First Episode 9: 家有儿女

[renzhe]

Thanks for the link. I'll edit it (and the Fendou one) in later.

[dongxi]

Ok, sorry for posting another link but this one is better in both image and sound quality!

They seemed to have all the episodes, here's the link for season 1

http://www.qiyi.com/dianshiju/jyen1.html

I just found out about www.qiyi.com so I'm not sure if it's accessible outside China but it works great from China.

[blandmc]

As I watched the first episode of this, I thought I would post my comments within this thread as well.

I studied Chinese for 1 class about 15 years ago... then traveled in China/Tw/HK for work the last 15 years... am fluent in Japanese... and have been living, working, and studying Mandarin in Shanghai for just over 1 year. I took the HSK last in April 2010 and got a level 3 on the basic test. I would guess I could get at least a level 4 on the Elementeary/Intermediate test now... I will find out next month I guess when I take it. Anyway, I know quite a bit of grammar, tons of Hanzi and thousands of vocabulary words... but my listening skills are not that great.

So, I wanted to watch TV to work on my listening. Based on the recommendations of this show as a good one for beginners, I bought the DVDs. I watched the first episode and it is crap as far as I can tell. My Chinese teacher also said there is really nothing easy enough for me to watch until my Chinese is fairly advanced (i.e. high intermediate level... I would say now I am at a low intermediate level or very advance beginner).

I found the show far too difficult due to:

- the DVD graphic quality is good but somehow the subtitles are very blurry and hard to read

- they talk SOOOOOOOO fast - seems unnaturally so. Maybe due to the sitcom/comedy style

- seems like they use fairly difficult words.

I would guess I understood about 30% max the first run through of episode one. So, to be fair perhaps if I understood 100% I would find someof the jokes cute... but at my level of Chinese it just looked painfully corny.

Even so... I was able to see some usage of words I knew but hadn't been aware of the usage. So, I think it will be useful for me to endure the crap show and practice listening.

I look forward to improving my level enough in the next year or two that eventually I might be able to enjoy some better quality shows/movies.

-michael

[renzhe]

Don't be too harsh on yourself. Everybody who has ever started watching Chinese shows went through this, even people who considered themselves fairly advanced. The first few dozen hours are pure masochism. But it will improve your listening like nothing else. As with every other aspect of Chinese, you need to put in the hours, then the comprehension will eventually come.

I agree that it's good to wait until you have a solid foundation. New HSK level 4 is plenty. It's just that listening to native-level materials is difficult, and takes time to get good at.

What helps is using the pause button to stop and read the subtitles, taking time to understand what was said, and looking up the words you don't understand. Then rewatching it once or twice. Also, using the transcripts for the first 10 episodes and looking for unfamiliar words before watching can be useful.

It will take time before you can follow this stuff without any subtitles or pausing.

[blandmc]

thanks for the encouragement!

Actually I was talking about old HSK level 4. I havent tried taking the new one yet.

They offer the new one infrequently here - still seems to be the old one that is favored.

Anyway - yes, I agree the subtitles would help if they weren't so darn blurry. Anyway - I will keep at it and hopefully as you say my masochism will eventually pay off. *smile*

[kongli]

I watched the first 3 episodes of this show and in my opinion it has easy everyday conversation vocab mixed with really difficult vocab.

For instance, I was watching the third (or second?) episode with my girlfriend and one of the characters made reference to the phrase“只许周官放火不许百姓电灯” 'they permit the Zhou official to set a fire but the commoners can't even light a lamp' this phrase basically used to say something is really unfair. The main character changed the phrase to “只许姐姐放火不许弟弟电灯”. Obviously if you didn't know this phrase (I didn't) you would have no way to know what they meant.

However, that being said, now I know the phrase and it is pretty well in my brain because I had to take the time to stop the t.v. show, ask about it, understand it, and rewatch the segment.

So yea t.v. shows are difficult, especially at the beginning, but I think they can also do amazing things to improve your listening,speaking and even reading (if you have clear subtitles that is....).

edit: I also think this show is pretty ridiculous but that is what I really enjoy about it, much better than other shows who try to be serious and fail.

[rob07]

Anyway - yes, I agree the subtitles would help if they weren't so darn blurry.

Yes, clear subtitles are very important to start off with (though you do get used to the blurry ones). With the popular shows, there are generally several different versions floating around on the internet and the quality of the subtitles often varies dramatically between versions. It can be worth poking around a bit to try to find the best one.

[Kurtz]

Just wanted to say that I recently bought the textbook out based on 家有儿女. My expectations for the book weren't too high, but I was very impressed. Book is well put together and is well targeted at a mid-intermediate level. The book contains a transcript of each episode, key vocabulary and explanation of grammatical points. Also some general cultural articles. The only down side is that it just covers 4 episodes.

Helped improve my comprehension though, as although its a good mid-level series, I generally find that the characters speak too quickly and sometimes the vocab throws me off. So I found it useful to have a guide like this to follow each episode.

[Andrew 45]

"Don't be too harsh on yourself. Everybody who has ever started watching Chinese shows went through this, even people who considered themselves fairly advanced. The first few dozen hours are pure masochism. But it will improve your listening like nothing else. As with every other aspect of Chinese, you need to put in the hours, then the comprehension will eventually come."

Thank you SOOOO much, RenZhe! I was worried that I might've been wasting my time watching it (watched the first episode, like someone said you can somewhat tell what's going on with the sound off, but it helps to hear the words). As a recent finisher of Pimsleur (and thus knowing... 300 words? or so?) I couldn't understand much of anything unless it was "Shen Me?!" or "Wei Shen Me?!".

Like you said, though, some of the points did get to me and I just HAD to look them up. Like when the Mother says "我想哭" I had to look up Ku (first tone) to find out it meant "cry". Then the Father goes into somewhat of a speech... about not crying? And then she says "还想哭". I guess what I am trying to say is that it is the isolated, short phrases that make me want to look them up all the more (that and they were said in a slower speed, I think, though the second time, her "xiang" sounded like "yong" to me...)

Anyway, I guess I will keep it up, get that "masochism" out of the way. Thanks a lot, you guys!

[atitarev]

Just checking. Is there a full transcript of the dialogues? Or only the first episode (word doc)?

[renzhe]

atitarev, there are transcripts for the first 10 episodes (though one of them seems to be missing): http://www.chinese-forums.com/index.php?/topic/17263-first-episode-9-%e5%ae%b6%e6%9c%89%e5%84%bf%e5%a5%b3/page__view__findpost__p__171526

I've just noticed that the link in the introductory post did not survive the forum upgrade, I'll fix it now.

[atitarev]

Thanks!

[atitarev]

Kurtz wrote:

Just wanted to say that I recently bought the textbook out based on 家有儿女. My expectations for the book weren't too high, but I was very impressed. Book is well put together and is well targeted at a mid-intermediate level. The book contains a transcript of each episode, key vocabulary and explanation of grammatical points. Also some general cultural articles. The only down side is that it just covers 4 episodes.

Helped improve my comprehension though, as although its a good mid-level series, I generally find that the characters speak too quickly and sometimes the vocab throws me off. So I found it useful to have a guide like this to follow each episode.

I have bought the textbook as well. It must be 12 episodes, not 4 - over 3 textbooks.

[Demonic_Duck]

Season 1 episode 19 was great, many 喷饭 moments. My favourite episode so far. I felt the poor old 保姆 was kinda 冤枉'd and treated as more of a stereotype than an actual character, though. Out of interest, does anyone know what specific regional accent she speaks?

[roddy]

No, but it's great to see the first episodes getting some action!

[wibr]

Digging up an old thread, but I just wanted to point out the the whole series can currently be found on youtube. Just use: "youtube-dl --merge-output-format mkv url_of_playlist" to download each season.

 

youtube-dl

[kangrepublic]

Thanks for sharing the youtube-dl tool. Never seen that before. Could be really useful for getting Chinese content from youtube.

[mungouk]

A 5-years later bump... the series is still on youtube (as a playlist at least).

 

Also, there's a slightly easier way to DL youtube content these days... just go to the URL bar in the browser where it says (for example):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PC3DmhI-3tU

 

...and type "pp" immediately after "youtube" but before the "." and then hit return.  This tool also has an option to DL MP3 audio only.