Short Scene 11: Criticizing your step-father

[StChris]

奋斗, Ep. 15, 17:25 - 19:12
http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XODUyMTk3MjQ=.html

陆涛 (the young guy) goes to his step-father for advice. He's the project manager of a big construction contract at his biological father's company. His step-father works at the governmanet office responsible for giving permission for building such projects. He's frustrated by what he regards as his step-father's lack of support for his ambitions and lets him know it in this scene.


耍花招        shua3hua1zhao1    get up to tricks
仍然        reng2ran2        still, yet
原则        yuan2ze2        principle
理顺        li3shun4        sort out, straighten out
急功近利    ji2gong1jin4li4    seeking instant profits and success, looking for a get rich quick scheme
搞人事关系                I'm not sure on this one, but I think it means to pull strings or use one's contacts
徐志森        xu2zhi4mo2        name of the young man's biological father
挫败 (cuo4bai4)    defeat, frustrate    
刻板 (ke4ban3)    inflexible
沉闷 (chen2men4)    gloomy, depressed
压抑 (ya1yi4)        constrained, inhibited
平平 (ping2ping2)    mediocre, average
干部 (gan4bu4)    cadre
除了X还是X             useful sentence structure (it's used twice in this scene - just watch and you'll understand)
增经 (ceng2jing1)    once (at some point in the past)
接着 (jie1zhe0)    carry on, continue
争取 (zheng1qu3)    strive for, win over

              

[StChris]

Oh, and evidently I wasn't the only one to think this scene would be useful for learning Chinese - it features in a Chinesepod Media level lesson. I used to listen to the Media level podcasts a year ago, just to have something playing in the background while I was doing other things. I started doing this again this week, but now I can actually understand what they're discussing, most of it in fact! It's nice when progress sneaks up on you like that :-)