User Comments - maryellen1

Posted on: Diet Coke

Please excuse a newbie for peeking ahead but I was searching for how to ask for a caffeine-free product. Are there such products in China? I'm open to ke3la4 or cha2. Any suggestions?

And, thanks to Chenggwo, May 3, 2008, for the remarks on measure words. That is the best explanation I have found so far. I figured out that you need one between a number and a noun. However, when searching the glossary for liang3 some of the examples did not seem to make sense until I read in Chenggwo's entry that cup, bottle, etc. count as measure words. Suddenly baskets of crab and jugs of water made sense.Also helpful was the statement that a measure word is only needed between a number and a noun when a specific quantity is given. I know that Ken and Jenny always tell us Newbies don't over analyze but in trying to make sense of things until I have enough information to even see a pattern, it drives me crazy. Anyway, in future updates to the format would the Chinesepod team consider having some topic boxes in the comment section so that the author could check a box if the comment fit into a category like grammer, culture, etc.? Then, could those comments be gathered and stored in the Library by topic? Thanks.

Posted on: Explaining Your Job

Didn't realize that response would be addressed only to veronique21. Thanks to Toianw for the job title!

Posted on: Explaining Your Job

Thank you. I am getting better at recognizing multi-syllable words when I hear them but I think that it will take a while to get my ears accustomed to my "new" title. I would like to go back to the link to the article on social work in China. Professor Xu mentioned the ethical issues regarding gift giving and receiving by social workers and how trust was built by the offering and acceptance of gifts. I found that culturally insightful and cultural diversity is very important at my agency. Here it can become a slippery slope as to where to draw the line if one accepts a gift so, in general, it is better just not to accept. I would be interested to know if there is such a line in Chinese social work. Anyway, thanks for the new job title.

Posted on: Explaining Your Job

thanks to Veronique 21 and toianw! Interesting questions and replies. I followed the link to the article on Professor Xu. The Professor mentions shehui gongzou fuwufuan ( no tones given) as a social service assistance team. I'll bet the tones for gongzou are the same as for this lesson and fuwufuan probably is a typo forfu2wu4yuan2. But what are the tones for shehui? I ask because I am Evaluation Coordinator for a mental health agency and I am wondering if shehui will be as close as I can get to explaining what I do in Chinese. If anyone can give me more exact wording, I will appreciate it.

Just as an aside, when I was a graduate student in Gerontology in the '80's, I attended a conference in which there was a presentation on the need for more social services for the aging miners of northern China (I think it was the north) as many of them had never married and had no family support system. I am glad to hear that social services have taken on a broader perspective and now receive more attention from the government.

Posted on: Days of the week

Thanks. I was under the impression that with each change of tone, the word took on a completely different meaning but as I have progressed through a few more lessons, I see that this is not necessarily true. I hadn't even thought about a dictionary. I will save your advice for when I become a little more proficient.

Posted on: Days of the week

I noticed that the explanation for kong4 is empty or vacant in you3kong4. In the newbie Color Song Lesson number 0505, Jenny comments that kong1 means empty as in tian1kong1. I looked at the characters in both lessons and to me they look identical.But I have no understanding of characters. Is there a difference in meaning that makes the tones different? Thanks.