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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 12, 2019 23:14:05 GMT -5
In some ways, Mandarin Chinese is simple. For example, take the following sentence:
I'm glad you didn't cut your hand.
In Mandarin, all you have to do is find segments of the above sentence and find the right words for those segments. For the above example, the Mandarin Chinese equivalent translates to:
Your hand + no cut + good
(Ni de shou mei hua po jiu hao.)
Of course, you have to know the actual Mandarin words and phrases for the above segments.
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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 13, 2019 17:07:28 GMT -5
What is often confusing is when I want to say certain things like:
"What is your telephone number?"
In Chinese, you say it the following way:
"Your telephone number is how much?"
Very bizarre. But I suspect many foreigners find the way we say things in English is bizarre.
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Post by mikegarrison on Mar 13, 2019 17:47:14 GMT -5
Very bizarre. But I suspect many foreigners find the way we say things in English is bizarre. Trash. Everything we say in English is glass transparent. |
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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 14, 2019 20:51:26 GMT -5
So,
"Where do you live?" in English becomes:
"You live where?" in Chinese. You just have to find the Chinese words for "you," "to live," and "where."
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Post by ironhammer on Mar 15, 2019 2:07:15 GMT -5
So, "Where do you live?" in English becomes: "You live where?" in Chinese. You just have to find the Chinese words for "you," "to live," and "where." In Chinese: 你住在哪裡 How it is pronounced in Mandarin: Nǐ zhù zài nǎlǐ And another thing, the above was in traditional Chinese characters. In simplified Chinese, it's written the same, but in other cases it is not. |
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Post by Steve vb on Mar 15, 2019 11:21:44 GMT -5
So, "Where do you live?" in English becomes: "You live where?" in Chinese. You just have to find the Chinese words for "you," "to live," and "where." Yǒu shíhòu (有时候) is a useful double-word meaning sometimes. dōng 东 means "east" and bù 部 means part. dōngbù 东部 therefore means eastern part. With that in mind, can you translate the following two sentences? Yǒu shíhòu wǒ zhù zài zhōngguó de dōngbù. Yǒu shíhòu wǒ zhù zài měiguó zhōngbù. |
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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 15, 2019 11:35:41 GMT -5
So, "Where do you live?" in English becomes: "You live where?" in Chinese. You just have to find the Chinese words for "you," "to live," and "where." Yǒu shíhòu (有时候) is a useful double-word meaning sometimes. dōng 东 means "east" and bù 部 means part. dōngbù 东部 therefore means eastern part. With that in mind, can you translate the following two sentences? Yǒu shíhòu wǒ zhù zài zhōngguó de dōngbù. Yǒu shíhòu wǒ zhù zài měiguó zhōngbù. Sometimes, I live in the eastern part of China. Sometimes, I live in Central America. |
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Post by Steve vb on Mar 15, 2019 11:52:41 GMT -5
Good job!  You've definitely been spending time studying. The key is to push yourself through the first year. Almost everyone loses interest or hope and quits during the first year. That's why 99% of Chinese books and podcasts are for beginner's level. If you can force yourself to study speaking and listening for 30 minutes everyday, you will make a lot of progress after one year. Also enjoy the first year of learning things that you've never thought of before. Studying Chinese also taught me some things that I was not expecting, including many things about English that I never had thought of before. If possible, spend an hour with a native speaker to make sure that your pronunciation is correct and that you lips are in the right position. For a few years, I mispronounced the simple word Wǒ 我 because I was pronouncing it the same way that Japanese pronounces "Wa". To pronounce Wǒ correctly, we need to begin by having our lips in the "oooh" position. |
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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 15, 2019 11:57:51 GMT -5
Good job! You've definitely been spending time studying. The key is to push yourself through the first year. Almost everyone loses interest or hope and quits during the first year. That's why 99% of Chinese books and podcasts are for beginner's level. If you can force yourself to study speaking and listening for 30 minutes everyday, you will make a lot of progress after one year. Also enjoy the first year of learning things that you've never thought of before. Studying Chinese also taught me some things that I was not expecting, including many things about English that I never had thought of before. If possible, spend an hour with a native speaker to make sure that your pronunciation is correct and that you lips are in the right position. For a few years, I mispronounced the simple word Wǒ 我 because I was pronouncing it the same way that Japanese pronounces "Wa". To pronounce Wǒ correctly, we need to begin by having our lips in the "oooh" position. Feel free to send me more translation jobs. I promise I won't cheat because, as they say, I'll only be cheating myself. If I don't know, I'll say "I don't know." By the way, I almost said "central part of America," until I realized there was no "de." Also, I don't know any native speaker other than former coworkers and I don't want to bother them. I may have to pay someone. |
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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 15, 2019 11:59:40 GMT -5
My biggest problem is that I can never remember the tones. I can remember the words, but not the tones. I don't seem to have an ear for the tones. So, when I'm studying or translating, I can "see" the word in my mind, but I can't see the corresponding tone.
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Post by Steve vb on Mar 15, 2019 14:17:31 GMT -5
Good job! You've definitely been spending time studying. The key is to push yourself through the first year. Almost everyone loses interest or hope and quits during the first year. That's why 99% of Chinese books and podcasts are for beginner's level. If you can force yourself to study speaking and listening for 30 minutes everyday, you will make a lot of progress after one year. Also enjoy the first year of learning things that you've never thought of before. Studying Chinese also taught me some things that I was not expecting, including many things about English that I never had thought of before. If possible, spend an hour with a native speaker to make sure that your pronunciation is correct and that you lips are in the right position. For a few years, I mispronounced the simple word Wǒ 我 because I was pronouncing it the same way that Japanese pronounces "Wa". To pronounce Wǒ correctly, we need to begin by having our lips in the "oooh" position. Feel free to send me more translation jobs. I promise I won't cheat because, as they say, I'll only be cheating myself. If I don't know, I'll say "I don't know." By the way, I almost said "central part of America," until I realized there was no "de." Also, I don't know any native speaker other than former coworkers and I don't want to bother them. I may have to pay someone. Actually, it does mean "central part of America". In my case, the city of Omaha, which is in the central part of the US. For direction words (south, north, ect.), the "de" is usually dropped. That's also why I also didn't use "de" when wrote "Zhōngguó dōngbù". In every language there are exceptions to the rule. The good news is that in my opinion, English is the king of exceptions to the rule, and that didn't stop you from mastering English. |
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Post by Steve vb on Mar 15, 2019 14:50:58 GMT -5
My biggest problem is that I can never remember the tones. I can remember the words, but not the tones. I don't seem to have an ear for the tones. So, when I'm studying or translating, I can "see" the word in my mind, but I can't see the corresponding tone. I recommend following along with Chinese Youtube videos and speak the words out loud. Soon you'll correctly speak more and more tones because you have heard them and have said them correctly many times. In English, I bet that you can correctly say the word "encyclopedia" using the correct tones because you learned it from listening and speaking. Just remember that it is normal to at first struggle with tones. One free idea is to leave a flier at a Chinese market or go to a small Chinese restaurant and exchange one hour of English pronunciation lessons for one hour of Chinese pronunciation lessons. One final thought about the tones, new learners of Chinese tend to exaggerate how strong the tone needs to be, especially the 2nd and 3rd tones. We actually use all four tones when speaking English without realizing it (although changing the tones in English doesn't change the meaning of the word). |
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Post by Wolfgang on Mar 15, 2019 15:26:42 GMT -5
My biggest problem is that I can never remember the tones. I can remember the words, but not the tones. I don't seem to have an ear for the tones. So, when I'm studying or translating, I can "see" the word in my mind, but I can't see the corresponding tone. I recommend following along with Chinese Youtube videos and speak the words out loud. Soon you'll correctly speak more and more tones because you have heard them and have said them correctly many times. In English, I bet that you can correctly say the word "encyclopedia" using the correct tones because you learned it from listening and speaking. Just remember that it is normal to at first struggle with tones. One free idea is to leave a flier at a Chinese market or go to a small Chinese restaurant and exchange one hour of English pronunciation lessons for one hour of Chinese pronunciation lessons. One final thought about the tones, new learners of Chinese tend to exaggerate how strong the tone needs to be, especially the 2nd and 3rd tones. We actually use all four tones when speaking English without realizing it (although changing the tones in English doesn't change the meaning of the word). I've been doing this but my brain doesn't retain sound info (tones) very well. I probably need more reps. |
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Post by Steve vb on Mar 15, 2019 20:21:30 GMT -5
I recommend following along with Chinese Youtube videos and speak the words out loud. Soon you'll correctly speak more and more tones because you have heard them and have said them correctly many times. In English, I bet that you can correctly say the word "encyclopedia" using the correct tones because you learned it from listening and speaking. Just remember that it is normal to at first struggle with tones. One free idea is to leave a flier at a Chinese market or go to a small Chinese restaurant and exchange one hour of English pronunciation lessons for one hour of Chinese pronunciation lessons. One final thought about the tones, new learners of Chinese tend to exaggerate how strong the tone needs to be, especially the 2nd and 3rd tones. We actually use all four tones when speaking English without realizing it (although changing the tones in English doesn't change the meaning of the word). I've been doing this but my brain doesn't retain sound info (tones) very well. I probably need more reps. More reps and more time. At this point, having difficulties and frustrations with tones is what is supposed to be happening. This all takes time. Remind yourself how much better your Chinese is today compared to your level six weeks ago. |
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Post by breakoutsports on Mar 16, 2019 19:04:21 GMT -5
I moved to Denmark a few years ago to play professionally and ended up staying and getting a job. I’ve been trying to learn Danish now for 3 years and it has been very slow going.
I speak fluent Spanish though and what helped me learn in the beginning was to memorize certain phrases that I could us ALL the time. Things like the Spanish equivalent of “yeah, that sounds good” or “let’s do it”
It may sound kind of basic, but it’s a great way to get yourself speaking
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You've definitely been spending time studying. The key is to push yourself through the first year. Almost everyone loses interest or hope and quits during the first year. That's why 99% of Chinese books and podcasts are for beginner's level. If you can force yourself to study speaking and listening for 30 minutes everyday, you will make a lot of progress after one year. Also enjoy the first year of learning things that you've never thought of before. Studying Chinese also taught me some things that I was not expecting, including many things about English that I never had thought of before. 