User Comments - maktubhelou
maktubhelou
Posted on: Cpod's Upcoming Anniversary
August 16, 2010, 03:26 AMI think that was the gist of it, bababardwan. ;-)
@mengguren, I'm an English Teacher, if you're really curious. But, yeah, mainly, I think the topic was meant to be about Chinese, not my relatively normal expat life :-)
It's not so much that I didn't want to talk about it, is that I was pretty sure nobody would find it very interesting.
In the meantime, if you're interested in Korea, I'd be glad to answer any questions. Just having returned, I'm brimming with ideas about how the two cultures differ, and also about the similarities they share. But again, only if you're interested, then ask away.
Posted on: Yellow Mountain
July 09, 2010, 03:55 PMI'm really curious what the response is. I have a question: could it be that he really felt the Indian food was overpriced? Maybe he didn't really like Indian food? Living in Korea, I've found that Asians that I've met (Korean and Chinese) often have no qualms about criticizing a cuisine. Criticizing the actual food, especially when it's the local variety, or when prepared at home, is a definite faux pas, however, expressing preference for a particular cuisine doesn't seem to be an issue at all. I can't imagine how it would be in China, but here in Korea, if you went into a restaurant (even a Korean restaurant) and said "I don't like anything on the menu" I suspect the majority of Koreans wouldn't be offended, they'd just assume it was because you were a foreigner and your palate was different. It's considered rude to make a big deal about it, but not merely to comment and state your preferences. Maybe it's similar to the way you can outright tell your friends "I don't want to" in Chinese (and Korean too) but in English it often comes across as rude and we tend to beat around the bush with "Well, I'd love to but..." or "Mmmm... I thought we could..." or "I'd rather..." I realize you're talking about Chinese culture and not Korean, but there are often cases where I find the two cultures quite similar when it comes to this kind of thing.
Posted on: Organic Food
July 06, 2010, 11:17 PMBrilliant! Is it just me or is ChinesePod entertaining its "granola" side a little more lately? Fantastic lesson. Useful dialogue sprinkled with a few words to expand our vocabulary into more difficult areas (i.e. environment). To me, this is what an intermediate lesson should be.
I'm wondering, do Chinese people generally think that the food grown in China is healthy for you? There seems to be a misconception - shared by a surprising amount of people - that all food grown here in Korea is by default better than American grown food. I suppose, there could be some truth in that, but a pesticide is a pesticide. The Organic Food movement has only recently begun to take off which is a little surprising. It seems to me that the delay is because of this "false sense of security."
Posted on: Directions to the Metro
July 02, 2010, 05:29 AMThese lessons are great, and I'm beginning to think it wouldn't be impossible to learn this language, provided the right material. Can you recommend any?
Also, I noticed - or failed to notice the contrary - that you didn't mention tones throughout the whole series. I'm aware that there are tones in Shanghainese but it looks like it's not as simple as the one syllable one tone nature of Mandarin. Can you give any tips on this?
Cheers. Here's hoping you come out with a "Shanghainese II" series.
Posted on: An Unplanned Tan
July 01, 2010, 05:16 AMHa. I missed that one. Xiao_liang, I wouldn't dream of it ;-)
And as for my place in the whole debate, I'm on neither side. My mother tongue is a dialect of English heavily influenced by Irish, replete with regionalisms nobody else understands.
When it comes to accents and variation, I'm not much of a linguistic purist. I'm totally with you, Suxiaoya, on the fact that it's great people can debate language on here too... however, I'm a little disappointed when people mistakenly assume that their regional variant of our rich language is "the right one."
To vulgarity! :-)
Posted on: An Unplanned Tan
June 30, 2010, 10:01 AMFully aware that that was a joke, I'd like to point out that languages tend to change faster over time at their main cultural centres, whereas peripheral areas and isolated regions tend to be more conservative about accepting change. The last 50 years or so excepted, the English language as spoken in the UK is probably the more "vulgarized version" of what was spoken 500 years ago. (Of course, you might call it "refined" ;-)
Posted on: NGO Guy
June 29, 2010, 02:30 PMGood question. I'd have to say both. I really like the lessons on different types of organizations. I'm interested in International Politics so both lessons really cater to that particular taste. As for this lesson, I like the format. The context of a guy explaining his job at the NGO to his blind date really hits on so many levels, and explains what an NGO is in a natural way would be useful in real life, yet simple enough to understand even for an Intermediate learner. Plus, it was only a little over a month ago that I mentioned in the comments of the United Nations podcast that it would be great to have one on an NGO. This kind of personalized feel is exactly what makes ChinesePod such an appealing form of education. It looks like a few others are interested in this type of lesson too. I'm going to be up late working on this one!
Cheers!
Posted on: NGO Guy
June 29, 2010, 09:52 AMAwesome! This one has a great format, and it's a very useful topic. I really like the way NGOs are kind of explained in the context of the dialogue. United Nations, NGOs, what's next? Fantastic!
Posted on: Insecticide
June 02, 2010, 03:17 PMYou beat me to it! I was about to say the same thing, but at least I'll voice my support. I agree with the Buddhists, vegetarians and environmentalists out there. I side with all three.
That said, this is a lesson to teach us about language and words. ChinesePod does it with zest, gusto and humour and I applaud them for all three. Listening to this lesson, I couldn't help laugh at the absurdity of it all, especially the husband's well-meaning stupidity.
Here's a thought: maybe we can interpret this lesson as having a hidden agenda. In actuality, this house is a microcosm for China... the moral of the story being that if people keep spraying pesticides around they'll render the country uninhabitable. Humour people. Humour!
Just a thought ;-)
Posted on: Cpod's Upcoming Anniversary
August 16, 2010, 03:26 AMI think that was the gist of it, bababardwan. ;-)
@mengguren, I'm an English Teacher, if you're really curious. But, yeah, mainly, I think the topic was meant to be about Chinese, not my relatively normal expat life :-)
It's not so much that I didn't want to talk about it, is that I was pretty sure nobody would find it very interesting.
In the meantime, if you're interested in Korea, I'd be glad to answer any questions. Just having returned, I'm brimming with ideas about how the two cultures differ, and also about the similarities they share. But again, only if you're interested, then ask away.