ChinesePod - wolson Conversations

Re: Why are you learning Chinese?

wolson — 2008-08-28 09:15:45

Why did I start to learn Chinese?

Because I was forced to. Yes, forced to.

Back when I arrived at the United States Military Academy at West Point, NY, I spoke passable German. Every Cadet must take two years of a foreign language. And because of my ability to speak German they would not me met take German. There are no “easy way outs” at West Point.

During an interview with the Foreign Languages Department at West Point, they learned that I played a number of musical instruments. So, then the interviewer says, “We have this new language program. There are not many students either wanting it or have the ability to take it. However, with your musical abilities, would you be interested in taking Mandarin?”

A request like this is more or less an order: I was not given options here. I could have said no but one generally does not in a military unit refuse requests without a very good reason to do so and I lacked one.

So I was force fed Chinese and regurgitated Ying-ese three days a week. I make it sound worse that than it actually was. Even though my areas of interest were Physics and Electrical Engineering, I continued to try to fit Chinese electives into my program during my fours years at West Point so it could not have too bad.

But anyone familiar with the West Point classroom with Plebes will understand what I meant about force-fed and regurgitate. It is a very demanding program where you are given a lot of material very rapidly and must speak in Chinese everyday in the class room. By the time that I completed my four years at USMA, I could read about 2500 characters and communicate in Chinese passably well.

But in my 24 year Army career, I never once used the Chinese I learned. Instead, I served in Germany where my German was indispensable (within four months of arriving, I had negotiate, in German, contracts) and then later, a little time in Korea.

When I retired from the Army, I became an Engineering College Professor. Then, in 2005, some 32 years after my last Chinese class, I was asked to speak on my research in Sustainability in Shanghai.

To understand me, you have to understand that I am somewhat a fanatic about communication: I never want to visit a foreign land without being able to speak some of the local language.

So I dusted off my old Chinese books, (“Speak Mandarin” by Fenn and Tewksbury) and started to try to recall what I learned so many years ago. In addition, I bought several books all which used Pinyin which was very different than the Yale Romanization System that I had been familiar with. It was somewhat of a hopeless task but I managed.

Then my University asked me to visit China in 2006 and 2007 to coordinate programs with several Chinese Universities. This was followed by an assignment in 2008 to perform as an exchange professor. In 2007, Yanshan University sent to Toledo two Chinese Professors to teach Chinese. I took their Intermediate and Advanced classes which greatly helped me.

In addition, another student in my class showed me ChinesePod last October. And I have been hooked ever since.

So why do I continue to learn Chinese?

1) I love it.

2) I feel that it helps me to perform my job as a Professor and as a representative for my university better.

3) I am also somewhat egotistical and like to show off that I can do things other American professors at my university can’t: that is, talk to my Chinese students in their native language.

So my reasons are not necessarily altruistic but Chinese is fun for me. So I continue.

Re: The More Than One Child Policy and Taking Trains

wolson — 2008-08-13 11:57:11

Refe: Purchasing power:

raychenon says
1 day ago

Interesting lesson on one child policy. Great information when I will travel.

It was a pleasure to meet you and the rest of the team at your office.

A suggestion for next "Dear Amber", how about the Chinese purchasing power. During my stay, I see products like laptop,cell phones, Haagen-Dazs, western brand clothing which are the same price as one would get in Europe. On the other hand, brand like McDonalds,KFC and Coca-cola are on the parity of Chinese wages. What do really local people consume ? Who live on the western lifestyle ?

China is very interesting place right now: there is a segment of the Chinese society that is extremely rich. For example, next to our Shanghai office is the Ferrari dealership and the Bentley dealership. They would even let me sit in the cars. :-P Buicks in Shanghai sell for twice the price they do in Detroit.

A McDonalds hamburger is, however, a fraction of the price that it is sold for in the US. And that is the same for KFC; while the McDonalds tastes exactly the same as it does in the US, KFC doesn't. I have seen Starbucks, Haagen Daz and a number of other chains in China but since I do frequent them either in China or the US, I can not give you a comparison.

There is another part of China that is extremely poor. To see this part of China, you need to get out of the cities into the farmlands. They still use donkey carts and a lot (and I mean a lot) of human labor to farm their lands. You will see some small tractors but most is still human labor.

Quite frankly, this dichotomy is a problem that China will have to address in future years. They will need the farms; but if the farmers can not produce the wealth that they can get in the cities, there will be a migration toward the cities. How China handles this problem will be interesting... In many ways, China is a grand experiment in developing a modern society. The distribution of wealth issues are not easy anywhere in the world and can produce great social discord.

A Dear Amber on this subject would be very interesting and edgy! Because Praxis is located in Shanghai, they may not be able to fully address the issues that could arise. But there are some issues that could be addressed. For example, with a perponderance of new wealth going to younger Chinese businessmen, how are tradiational attitudes about money management being perceived?

Re: Wang's Office: Welcome to the Team

wolson — 2008-08-12 09:33:23

Wow, this one is really edgy! Somebody has to go: either Lao Wang or Xiao Zhou. My vote is for Xiao Zhou.

This leasson is really timely. Today, I am welcoming new Chinese students to my research group. But so far, none of them are "know it alls." They all seem to be very polite young students ready to go to work.

Re: War Zone

wolson — 2008-08-01 11:04:44

As a retired soldier, I found this lesson much too basic and much too short. Perhaps military terms could be covered in an Intermediate or Upper Immediate Lesson.

Of course, now that I am over 60, it is doubtful that I will ever need these terms again.

But even as a tourist to the Forbidden City, I watched soldiers drilling just inside the Tiananmen Gate and to the East of it. It would have been interesting to have the volcabularly to understand what the orders were, and what the officer or NCO in charge was saying to improve the marching performance of his squad.

Re: Tool Delivery

wolson — 2008-07-31 11:12:24

Bazza,

In the US, we call these "vise grips." The Chinese called these

大力钳（da4 li4 qian2)

32 minutes ago

Anyone know the Chinese name for Mole Grips? That's one of the few tools not in my visual dictionary.

Re: Tool Delivery

wolson — 2008-07-31 10:02:59

Outstanding Lesson! I could have used this when I was at Qinhuangdao: I had a chair that kept coming apart. I had a hard time describing what tools I needed to fix it... Apparently, most academics in China (and probably in the US) are not familiar common hand tools.

Sound Check Follow up: Musical Instruments (Cross Post)

wolson — 2008-07-24 12:01:40

Posted by wolson July 9, 2008 .

Comments

Re: The Role of the ChinesePod Forum

wolson — 2008-07-24 11:52:53

It seems to me that the problem is really one of organization. I really don't care whether it is the forum or comments made in t he community. However there needs to be a structure.

For example, recently, I made two long posts on terms, one for music and one for tea. These could have been in the forum as well as they were posted mainly for reference... There have been no added comments to them since they have been posted (that I know of) not does there need to be.

However, sometime in the future, somebody is going to want to know about a certain tea or a certain musical instrument... About the only way to find these posts currently is know that I made the post and then search my posts. If there was a structure, this would not be necessary.

A search option that finds posts by keywords would be a very useful tool here. For example many of the previous users provided word lists. At times, I would like find these.

Re: The Role of the ChinesePod Forum

wolson — 2008-07-24 06:47:08

The forum was great for its organization and archiving of posts. IT is not something that I visit every day or even every week. But when I want to find a certain piece of information, it is invaluable.

I recommend keeping it but it does require an active moderator.

Re: A Thanks and Goodbye to Clay

wolson — 2008-07-23 07:01:34

Please say it ain't true!

I have really liked Clay's humor and character in the Qing Wen Series. I don't think Qing Wen will be as much fun to listen to as it was with Clay. Can we have at least one more Qing Wen with Clay?

I wish Clay the best of luck in his future endeavors and hopefully, we will hear form him again.

Re: Chinese Tea

wolson — 2008-07-23 06:58:52

Bazza,

Lapsang Souchong is a smoked black tea from the Fujian region that most people either love or hate... there doesn't seem to be a middle ground on this one. Earlier, you mentioned that you like Earl Grey. Again this is another black (although, generally not Chinese,) tea that is again flavored, this time with a citrus oil.

In thinking about your taste for these teas, they may be another one that you would like. In the United States it is called Dragon Tears. However in Chinese it is usually referred to as

茉莉花茶-小龙珠 : mòlì huāchá -Xiǎo Lóngzhū

or Jasmine Dragon Pearl Tea. It is a "花茶" (huāchá) which generally means flower tea. Unlike the black teas above, most people do seem to like this one.

Another tea that people either love or hate (I happen to love it but I like most teas) is 普洱茶,pǔ ěr chá, Pu-erh. I am certain based on your tastes that you would probably love this one as well. This tea, when it is of good quality, has a strong earthy flavor.

Pu-erh's are among the highest price teas in the world and also keep the longest. When I was in Wuhan, I was invited to a meeting of tea specialists where we had a four hour 茶道, chá dào. During this ceremony (I guess that would be the best translation), we sampled a very old Pu-erh that was part of a tea bundled that was carried from Yunnan to Tibet. Its age was about 150 years old and it was still an extremely good tea.