User Comments - auntie68

Posted on: Internet is Down

@changye: No, it wasn't a "super giant robot". I wish. Stunt Toddler has become addicted to YouTube. He loves to search for clips, make playlists, toggle between full screen and small view, pause, mute the sound, rearrange the playlists etc. Last week he was watching Pink Panther cartoons on TV AND on YouTube, simultaneously.

An Internet Nerd at 3! Like Aunt, like nephew, I guess... And when he takes over the computer, I don't get a look in (except to be a convenient spelling consultant). But I don't mind, because I think it's teaching him how to read and spell. 

http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=932C4401AE312B22

Posted on: Internet is Down

@raychenon: The good news is that the character 了 doesn't only indicate the past. So today may be a big "OH!!!!" moment for you, one that will power your Chinese to a new place. 加油！

The various 了 have been colourfully labelled by grammar experts: Eg. "Completive 了", "Inceptive 了" etc etc. 

I found two QW on 了：

http://chinesepod.com/lessons/the-double-了-le-phenomenon

http://chinesepod.com/lessons/了-le-somethings-about-to-happen

Posted on: ...都 (dōu): The Bryan Adams pattern

@patmetheny: The copyright issues have been beaten to death in this thread at FrenchPod, where the question was raised by a user (alexthurgood):

http://frenchpod.com/lessons/jai-demande-a-la-lune/discussion

The infringing act is mere reproduction, if it's not expressly authorised by the rights holder.

It's quite common in legal practice for clients to be absolutely convinced that they have a "defence" based on doing the rights holder a favour of some sort (!!!) by helping to promote his/her works. If it's so clear-cut, they should have no problems taking this argument to the rights holder and getting the permissions right away with no problems. 

Some users here -- eg. calkins and rash -- are professional photographers. I don't think they would be very stoked to see one of their images being used without permission. 

Clay, I hope you won't delete this comment for being irrelevant. CPOD is also about its "community of practice", and this CoP also includes real human beings who depend on IP rights.

Maybe we all do (depend on these rights); I don't think you would like it if I were to rip your lesson MP3s for my student, and supply her with a copy of the PDFs while I'm at it. I am teaching her gratis. Well, I promise this is the last I'll say on this subject.

Posted on: ...都 (dōu): The Bryan Adams pattern

You're welcome. But I definitely am NOT sure about what I proposed. I just wanted to get some practice for myself. Hope that Amber, Clay, or Connie will step in and rescue us!

P/s: Has anybody out there seen the classic Chinese film 一个也不能少 ("Not One Less"), about schoolchildren in rural China? I think that 一个／也 is like the "direct objects" version of 谁 (or 什么 or 哪里)／都, which works better when you are emphasizing the subject.

Posted on: ...都 (dōu): The Bryan Adams pattern

Hi baillies. If you want to type a ü (as in nü - 女), the key to use is actually "v". It took me a while to figure that one out.

I'm not 100% certain, but I think I would say:

Clay 的女朋友我一个都不喜欢。

or：

Clay 的女朋友我谁都不喜欢。

I might have used 也 instead of 都，though, but can't explain it. And I am also trying to figure out why 一个/也 sounds more natural to me here than 谁／都(could be wrong!). I think it may be because 都 has a superior "chemical valency" with a subject (eg. 谁都有朋友嘛。。。;"But everybody has friends"), than with an object (eg. 我一个朋友都没有。。。"I don't even have one friend...").

Posted on: ...都 (dōu): The Bryan Adams pattern

Clay, if you can tackle word order in a meaningful way in each QW, I think everybody will love you for it!

I can think of one very basic, simple, expression -- 为什么 (wei1shen2me; "Why") -- which is one of the first things a newbie will learn, but which does present enough word order issues to merit a QW of its own:

Eg. 你为什么要。。。。or 为什么你要。。。?

but I think 为什么你不。。。is correct, with the negative.

A lot of the time, the question is where the subject goes. When I first started using a Chinese character-only dictionary earlier this year, it dawned on me that native speakers who had always told me, "Can't explain. It's just like that", were actually saying, "There is a explanation, a simple one, but we only know how to tell you in Chinese, and you probably won't understand unless you learn some Chinese grammatical terms such as：转折，动词，分句， 主语 etc etc"

My little dictionary has usage notes, including some notes (and a lot of examples) specifically on the "是。。。的“ construction, so I know for a fact that such things can be explained/ taught. But teaching such things is CPOD's job, not mine, heh heh.

Posted on: ...都 (dōu): The Bryan Adams pattern

@inland: The difficulty with trying to teach word order in a single lesson is that -- as John Pasden suggested in the "Hiking" comments -- Chinese is so different from English that it's better to learn by patterns rather than attempting to extract principles and apply them.

Why don't you try posting some of the exercises you have trouble with in the Comments? Do please be as specific as possible, eg. "Why is the correct answer ABCD and not ACBD? I thought that C..." etc. I'm not a native speaker, but I'll look out for them and will have a go at helping you if I possibly can.

Re-listening to the existing library of QWs is not a bad idea either, as most QWs do seem to address the issue of word order for the specific expressions they are dealing with. And that's the best, surely; you want to study word order in the context of a specific expression. Good luck!

Posted on: 磁悬浮

I want to try and express how much I appreciate and welcome the help of native speakers such as cassie, dldshanghai, sophie, zhanglihua etc (plus anybody I've somehow forgotten to name) here on CPOD. dldshanghai, your gentle re-write didn't only benefit guolanusa, I was able to learn from it too. Thank you so much, CPOD native speakers! You bring pure class and graciousness to this place.

Posted on: Sneezing

Hello uncle changye. Stunt Toddler has just left the house with his grandmother (and nanny), so I can post. Thanks for the interesting etymological history. My humble personal bet is on 似 as si4 predating shi4. How I love my humble print dictionary for taking the pains to pinyinize the 似 as shi4!

P/s: I only wish the big toy were a transformable super robot, or something like that. In fact, I can only describe it as a "airport-cum-multi-storey-carpark" toy which has ramps, a simple (but functional) vehicle lift, and all kinds of fiddley accessories (including a helicopter pad). In short, it's the kind of generic toy which EVERY Asian little boy has in his toy collection, whether he lives in Singapore, Japan, or Korea, and whether he was born in 1972, 1982, or -- like Stunt Toddler -- in 2005. The small metal cars that my brother and I played with in 1975 still fit my Stunt Toddler nephew's big toy today!

Posted on: One-on-One Basketball

Clay, thanks for being patient with this Grumpy Auntie. I feel bad now because I do appreciate and admire very much what you guys manage to pull off week after week, podcast after podcast. Thanks for fixing this error, I forget how much much you have on your plates these days... Sincerely, thanks. Please feel free to delete my grumpy post since it's served it's purpose.