User Comments - sfrrr

Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Sichuan

How about some more intermediate lessons about food, tea, table manners and related etiquette, kitchens (names for everything?), difference in techniques between restaurant cooks and home cooks--what's strictly restaurant food, e.g., and what's strictly home cooking? Etc?

Posted on: Measure Words for Counting People

Ah, you guys just solved a problem I didn't know I had.

Posted on: Rock, Scissors, Cloth

lostinasia--thank you, thank you. For reasons I don't understand, this has been bugging me for years.

Posted on: The Panda's Secret Wish

There was also a lesson on a Chinese run-on joke that Jenny taught. Or was that a riddle? I'd swear there's already been humor lessons.

Posted on: Olympic Excitement

Emily 424--I'd swear I got this lesson the day before (I'm in the States.) Try logging on in the evenings. Thanks to the time difference, tomorrow's lessons arrive tonight in the Pacific Timezone.

Posted on: Rock, Scissors, Cloth

I've become convinced that no one knows how to play the group version of this game except movie script writers. In real life, it must take 10 minutes to figure out who buys the next round through process of elimination.

Posted on: Rock, Scissors, Cloth

Jenny--I doubt lom sam po is from any real language, but, yes, we believed the words were Chinese. (When you're a qi-sui de Chicago kid of that era, Chinese is monolithic (and it sounds like Cantonese).

As for playing this with a large group, I can't figure out how one you would do that? Process of elimination through several rounds? i.e. each pair of people do rock/paper/scissors together, then the winners of that round pair off and play again. The winners of that round pair off, etc. That process would take forever, and it's certainly not what I've seen in Chinese movies where, say, a group of people at a bar play to see who pays for the next round of drinks. That usually takes one round.

Someone please enlighten me.

Posted on: Rock, Scissors, Cloth

In Chicago, we called it Lam Sam Po. What are some of the other names for this game around the world?

Posted on: Sales Call

Aliyah--how comfortabe are you with English? John Pasden not only works for ChinesePod but also maintains his own Website, www.sinosplice.com. He has very good sections on Chinese pronunciation. Check them out.

Also, ng is neither an n sound nor a g sound. It's a different nasalized sound of its own. N, too, is nasalized. If you pronounce an N but put your tongue touching the back of your upper front teeth (as if you're making an American L) and let the sound come through your nose, you have Chinese N. (Conversely, although you didn't ask), to say an L, put your tongue on the ridge of your palate, way behind your teeth and keep the inside of your mouth hollow/open. This sound is also slightly nasal.)

My former son-in-law is from Nanjing and to our ears, he reverses his Ns and Ls. He was forever saying things to our daughter like "You're lice."

He also says, in English, "I'm going over to Li Yu there," probably because in Chinese, you either have to specify Li Yu's house (or office or...) or you have to add nar after the name.

I have learned a lot of Chinese from listening to him speak English.

Posted on: Addressing People

Right click on the icons (musical notes and a pdf file) below the picture and save to disk.