User Comments - xiaoanolga
xiaoanolga
Posted on: 中国鬼节
August 6, 2008 at 7:07 AM啊呀, 觉得太难看!
Posted on: 十月怀胎
July 27, 2008 at 12:47 PMI totally agree with aaroninwisconsin...ie "having lessons of varying levels that all cover the same topic..." (for certain topics where there is a demand)
in fact I think that introducing more english at the advanced level would only be counterproductive. I would even advocate that at this level the vocabulary shoud be chinese only (eg xinhua cidian explanations of the words), and the pinyin banished. After all, in real life you never get a text with pinyin and you have to acquire the skills of how to look in a dictionnary, be it paper or electronic (for the case there is no native around whom you may ask)! the texts presented in the lessons are short and the number of words/expressions presented is rather low, the articulation is clear and there is no background noises: even if it is clearly not realistic,that is excellent for learning.... Communicating in any language is a skill which is totally different from translation. You have to be able to think directly in the target language without references to the mother tongue. Chinesepod is clearly working in this direction, but perhaps could go further...
Keep up this excellent work, guys!
Xiaoan
Posted on: Colors, By Degrees
July 27, 2008 at 12:20 PMChangye, thanks for your list!
Did you notice that there is no real "brown" in it?
Xiaoan
Posted on: SBTG: Health Class
July 11, 2008 at 3:53 PMHi Changye, I do not think there is an english equivalent to this Xunzi saying(and I'm sure there is no French one). I always interpreted this as meaning that man is able to alter something natural to get something better (藍 being the plant from which one get the stuff to dye things in blue - polygonum tinctorium: indigo- )
on colour topic: what about 苍? it can also be translated as blue/green but in a sense is an antonym of 青 (as you can see in 苍白, 白发苍苍...). Do you also have in Japan the phrase 天之蒼蒼，其正色邪？ (answer: no, 真正天空的 颜色是青的)
Posted on: SBTG: Health Class
July 11, 2008 at 7:41 AM好是好, 但我们还不知道为什么静脉的颜色是蓝的....谁要知道, 必须回答谁的问题, 是不是?
晓安
青、取之於藍，而青於藍 (荀子)
Posted on: 磁悬浮
July 8, 2008 at 7:25 PMDo I dare to ask a very down to earth question? (真不好意思"down to earth" 怎么说?)
我有个问题:"加速" 的意思是 to accelerate, "减速" 的意思是 to slow down. "加热 " 的意思是 to heat.
但是怎么说 "to cool something (soup for instance)" 使冷 清冽? 加冷? ? 谢谢!
晓安
PS: 要不大伟觉得你门教书的方法不怎么样, 事实上不然。 反而我觉得很有意思, 非常好玩。请你们继续下去!
Posted on: Taking the HSK
July 7, 2008 at 4:13 PMHi Changye!
Thank you for your interesting posts! I never thought I could get an interest into HSK (for me, like the pod claim, it was mostly 头痛!)
Now, I know that my korean friend on top of his linguistic abilities (he's fluent in italian too) is over-modest...and will therefore make all due compliments!
However, as regard the Chinese policies towards minority languages, I must say I am not sure what to think: I do understand the utility of having a common language in a country, but, on the other hand, many countries do not and still functions (I should know, I'm Swiss..): is there no danger that minority languages and therefore cultures will simply dry out or be reduced to the status of tourist attraction? And it is not only the minority languages, some of my shanghainese friends deplore that shanghaihua seems to be desappearing amongst young people. (I will not add what they see as the reason of -local- governement policies regarding this isssue, as it is extremely politically incorrect!)
Posted on: Taking the HSK
July 6, 2008 at 4:24 PMHi changye:
I was just relaying what my chinese teacher (from Shanghai) told us....but here it is in the official hsk site:
"The Chinese Proficiency Test (HSK) is a national standardized test to assess the Chinese language proficiency of non-native speakers (including foreigners, overseas Chinese and students of Chinese national minorities). The test began to be designed by Beijing Language Institute (Beijing Language and Culture University or BLCU now) in 1984 and passed the appraisal by experts in 1990. Launched abroad in 1991, HSK was designated as a state-level test in No.21 Writ issued by the National Education Commission of China (the Ministry of Education today). Currently HSK is a comprehensive test system catering to various levels of the Chinese learners, including HSK Basic, HSK Elementary-Intermediate and HSK Advanced. By December 2005, HSK has been taken by about a million examinees from more than 120 countries (including students of ethnic minorities in China)."
http://www.hsk.org.cn/english/Center_intro.aspx
and:
"Summing up the whole number of examinees in the past 16 years, HSK has been taken by over 1 million people, half of them are foreigners from over 120 countries and the other half are ethnic minorities in China. " (chinadaily.com)
And tvan, I agree with you, what's the use of a second class HSK? we do not need baby sitters anymore....However, it is a fact that Japanese have a big advantage when it comes to Chinese: the kanji! And Japanese and Korean kids are all exposed to chinese during their schooling (my korean friends tell me they had to memorize about 2000 hanzi at school: this is because it used to be their script too before the hangul system), so yes, they do have an advantage over us westerners, even if japanese and korean are not in the same linguistic family than chinese!
So fuxi, yuxi....
Xiaoan
Posted on: 中国鬼节
August 6, 2008 at 7:46 AM在这里不但你可以下载这本小说, 而且是用简体字写的, 比较方便! 谁试试看一下?
http://www.bookhome.net/gudian/xiaoshuo/lzzy/
但在标题里"聊斋"这个两字是什么意思? ("chatting room"? ie the title would be something like "strange tales of the drawing room"?)