this-dialogue.  Don't let "history envy" get you down.  Just think about this point, in dialogue form:

A: 中华人民共和国有多少年的历史？

B: 中华人民共和国只有六十多年的历史。

A: 真的！我们美利坚合众国有两百多年的历史。

So, feel proud, American-in-this-dialogue, your federal government is four times as old as the People's Republic of China!

Posted on: Buying High Quality DVDs
April 24, 2011, 03:27 AM

Another minor correction - the sound file for this expansion sentence is wrong:  那种靠甜言蜜语忽悠女孩儿的男人靠不住，但老实巴交的男人又没意思.  The sound file is missing the first 靠 and "忽悠女孩儿."  Thanks again!