Newbie - Where is the supermarket?

Here is my revised Character Dictionary. It now includes Vocab from the Expansion Exercises (but not necessarily the Expansion Vocab Lists).

Download here

If you prefer to have only vocab from the dialogs, my original Character Dictionary is here.

Coming VERY soon (perhaps even today):  a PDF showing stroke order for about 1000 characters.

Does anyone think this lesson is too challenging for a complete Newbie? I'm always concerend that ppl who visit for the first time might be overwhelmed by the more challening Newbies. Thoughts?

So, '(the destination is) 15 minutes on foot' is 走十五分钟 zǒu shíwǔ fēnzhōng, how bout 15 minutes by car? Would it be 开车十五分种 kāichē shíwǔ fēnzhōng?

Ken, I think this is fine as a newbie lesson ... although the translation (in the review mp3 file) of 'the Great Wall isn't far' as '公司不远' might cause a bit of confusion ... (unless you're referring to 中国长城工业公司, in which case it is too challenging) 

Ken,

 I think this lesson is fine for a newbie, even if they don't get the whole thing they will plant seeds that will sprout later. Keep in mind that those of us who are beyond newbie now were newbies once. We all knew going in it was going to be a challenge.I walked into this knowing that it would be one of the biggest challenges of my life. If this is for them they will step up and if not they will move on.

Jess.

Foreigners often seek out the 'Western' supermarkets.. here are a couple of chains:  

麦德龙 màidélóng (Metro) 

家乐福 jiālèfú (Carrefour) 

These supermarkets usually have a small section selling imported goods - but most of the product is the same as what you find in a Chinese supermarket.  The prices are similar to those found in Chinese supermarkets (except the imported goods.)  

This is pretty close to the first dialogues in most of my texts. Places, numbers, and time are usually in the first few lessons. But C-pod is a "lexical chunk" teacher not the method of teaching different subjects in numbing details like having a chapter teaching all numbers from one to a 1000, or a chapter with all possibilities of time and date, all direction words (north, south,..., forward, backward, right, left), etc.

This is a feature of C-pod not a bug.

Is  "Where?" expressed as 在哪儿 （zài nǎ'r）? a Beijing term more than 在哪里 （zài nǎlǐ）?

Carrefour

5 * lesson

Ken,

Does anyone think this lesson is too challenging for a complete Newbie?

..nope.I think it's about spot on.There's only about 10 words in this dialogue.I think if you make it much less than you run the risk of the complete newbie not thinking they're getting much out of the lesson.In fact in that way it may actually suggest to them that progress in Chinese is going to be painfully slow[and we as your teachers advise against biting off more than you can chew from our experience] by it's very nature and it may be offputting,whereas with a lesson like this I think it is digestible [the dialogue is repeated 3 times to boot at the beginning and end and there's always the option to listen again] and a complete newbie could see that in 15 minutes they have learnt something that could be part of a useful real life exchange.I think at the end a small sense of achievement is reached.It is lack of experience in the language not lack of intelligence that makes one a newbie and showing some faith in that can be very encouraging.Just my 2 fen.

I have almost finished my stroke-order doc. But can someone give me some help with Word. When I paste diagrams into a line of text, the surrounding text lines up with the BOTTOM of the diagram. I can't figure out how to line-up this text with the TOP of the diagram. Any suggestions?

Ken,

This suits very well a Newbie lesson.  An important topic, finding the supermarket, a place highly needed by the majority of people. This lesson  demostrates the simple yet powerful sentence structure that will allow beginners to find whatever they are looking for. By swapping the word "超市" chāoshì with other things your are looking forward eg. 饭店　fàndiàn (hotel) the "Newbie" listener is on the way to discover the whole of the Chinese city in which they may live.

Well Done!

Ken,

I agree with what others have already stated.  This kind of newbie lesson is perfect.  Though perhaps when John and Jenny are discussing tones as they did in this newbie lesson, it might be beneficial for new listeners if they say a line or two telling the truly newbies to check out newbie lessons on tones, etc.

Thanks for all your amazing work!

Ken, I also think this is fine as a newbie lesson.

go_manly

Try right clicking the picture.  On the drop-down menu choose: Format Picture, tab ‘Layout', wrapping style ‘Square', Horizontal alignment ‘Other'.

Go_manly, I think your links may be blocked for those of us in PRC.  I'd love to see what you've done - do you know if there is any way of hosting your documents on a site accessible from within China?

Many thanks, Chris

Some things about 前面 qiánmiàn from my exploring MDBG. It means "before" and "the side of", respectively, i.e., the side of you that is before you is in front of you. To remember the tones, think of a mountain in front of you: it goes up then down (second then fourth).

Lots of words arise from miàn:

后面 hòumiàn － behind

里面 lǐmiàn － inside of

左面 zuǒmian － left side (though 左边 zuǒbian seems more common)

右面 yòumiàn － right side (though 右边 yòubian seems more common)

C-podders: Are 面 miàn and 边 biān interchangeable?

Hi Chris, they're not blocked, at least not in Beijing, and at least not at 7:24pm local.

frognotinawell

I have Office 2007, and it doesn't seem to be the same as you described. I found 'Layout' separately from the Format option (its not in Format). The 'Square' style has no other options. When I select 'Square', the alignment is how I want it, but the picture no longer alters the line height. So I have to press Enter a number of times to get the right spacing.

Any suggestions?

I could do this so this easily in WordPerfect, but the PDF production there is ordinary.

mudphud,

I really like your mountain mnemonic for the tones.Continuing with the journey,once you reach the summit of this volcanic like mountain and pass along the right rim of the crater,behind hòu is down,inside  lǐ,left zuǒ,right yòu.Oh well,works for me anyway.Thanks mate. :)

hi mudphud,

边 and 面 are not entirely interchangeable. I'm not a linguist but i'll try to explain with a few vocab examples.

面 refers to one's face, or the face or surface of an object,  as well as space. 面子，没面子。 对面，前面、后面。 河面、海面、上面、下面. 里面、外面。

边 on the other hand refers only to directional space. 旁边。左边、右边、海边、河边。这边、那边。东边、西边、南边、北边。边 can't be used for surface or face.

maybe other poddies can offer a better explanation.

My Mandarin teacher says that biān can mean 'edge' or 'side'. So if something is on a table, but teetering on the edge, you could say zhuōzi shàngbiān, but if it is safely in the middle of the table you would say zhuōzi shàngmian.

Its probably why pángbiān is used for something which is next to you (at your side), but duìmian is used for something opposite you (you are facing it).

go_manly

Sorry, it seems that Word 2007 menus are completely different from earlier versions.  Word 2003 also has the option ‘Top and Bottom' i.e. between the lines.

Mudphud,

Miantiao's explanation was quite sufficient, however as an aside, if you spend anytime in China you will find that 面's versatility extends even beyond the aforementioned. The traditional character 麵 (mian4) meaning flour or noodles, has been simplified to 面, which is what ChinesePod uses. So from a simplified standpoint this is another 'face' to 面.

Example...面条 (mian4tiao2) means noodles, which, if I'm not mistaken, are the characters that coincide with 'miantiao's name?

This is my second lesson and I thought it was difficult at first but the explanation was done in a way that made it very easy to understand and not seem so difficult at all.  I really enjoy how the lessons use common words and phrases and I like the background you gave on supermarkets.  Chinese culture is so interesting!

Guys, great to hear your feedback! 'Level appropriateness' is something that we obsess about. And it's something that learners know better than teachers.

This lesson is a good orientation for Newbies!

In the dialogue text, 不 in 远不远 is written as neutral tone. Shouldn't it be bù (John also says it's 4th tone)? I thought it was neutral only in set phrases such as 对不起.

@frognotinawell

My textbook says for questions stated in the "A 不 A" form, the "不 A" is generally the neutral tone.

E.g.
Ni3 lei4 bu5 lei5?
Ni3 shi4 bu5 shi5 zhong1guo2ren2?

And then there is "Ni3 shi4 zhong1guo2ren2 bu5 shi5?" as well. And "Ni3 shi4 zhong1guo2ren2 ma5?"

On the topic of level appropriateness I think it's important to have a spectrum of difficulty levels within the Newbie, Ele, Intermediate bands, firstly to expose learners to new challenges and secondly to allow them to work up through the stages without hitting the wall at the transition.

I certainly wouldn't be obsessed with the perceived off-putting effect of this relatively hard lesson, anyone who is going to pack in their learning on the basis of one lesson is probably not that committed and might be expected to drop out irrespective of how hard the lessons are.

As a slight aside, it might be useful to solicit the opinions of other users on how they negotiate the transition between the stages. Or maybe this has already been discussed and I've missed the boat.

In spoken chinese, is it possible to shorten "走时是五分钟" without verb as "走时五分钟" which leads to a possible confusion with "走十五分钟" ?

A Stroke-Order Dictionary for download.

(You will need to download the Character Dictionary. The download for this is in the first entry on this page.)

It's a shame that your fine work is denied to poddies here in China, Bob. Seems your chosen file share site is one of countless web addresses deemed undesirable by the censors here. I guess the majority of poddies are not actually in China, but for those who are, it might be nice if you'd look into an alternative download option.

On level appropriateness, I remember in the beginning, I did newbies, then started on ele's quite quickly. I did newbies and ele's for a long time without even looking at intermediates. Now, I don't bother with the newbies anymore, because there's hardly ever a new word. New words on eles are getting rare too, but I'm stuck getting to intermediate proper. Intermediate seems a much bigger jump than ele was. Low-intermediates are few and far between. I would like to hear a slow rendition of the dialog in addition to the normal speed (fast) one. It's very difficult to hear and keep up with a dialog that I don't understand all of. I mean, if I could follow it all at top speed, I'd be at the next level, right? Give me a chance to think while listening and keep up.

yes, if you want to show "15 minutes by car? "

in chinese " 开车十五分种". that's ok, you can use this way to show the length of a distance. all Chinese people can understand it .

Is  "Where?" expressed as 在哪儿 （zài nǎ'r）? a Beijing term more than 在哪里 （zài nǎlǐ）?

They are of the same meaning of "where" but  for a Beijingner they may use "在哪儿 （zài nǎ'r)" . But for people from the south of China they may use "在哪里 （zài nǎlǐ) " . both of them can be understandable in China.

OK, for anyone living in China, you can PM me with your email address, and I will send you a copy. (Tell me exactly which file(s) you want)

Just to clear up my above message, I am NOT looking for Chinese friends or language-exchange partners.

Hi mudphud

"边" and "面" are basically interchangeable when they are used in words that indicate direction or location such as front/behind, right/left, inside/outside, and etc. Possibly there might be a slight difference in connotation/nuance/usage, but ...... who cares? haha

左边/左面 右边/右面 (left side, right side)
上边/上面 下边/下面 (upside, downside)
里边/里面 外边/外面 (inside, outside)
前边/前面 后边/后面 (in front, behind)
东边/东面 西边/西面 (east, west)

Look who's back!!

I've never really got to know you, but you have answered some questions for me in the past. Its good to see you make an appearance.

yeah, it's great to have changye back!

I was just thinking of starting a thread:

“what happened to Changye (and 巴迪 of course) ?”

where have you been, Changye 叔叔？ ：-）

wb Changye ;-)

@barbs

你介绍家乐福， 谢谢你。ni jieshao jialefu, xiexie ni (Thanks for the background on Carrefour supermarkets).

它叫'hypermarket'，不是'supermarket'， 我还不知道。 ta jiao hypermarket, bushi supermarket, wo hai bu zhidao (I didn't realise that they are actually 'hypermarkets' not 'supermarkets'.)

现在我知道为什么在家乐福我呼吸困难， 还有点头晕。 xianzai wo zhidao weishenme zai jailefu wo huxi yin nan, hai hou dian tou yun (That possibly explains why in 家乐福 I cannot breathe properly and I feel dizzy.)

I wonder what makes Carrefour Greek rather than Latin... since hyper- and super- mean exactly the same thing.

Hi Orangina,

You're right, the prefix "hyper-" comes from greek and the prefix "super-" comes from latin. Even if "hyper" and "super meant the same thing centuries ago, nowadays "hyper-" is bigger than "super-".

Btw, in french a "carrefour" is an intersection/crossroad.

Hi Guys

Intresting lesson :)

does anyone know the words for "corner shop " or convience store aswell ?

many thks

J

@jzd101

Culturally this is a strange concept because the whole shopping experience is expected to be 方便 fāngbiàn (convenient).  You are more likely to hear someone complaining that something is 不方便 (not convenient) - if it is not convenient.  

Of course this is a kind of myth because lots of things are inconvenient in China.  But whatever you think should be in a corner store in the West you will find somewhere close by in a city in China.  I think that the equivalent term in China is .. 超市

便利店 (bian4 li4 dian4) is convenience store/corner shop, no?

七十一便利店 is a 7-Eleven ™ convenience store

OK便利店 is a Circle-K ™ convenience store

哦哦！ o1o1 is a popular chain 24h convenience store in china. 

another name given to a small store selling all types of daily necessities, but commonly not a 24h store, is  杂货店 za2huo4dian4. these mostly family run stores are ubiquitous throughout the country. Usually opening very early in the morning and closing around midnight.

i like the lesson (just as i do all others :) )and dont find it too advanced for a newbee, at least not for me. i also noticed the small mistake in the Extension audio of the sentence :"The great wall isnt far". (I might be wrong, but i believe the audio says 'Gognsi' instead of of the Great wall,  which i assume should be 'My office isnt far?) thanks for the great work!

@miantiao

Thanks for the term 杂货店 - I know exactly what you mean, I've seen them all over.  It just occurs to me though that I can't remember one in my daily sojourns here.  I wonder if the 超市 has killed them off as they did of course in Australia and elsewhere in the West.  To be replaced by that invention loved by business schools the 24 hr convenience store chain.  here the family run business seems to be specialized - fruit & vegetables; bakery; hardware; smokes & alcohol; tea; phones; newsagent; etc.  My favourite is the hardware - goods stacked floor to ceiling in a space like a garage.  I'd like to ask for something from the bottom (eg. piece of hose pipe) - they would say come back in a week, we'll have it ready for you?  But there are numerous small 超市 - chain stores.  Food on one side, non-food on the other.  Some are now getting into selling cooked food.

its a challenging newbie but its definitely not an elly.
wonderful lesson.

nothing bad about your teaching Ken but i love the new addition of John moving to more levels.
he's an amazing teacher and us newb/elly level listeners never got to hear just how good he is.

thanks CPOD team 

kimiik:

"走时是五分钟" sounds strange. I'm sorry, can you tell me what do you mean?

miami_meiguoren,

Thanks, it's sweet of you to say so!

I agree with miami_meiguoren, it's refreshing to mix it up a bit.

Hi lujiaojie,

I already had the answer from "another channel" : 走时 and 旅时 are not measurable.

go_manly, thanks for sharing your work... great job!

I think the level is fine. To echo an earlier comment, I prefer that the lessons at a given level have some spread in difficulty. Otherwise it's too hard to move up levels.This is easier to see with the Elementary lessons than with the Newbies.

Not sure I agree with the comment in the lesson about there being nothing like a Super Walmart in China. There's an Auchan in Suzhou on the SIP boundary - I've never seen anything like it in the US. There must have been over 100 checkout lines. I was there just before Spring Festival began and it was completely packed, no idea how many thousands of people were in there.

Carrefour may be on the way out of China: http://www.economist.com/businessfinance/displayStory.cfm?story_id=14587923&source=hptextfeature

As a few others have pointed out, "Great Wall" (Chang Cheng) in the expansion is pronounced "gong si" ("company") in the audio file. I'd worry more about this sort of thing confusing newbies. Proofreading/listening (with care and attention) may be time-consuming, but it's time well spent IMO.

Hi everett

Thank you for pointing out the mistake in the audio file. It's fixed now.

So you're in China. You don't need no stinking "maps." You'd rather just walk up to the nearest person on the street and ask where the supermarket is, in Chinese (of course). Tune in to today's lesson and learn how to do just that.

如果你在中国。你不需要没有味道的地图。更好的方法是走到街上离你最近的人的面前用中文问他们超市在哪里。Tune in to  今天的课程去学习怎么样去做

it is my understanding with this lesson

hehe

Go sleeping

Good night everyone

mepple,

I like your translation of "stinking" as 没有味道! Does chinese use any nonsensical adjectives like that? I suspect yes. They do tend to make sense when you think them through. Like "stinking" for useless, bad quality, no good. If you are shopping for food, you want to make sure it smells fresh, or you may buy something you can't eat. You could yell at the fish monger, "Don't try and sell me no stinking fish!" And it sounds so good you just use stinking for everything you don't want. Can things in China 臭 in a figurative way?

badges? We dont need no stinking badges.

rj,

我也不喜欢恶臭獾. Wo3 ye3 bu4 xi3huan1 e4chou4huan1. I don't like [wicked] stink badgers, either.

Link

There's been very little research into their habits. I wonder why?

orangina

I just translate this lesson into chinese with my opinion.

I am sorry i cannot understand this lesson completely

cause there is some sentence i cannot see

for example: You don't need no stinking "maps."

what does this sentence mean?

heh

Good luck to you

maybe this sentence has its behind means

maps has a quotation mark

mepple,

"stinking" here is a slang term meaning anything you have contempt for. It is a "useless" map in this case. He doesnt want a map because the map isnt any good anyway, or not as good as the alternative of asking someone on the street.

@dogupatree (love that name) - "We dont need any stinking badges" is a famous movie quote from an old bogart film that was somewhat made famous again as a slight mis-quote in the movie blazing saddles by mel Brooks. Do an internet search for the phrase and you will find many hits. Where is Pete when you need him? :-) And its badges not badgers, I assume you were being funny.

Hi, Mepple.

There isn't a hidden meaning in the word "maps". I think the "" are there to emphasise the word. Imagine somebody saying it loudly: "We don't need no stinking maps!". (NB the grammar is very colloquial, too. Formal English might be: "We don't need any useless maps.")

Thanks, rj.

I'd just written a post asking you why you were talking about badges. It rings a bell, now. I haven't seen "Blazing Saddles" for over 30 years.

Thanks for you help rjberki,i can understand this sentence,i am so glad to receive you help .

and ,aslo thanks dogupatree,

both of your are good man

When do you use "nali" and just "nar"?  Is "chaoshi zai nar?" OK?

@gatorfan7

哪儿 (nǎ'er) and 哪里 (nǎlǐ) both mean 'where' and are interchangeable. 

The only difference is that 哪儿 tends to be used more in the north, whereas 哪里 tends to be used more in the south. 

So, you're sentence is correct!

Xie Xie.  What great service! :-)

Hello everyone, my first post on cpod!

@Ken: I think it's a very useful lesson, I struggled on the "15 mins", she said the numbers so fast, and I did not know the word for mins, but kind of inferred it from the context. I actually thought she'd said 10. But that's cool, at least it gives me a better feel of the pace of native speak.

This said, I've studied directions in class, so a lot of the vocab was still fresh ^_^

Hi cypherdj

Welcome to the Chinesepod forum! You can feel happiest when you just started learning a new language. Enjoy learning Mandarin!

@Ken,

I've listened to this pod 10 or 12 times, and I'm still struggling with hearing the words in the dialog.  Yeah, this is a good lesson.  Yeah, it's tough for a complete newbie.  No, it's not too tough.

@rjberki,

The "We don't need no stinking badgers" version was from... er... I think it was UHF (that old Wierd Al Yankovich movie).  Cheech was getting a shipment of animals for his animal show, and the guy was trying to sell him badgers.  Hilarity ensued.

.  Topher

bodewei has give this translation 家乐福 jiālèfú (Carrefour) which is great but in this picture I would have expected to see the characters above after huan1ying.

What are the last two characters ?

@paulbz

欢迎光临 huānlíngguānglín (welcome)

The whole sign means 'welcome' - in this case the English does not correspond exactly to the Chinese. 

It is commonly heard when you arrive at a shop and when you leave someone will say 慢走 mànzǒu (goodbye!)

PS. If you look carefully at the word Carrefour on the left of the sign you will see the three Chinese characters below.

When you want to ask a question in Chinese, just change the object into the word you want to ask, like 谁（who，whom），哪里（where），什么（what）.It is a little different from English. When you want to ask a question in English, you put the word you care at the beginning of the sentence. When you hear 'Who is...' ,you know that the asker is going to ask a question about a person.But If you hear a question in Chinese ,you don't understand what the asker want to ask at first.

eg:

导演（film director）

导演是什么？and 导演是谁？are different ,the first question means'What is a film director in Chinese'or'What does the word 导演 mean?',and the second question means "Who is the film director (of this film)?".When you hear 导演是...you can't identify it.

eg.

A:机场在哪儿？（Where is the airport?)

B:机场在那儿。（It' there.)