User Comments - rich
rich
Posted on: Lili and Zhang Liang 17: It's Over (Again)
July 23, 2007 at 4:08 AM@Cpod Wow, great lesson, although it seems to take me back to memories of breakups again like the other break up did. @大家 At first I'm thinking, I bet Zhang Liang wishes he hadn't stayed at the office that night his phone didn't have power, etc., but then again, isn't it good he figured out how unstable their relationship and Lili herself are? Those are the kind of things in life that I even have to deal with... the regrets not much different than this, but than maybe it's for the best in Zhang Liang's world? @Lantian & Amber: I used to often use the word 期待 to mean to look forward to something, but many of my friends, when I say something like in your examples that I "期待和他们见面" or "期待今晚的晚饭" that 期待 is too formal, and I should use 盼着, e.g. 我盼着今晚和你一起吃饭。So, which should it be? Is there a different in the two and how should they be used in daily use? (question directed at Amber or John or anyone who has the answer) @Jenny Well, get to enrolling! You do have weekends free, right? 嘻嘻. You're already good at doing audio recordings, how much harder can acting out the story you took part in writing? ;-)
Posted on: Social Networking
July 23, 2007 at 12:57 AM@kien While the mind set of Chinese is quite different when it comes to privacy than the western world (parents barge right into their child's bedroom no matter how old, bike repair men sit outside restaurant fronts which would no way happen in America, etc.), yes,there is the word for "private" and "privacy" especially as people begin to buy their own cars and live more individual-style lives. * 私人 sīrén is an adjective meaning private, something personal to a person.私人的事情 personal mattter * Or 个人 has the same affect, such as in 个人财产 gèréncáichǎn personal property * 私家 sījiā is something belonging to a family, such as a family car 私家汽车 * To stay/be alone in privacy is 独处 dúchǔ * And the word talked about above 隐私 also has to do with something one wants kept in privacy. * And another important 私 word is to be selfish is 自私zìsī
Posted on: My Dog
July 22, 2007 at 1:32 PMYeah, it's from the Dr. Seus children's story "How the Grinch Stole Christmas"... not sure how popular it is outside of the western world. Jim Carrey stared in a movie of the book 7 years ago, which is when my 3 roommates and I through a Grinch Christmas party and each dressed up as a different character... I got stuck as the dog since I already had the costume from being the Big Bad Wolf from Little Red Ridding Hood at Halloween.
Posted on: Why, why, why??
July 22, 2007 at 12:13 PMAny experts on the usage of 该 and 应该 out there that are able to give me a little feedback on my post above?
Posted on: Giving up a Seat
July 22, 2007 at 12:10 PMWhen a Taiwanese girl, a friend of my parents who had lived in my home town of Boise, Idaho, USA had her parents come visit, my mom wanted to know what to call her. The girl, Rebecca, said to just call her 沈太太 or by her 3 character name (which I've forgotten). My mom was like "I can't call her that! What is her given name?" Rebecca looked at her strange and said "You can't call her that, even though we all know each other." It was funny how my parents were very uncomfortable calling them by a full name even that is what is the right thing to do in China to the point I believe they gave her parents English names. I do, however, prefer to call my Chinese friends who have 3 character names by their last two characters.
Posted on: My Dog
July 22, 2007 at 12:00 PM没问题。You can only really learn Chinese when you start to just write. To be willing to MAKE MISTAKES is the only way to learn any language. My Chinese improved this year only because I started to just write Chinese as much as I could in my notebook... when in class, when listening to a sermon at church, when planning my day... and I would let Chinese read it if they wanted to, even though they would laugh at some of it. It took me 4 years of constantly studying Chinese day-in and day-out before I was comfortable writing characters. Of course hand-writing Chinese is not for everyone (yet I still encourage it, and don't try to write every character correctly, it is just remembering where they go is important), but typing like you are is 很好!!
Posted on: My Dog
July 22, 2007 at 11:28 AMchangye, changed my avatar just for you! :P (yes, that's me as the Grinch's dog Max...)
Posted on: My Dog
July 22, 2007 at 11:23 AM@lunetta: You sentence looks correct grammatically, and I'm guessing your usage of 乖 is correct, even though I've only thought of using 乖 with children before, yet I would assume it works with pets too. Oh, behave....
Posted on: My Dog
July 22, 2007 at 11:20 AMexecuter is right, 好 can also mean very, and yes, in a softer manner. In sense English has it a little like this too, such as "a good number of people" (lots of people) or "good going" or "good luck" (very lucky) Okay, maybe not the best examples since there is still more of a measure of "good" in my examples than in "好小". Yet remember, languages aren't 1:1 translateable!
But you will find it gets even more confusing is that 好
Posted on: Lili and Zhang Liang 17: It's Over (Again)
July 23, 2007 at 4:15 AMUm, in the fix, maybe my listening is just bad, but I listened over and over again to the English-Chinese pair of "Ability" and it sounds like the Chinese said is something like "dai shi" not 本事, or maybe "cai shi"? Yet I don't hear "ben" is it me, or is it something different than in the written vocab list?