User Comments - pretzellogic

Posted on: When the Taxi Takes the Long Way

under construction, day before yesterday, clearly, I know what I'm talking about, held up time, wasted, intentionally, the wrong way, fines us, punishes us, luànshuō, gēnjù, ānpái, tàidu, jǐngguǎn

Posted on: When the Taxi Takes the Long Way

I think one of the reasons that this lesson is better than others is that this is one of the few lessons i've heard (right now being at intermediate) where some local is speaking really fast, in an excited manner.  The more you could shadow a lesson like this, the better chance you understand real Chinese in the street, especially if you just show up to China the first time after only doing cpod lessons.

Posted on: The Shanghai Literary Festival

Interesting question regarding the draw for an English language literary festival in China. I thought it was interesting that the population of attendees is growing, but there are about 200 people for some of the biggest names. Too bad that Peter Hessler isn't able to attend, but wow, Scott Turow! I guess a festival like this one is one of the draws of any big city. Glad to hear a bit about it.

I guess the authors show up at their own cost? I've never attended anything like this before. Do the authors also sign books?

Posted on: 中年危机

ha, ha, that's what i was thinking when I read the dialogue. "best mid-life crisis ever!" It really would be time to reach for the little blue pill...

Posted on: 中年危机

This lesson reminds me of Viagra commercials. Maybe its the picture of the handsome, mature couple accompanying it.

Posted on: Lili and Zhang Liang 8: Scheming Girls

I guess scheming girls aren't as popular as scheming guys.

Posted on: Introducing a Friend

Hey Chris, thanks for this!

Posted on: 减肥药

Just FYI, this lesson does have the English in the dialogue.

Posted on: 上火

Cpod, this lesson needs English in the dialogue.

Posted on: Talking about Illness

Hi Changye,

As you might guess, i'm not really making comments for questions; more for observations, search terms, future directions.

1: I wanted a detailed search of specific lessons to see terms I think would still be beneficial in lessons. i'm seeing some of the same words over and over again in lessons, so if I make a lesson suggestion, i'm hoping that i'm not repeating lessons already created on a topic.

2: i've noticed that certain lessons don't come up intuitively, or rather the way i would expect if i search for them in the cpod search engine. My favorite example is F1 in China, but I keep searching for "Formula 1" and never finding the F1 in China lesson. I would like it if Cpod could incorporate these terms in its search capability, but it appears that the search engine doesnt' search the discussion section. So it might mean cpod staff would have to change the search terms to include what I am suggesting. A lot of work, I know, and maybe less a priority that other things they're working on.

It's certainly eye-opening for me, but i'm not sure yet if it would benefit anyone else. I think where this search would be extremely helpful to get to something more important would be to go through all the friendship/relationship/dating/affair, and eating food/ordering food/tasting food/cooking food/Chinese food/cuisine lessons. I suspect that much of what we would need covered has already been covered in these areas. But only such a search might tell you something about the marginal value of another lesson in those topics, and what words should be included that haven't already been included.