User Comments - memmifer
memmifer
Posted on: London
March 10, 2008 at 3:27 PMQuestion re: 看来看去都是差不多的东西. Does the man consider everything the same (self-referencially-- "little boxes, on the hillside...") -- i.e., uniform, or... does the man consider everything in London to look the same as something else, like the man's home? I.e., what was the point in coming, it's the same as home?
Posted on: London
March 10, 2008 at 3:42 AMSpeaking of London cabbies and their memory of the city, I want to know how the fare collectors keep track of the mobs of people getting on & off the (often supremely crammed) Shanghai buses. They always know exactly who has paid and who hasn't.
Posted on: Buying a Newspaper
March 10, 2008 at 3:17 AMbento, I felt hugely safer walking around Shanghai (can't speak for other regions) any time of day or evening (never had reason to be out in the wee hours) than I did, say, walking around downtown Providence, RI in broad daylight by the Greyhound bus depot... maybe it was blissful cultural ignorance... But do keep your hand on your valuables. And definitely don't accept any offers to go have tea or coffee and chat!!! From what I understand, the serious crime rate in China is very low -- the punishments for serious crime are extremely high... I think there was one murder in Shanghai during my 1 year there. On the other hand, petty theft is rampant. If you buy a bicycle, think of it as a disposable item, because someone will definitely dispose of it for you.
Posted on: Buying a Newspaper
March 7, 2008 at 11:46 PMbuckaroo, Amber (above) says they're totally equivalent.
Posted on: Buying a Newspaper
March 7, 2008 at 8:01 PMThanks Amber, but... I mis-typed... it was the last two I couldn't get to accept my answers. Now I only have trouble with the final one. Isn't the right answer zhong1wen2? If so, it's not accepted as correct. Also, how about mentioning the use of 5 for neutral tone in the sample/explanatory description at the top, so all users on all exercises will see it.
Posted on: Updating Old Lessons
March 7, 2008 at 3:22 AMHats off to you guys, sounds like a lot of work! Will the new old lessons be flagged as new such that our feed will automatically download them for us? (Should we be so inclined?) Too bad you're doing this after the DVD was finished... Out of curiousity, how many are you going to go back and redo?
Posted on: Buying a Newspaper
March 7, 2008 at 1:37 AMCalkins, Another take on the 的 (in this case), is that it's a reference back to the thing you were already talking about, without having to name it explictly again. 你要甚麼書？中文的還是英文的？ (Ignoring possible plurals...) ... The Chinese one, or the English one? ... The Chinese book, or the English book? Yet another take is that it's one of the (many times) in Chinese where you can drop a character/word -- since everyone obviously (duh!/hunh?) already knows what you're talking about.
Posted on: Buying a Newspaper
March 6, 2008 at 11:27 PMI mentioned this on SpanishPod, but I'l mention it here as well, in case it doesn't make it across the great divide. It would be great if the supplementary vocabulary were used in the expansion sentences -- vocabulary always sticks better with some context around it... and better you guys make up that context than I! :) And I'll say it again, I LOVE the Expansion tab!!!
Posted on: Talking about Illness
March 6, 2008 at 10:36 PMEverywhere the word for throat (hóulóng) is said, I could swear that I'm hearing hou2long4. Do my ears need a tune up? Is this a word that can safely be said either way? I love the Expansion tab... I love being able to play a short phrase over & over again, and recite along/after. I can already tell (first week on the job here) that this tab is going to really boost my 水平! BTW, the exercise tab for me comes up blank. Is this podcast supposed to have exercieses?
Posted on: Signing up for Art Class
May 3, 2008 at 5:51 PMIn the expansion area there's a sentence that starts with: 我大学学过汉语，... The translation given is "I studied Chinese diligently in university". If I were to write this myself, I would have said: 我在大学学过汉语... Are there some rules that around when the 在 can be omitted?