User Comments - nurdle
nurdle
Posted on: Pre-Valentine's News
February 12, 2009, 05:26 AMhi paulinurus,
My favourite dictionary is the "ABC Chinese-English Dictionary" edited by John DeFrancis and published by the University of Hawai'i Press. It is alphabetized using pinyin, so it's a great quick reference, plus there's a comprehensive character to pinyin section at the back. If you don't know a character's pronunciation, then you can look it up in the guide using the radical stroke-count method.
If you wanted to memorize the radicals in order, the guide at the back of this dictionary would help you. I found that with consistent use, I was able to remember the radicals pretty easily without making any special effort to memorize anything.
Good luck!
Posted on: Harry Potter
June 21, 2008, 03:29 PMI also picked up the first 6 哈利波特books while in China (7 wasn't out yet, so my collection is incomplete...) and I was so proud to get through the first 3! I started the 4th after coming home, and without the language support I had in China, I abandoned it. They really do get more difficult! But I agree, it was a great learning tool for me. I think ChinesePod should have a "Book Club" tab! Pick a book, put up discussion pages per chapter (to prevent spoilers), and poddies could progress and post at their own pace. You could pick Elementary, Intermediate, and Advanced books... just an idea.
Posted on: Upset
March 23, 2008, 08:08 PMI echo bazza's frustration with mingr - or any 'ingr' - tai nan le! 太难了！just too difficult... Is it a safe rule-of-thumb to say that if the 儿 word is 1 syllable (zher, mingr, nar, etc) then the r can't be removed without replacing it with the original character, whereas if the 儿 word is 2 syllables (qishuir, meishir, youshir) you can just drop the r and be fine? Can anyone tell me if I'm on to something here? Thanks!
Posted on: Knitting a Scarf
March 21, 2008, 07:48 PMHi Lunetta and jlswedberg! I'm "Pistachio" on Ravelry and I love the idea of starting up a cpod group! I've tried to start up a thread in 'Asian Knitters' about chinese knitting vocabulary, but I let it die (my own fault).
Posted on: Teacher Salary and Perks
December 15, 2007, 06:48 AMDid you guys take a peek at my contract when you wrote this lesson? It's a page out of my life... Good job, as always.
Posted on: Most Frequently Asked Question in China
December 14, 2007, 05:27 AMHow can I say "I'm French-Canadian"? I'm not from Quebec; I'm Canadian born & raised speaking French as a first language. 说法语的加拿大人doesn't seem to do it justice. Any thoughts?
Posted on: How do you take your coffee?
September 08, 2007, 07:26 PMI'm guessing there's no Chinese equivalent to the Canadian "double-double"? 双-双？两-两?
Posted on: The Old Man Who Moved a Mountain
June 22, 2007, 12:23 AMThat's fantastic tusconmichael, franch and changye! Just what I was hoping for. Thanks!
Posted on: The Old Man Who Moved a Mountain
June 21, 2007, 01:51 PMThanks for all the 了 comments, everybody! Next request: could we maybe brainstorm a few uses of 愚公移山 -the chengyu- in a modern Chinese sentence?
Posted on: Pregnancy Series 3: Prenatal Checkup
February 18, 2009, 03:03 PMI'm due 3 weeks from today and my midwife (how do you say midwife in Mandarin?) tells me that he's considered 'term' as of today. Our ultrasound technician told us we were having a boy at 20 weeks. In British Columbia, Canada, this is a bit early. He should have written it in my chart and my midwife would have told us at around 24 weeks. I have been told that this is because the time for a voluntary abortion has passed by 24 weeks, and only medically-indicated abortions are performed. I guess he wasn't afraid of losing his job, though, so these rules seem to be loosely applied in BC.
Congrats to all the other pregnant poddies out there! Best of luck on delivery :)