User Comments - changye
changye
Posted on: The Broken Chair
January 18, 2009 at 1:33 PMHi Chinesepod,
Personally, I welcome comments both in English and in Chinese, and even in Latin (I would just skip it, though), because I'm not a newbie/elementary learner, however I myself usually don't post comments all written in Chinese here in newbie/elementary forums. I'm a guy who basically follows the rule, good or bad, hehe.
That said, I must say that the rule announced by Chinesepod admins is not so practical. I don't think that newbie/elementary poddies are very happy with "Chinese only but with pinyin" comments, although showing pinyin is nothing than better. But, for me, there seems to be no distinction between these comments and Chinese-only comments.
And, the biggest problem is that poddies can't find the notification of the rule anywhere, and therefore the same "futile" argument would surely be repeated many times. Probably, not a few poor poddies would be embarrased in the future by claims such as "please don't post comments all written in Chinese here in newbie/elementary forums".
Posted on: Do you have a menu?
January 18, 2009 at 7:27 AMHi kobukuro,
As pete explained, "请问" is a set phrase, which is also a shortened form of, for example, "请允许我问你。" (Please allow me to ask you) You can also say "问你一下" and "请问一下".
Posted on: The Broken Chair
January 18, 2009 at 6:35 AMHi Chinesepod,
I don't see much difference between Chinese comments with pinyin and ones without pinyin. In any case, most newbie and elementary learners need to look up online dictionaries by copying and pasting Chinese characters. Furthermore, adding pinyin to Chinese texts is really cumbersome. Do you think that just showing pinyin marks can justify posting in Chinese here in newbie/elementary lesson forums?
Posted on: Choosing a Chinese Name and Safety
January 17, 2009 at 8:05 AMHi japchinman,
"Donald" is commonly transliterated as "唐纳德" (tang2na4de2), so "Donald Duck" is called "唐老鸭" (= 唐纳德老鸭子) in China. As far as I can see on the Internet, "Don" seems to be transcribed as "丹" (dan1) in Chinese.
Posted on: Outrageous Power Bill
January 17, 2009 at 1:42 AMHi greasy8,
I'm also a faithful user of Chinese pera-kun, however please be noted that pinyin marks shown by pera-kun are not so reliable, especially when displaying multi-reading characters (多音字). I don't recommend newbie/elementary learners solely rely on this online dictionary.
Posted on: The Broken Chair
January 16, 2009 at 9:22 AMHi guys,
I think the problem is that there is no enough space for English translations at Vocab section, which often leads to "too simple translations" or "too free translations". This might not be so bad for newbie/elementary levels, but actually not enough for intermediate/advanced learners. And, I hesitate to say this, but what Chinesepod needs is more careful proofreading by a couple people before uploading new lessons.
Posted on: 敬老院之争
January 16, 2009 at 8:46 AM一般来说，在中国夫妻两口子都有收入才能好好维持家庭生活，老人有了好几个孩子才能好好享受晚年生活。反过来说，除非是有钱人，一个人的收入往往会不够养孩子，一对夫妻会很难抚养四个老人。现在中国大多数家庭只有一个孩子，如果成就不了孩子成龙成凤的梦想，那就完蛋了。生孩子越多父母亲就越有保障。其中至少有一个孩子出息就算成功了。毛泽东也说过，“人多力量大”！
Posted on: The Surname Code
January 16, 2009 at 7:23 AMHi owie,
There is a surname "欧" in China, although it's a rarely seen family name. It ranks around 160th in numbers and accounts for 0.06 percent of all 汉族人. Furthermore, there is a two-character Chinese surname "欧阳" (ou1 yang2). 欧文 is usually a transliteration of "Owen" in western countries, as you know.
Posted on: The Broken Chair
January 16, 2009 at 6:37 AMHi pretzellogic,
The English word "please" is not necessarily equal to "请" in Chinese, as is often the case in translation. Maybe "please" is much more frequently used in English than "请" in Chinese.
In other words, "请" could sometimes connote more polite than "please" does, so "吧" is actually often used in the sense of "please" instead of a little formal "请" in everyday conversation.
Posted on: Guided Plan Gets Better! Plus: Poetry is Pending
January 19, 2009 at 4:51 AMHi barto,
Appreciating classical Chinese poetry is actually not so easy, however I think it's not as difficult as you might think. Maybe there are a lot of poems that even we foreign learners of Mandarin can relatively easily enjoy, just like well-known "静夜思" or "春晓". Art is universal...perhaps.
About entering tones (入声), fortunately, they are generally not used for rhyming in Chinese poetry, probably because they don't sound melodious, and therefore, classical poems still preserve passably good rhymes even when they are recited based on modern Chinese sounds system.
The problem lies in so-called "平仄" (level and oblique tone combination rules?), as you pointed out. Let's just forget about that, haha. They are very complicted rules, and even educated natives have difficulty appreciating and understanding them, let alone foreign learners.
As far as tones concern, the problem lies not only in entering tone (入声) but in other tones. For example, 动 (dong4) has the fourth tone in modern Mandarin, but the second tone in ancient Chinese. Anyway, reciting 唐诗 is attractive enough for you even without using ancient sounds and tones.