User Comments - tvan
tvan
Posted on: Blog Posts, API's, Announcements and Gloria!
March 30, 2010 at 7:16 PM@zhenlijiang, I remember that conversation. Like RJ above, I'm sympathetic to these people. After all, why learn Chinese if you don't like, well, Chinese? I don't have any firm numbers, but it seems logical that there are a whole lot more Chinese trying to learn English than English-speakers trying to learn Chinese. Also, CPod is listed on several Chinese-language web sites as a resource for finding language partners.
One partial solution is to try to reply to the speaker with a question about the lesson that you have. It doesn't work with the drive-by's, but when it does, what better source of information?
Posted on: Blog Posts, API's, Announcements and Gloria!
March 28, 2010 at 9:05 PMGood luck John! Given the synergies (is that cliche?) between ChinesePod and Allset it seems like a natural.
Posted on: Have you bought your Shanghai Expo ticket?
March 26, 2010 at 8:19 PMHi pjkemp1. Shibohui in Chinese is 世博会/世博會, which is short for 世界博览会/世界博覽會, similar I guess to Expo being short for Exposition. If you parse the longer version, it means 世界/World 博览会/Fair.
I'll leave the question as to its recognizability up to a native speaker.
Posted on: Visiting the Hospital with a Fever
March 4, 2010 at 3:10 AM@changye, 很抱歉。我发现我的错误，已经删除我本来的留言。
Posted on: Visiting the Hospital with a Fever
March 3, 2010 at 8:45 PMuser30118, I'm no expert, but it seems like they're mostly interchangeable. Their might be some subtle difference but, for example, "我的頭痛“ and “我的頭疼" have identical meanings.
Posted on: The White Spectrum of Meaning
February 6, 2010 at 5:31 PMThere is sometimes/was formerly a connotation that your wife became pregnant during her affair, and you were raising the child aka the Brick's comment.
Posted on: 不一样的《阿凡达》
February 2, 2010 at 8:33 PMAccording to this article, that was initially the case. However, a subsequent article says that the restriction was loosened substantially.
Posted on: Pay Verbs
January 30, 2010 at 4:27 AM@bababardwan, 这是我的意见，而且我也查词典才说。但我还不一定。例如也可以叫 Chihuahua ”奇瓦瓦小狗”。可是好像也可以叫奇瓦瓦 “小种狗。“
However, for what it's worth,I think your analogy of "adult pony and foal" make the most sense to me... and, of course, since we're talking about paying, if I was buying a pet dog, I would say "我付钱买爱犬." 对吗？
Posted on: Pay Verbs
January 30, 2010 at 3:43 AM@bababardwan, no expert opinion, but I think 小狗/小犬 covers both small dogs and puppies.
Posted on: Back to Basics: Making People Plural with 们 (men)
April 4, 2010 at 1:53 AM@siteng, for me its just the opposite. If a student says, “同学们” it makes sense in that my classmate is including me in his group. However, if a teacher says "同学们”， then it sounds like the teacher is calling him/herself my classmate.
I guess the difference is that in English, there would be an implied "inclusiveness", whereas in Chinese this doesn't appear to be the case. I don't know if that's accurate but, based on the dialog, it seems to be the case.