User Comments - light487
light487
Posted on: Tone Rule: Two Third Tones
April 5, 2008 at 5:40 AMYeh.. just a little shorter than a fully sounded 3rd tone.. exactly. I guess this is why there are no hard and fast rules in "spoken" language.. just common usages.
Posted on: The Neutral Tone
April 4, 2008 at 9:46 PMI find this to be the easiest tone to pronounce.. hehe.. it's what I call the "lazy" tone.. or more precisely the "apathetic" tone because there's just no emphasis on it all.. like you don't care about the tone.. ma.. ma.. ma.. :p hehe
Posted on: Tone Rule: Two Third Tones
April 4, 2008 at 9:25 PMI find that when I have Wo3 hen3 hao3, I will say it as: Wo3 Hen2 Hao3.. is this wrong? In the lesson it says it should be pronounced Wo2 Hen2 Hao3.. it just seems more natural to me to have a 3rd-2nd-3rd for this phrase.. except that the Wo3 is perhaps a little shorter than a normal 3rd tone.. Look at me.. less than 2 weeks in and getting into the nitty gritty with opinions on how things sound.. haha..
Posted on: Lesson
April 4, 2008 at 9:09 PMThat is the 2nd tone.. it's actually going from bottom left to top right. I've since realised that the 4th tone is not what I originally thought: 1st is like -- 2nd is like _/ 3rd is like \__/ 4th is like \ You can see the pinyin actually reflects this in the way the accent is shown as well: mā 1st mà 2nd mǎ 3rd mà 4th
Posted on: Feeling Nauseous
April 4, 2008 at 9:02 PMhenning Xie-xie! Yeh.. now I just need to learn how to pronounce pinyin consistently. :)
Posted on: You Must Listen to this Episode - 非...不可 (fēi...bù kě)
April 4, 2008 at 9:00 PMThis is the verb to smell: wen2dao4 ? I have only been learning a week and a half now.. So having fun, off the cuff lessons like this one are a great way to end the week. :)
Posted on: You Must Listen to this Episode - 非...不可 (fēi...bù kě)
April 4, 2008 at 1:25 PMSo it's generally used when "you have no choice" whether it is because you need to avoid embarrassment or deportation... or whatever. Like when someone farts on the train, you can not not smell it. You have no choice but to smell it. :)
Posted on: Updating Old Lessons
April 4, 2008 at 1:11 PMGet yourself some "yoga-style" headphones that go inside your ears. They block out a lot of the outside noise and let you concentrate on the dialogue. I have to agree about the older lessons though.. I have listened to the old ones too.. and I like them a lot, they make me laugh and I love them for that.. but I also agree that they are dated and I prefer the new improved sound and banter on the later ones.
Posted on: Feeling Nauseous
April 4, 2008 at 12:58 PMHehe I needed this lesson yesterday when I had a migraine for 8 hours and threw up many times... Is there a word for migraine or headache? Also.. is there a way to tell, in pinyin, when the neutral tone is being used. It wasn't until it was pointed out in the lesson that the fu sound in shu1fu was neutral that I knew... also, why are some particles put together like that (I also noticed that wei2shao4me - why?) is put together like this, rather than separated like xi ˇang t `u
Posted on: You Must Listen to this Episode - 非...不可 (fēi...bù kě)
April 5, 2008 at 5:43 AMI wish you had the time to pinyinize them :) I have no idea what you said.. :) but it's all a little beyond me at this point anyway.. may be in a few months I will come back to this lesson and it will make a lot more sense than it does at the moment. I think I have the basic idea understood though which is good enough for now.