hongputaojiu Posted October 9, 2011 at 06:17 PM Report Posted October 9, 2011 at 06:17 PM Hi guys I just wanted to share my experience from the other day, and wondering if others have a similar experience to share? I arrived early for chinese class on Thursday evening and saw the series of New Practical Chinese Reader sitting on the bookshelf in the classroom. Two and half years ago I started learning chinese from scratch, couldnt read a single character, and started with NPCR1, this month have almost finished NPCR4. So sitting there on the shelf was NPCR1, which I picked up as I hadnt seen it for 2 years. It was really amazing to see how much progress I had made over the time, and just how far the textbook series has come. I often feel I am making little progress in chinese, and obviously still have a long, long way to go, but this was a really nice moment of realising just how far I have come over the last 2.5 years. Have you ever had a moment like this? all the best for everyones study and keeping motivated with it! hongputaojiu 1 Quote
Geiko Posted October 9, 2011 at 06:59 PM Report Posted October 9, 2011 at 06:59 PM Sure! I still remember the first time I read a Chinese breeze novel, it was 我一定要找到她. I was flying from Barcelona to Prague (a 2.30 hour-flight) and I was only able to read one chapter, i.e., three pages, before we landed (I had to look up every word in the dictionary I was carrying). Now I could read the whole book twice in the same amount of time... Quote
Meng Lelan Posted October 9, 2011 at 09:07 PM Report Posted October 9, 2011 at 09:07 PM Yes, the other day ago I was teaching my class the word for 欢迎. I told them I could not even recognize those two characters when I first came to China. Some friends invited me to dinner, they were deaf, so we had to write down everything we said as I didn't know Chinese Sign Lanugage yet. One of them wrote 欢迎，欢迎！and I spent 30 minutes trying to look up those characters in a paper dictionary (this was in the 1980s) and by the time I found the meaning it was time for dinner. Quote
abcdefg Posted October 10, 2011 at 03:12 AM Report Posted October 10, 2011 at 03:12 AM Have you ever had a moment like this? Those are moments to savor. I've been reviewing old notebooks and this morning found one in which most of my class notes were in Pinyin. Made me feel good because now my class notes are mostly Hanzi. Quote
Iriya Posted October 10, 2011 at 03:39 AM Report Posted October 10, 2011 at 03:39 AM Yesterday a middle-aged woman asked me for directions and I was able to help her. Made me feel good. Quote
Matty Posted October 10, 2011 at 03:42 AM Report Posted October 10, 2011 at 03:42 AM I'm sure my Chinese isn't as good as yours but... Some times it just dawns upon me that I'm casually speaking to Chinese people in Chinese, or when I've just read a long message on my phone and realise that I can read these "crazy characters" and understand them. It's quite an amazing feeling. I've got a long way to go, but I'll get there one day. Quote
renzhe Posted October 10, 2011 at 10:14 AM Report Posted October 10, 2011 at 10:14 AM Yesterday a middle-aged woman asked me for directions and I was able to help her. Made me feel good. As an (I assume) obviously foreign looking person? That's cool! Quote
Iriya Posted October 10, 2011 at 11:15 AM Report Posted October 10, 2011 at 11:15 AM Yeah, I'm white as snow. It's really cool that the vast majority of the Chinese don't care what you look like as long as you can speak Chinese. So very different from Korea and Japan... Quote
hongputaojiu Posted October 10, 2011 at 05:03 PM Author Report Posted October 10, 2011 at 05:03 PM yeah its cool to hear everyones experiences! Quote
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