Reflection on years of watching Chinese dramas

[Tomsima]

Just a small reflection I wanted to share here on my improvements with tv comprehension. I can vividly remember feeling so frustratated with how impossible and stressful watching the 'fun' Chinese tv recommended here on the forums used to be. But now watching tv is so easy and fun, I wanted to share my 'yeah you can do it' moment

 

So, I watched 琅琊榜 when it came out, which was what about 3-4 years ago now. I loved it, but it was such hard work, I remember spending about a week working through the first episode alone. The visual aids made it watcheable and fun, but I was well aware of the fact that I was only really able to grasp the bare bones of the plot, and struggled a lot with even trying to pick out names from regular vocabulary.

 

After that, I watched similar kinds of tv shows non stop, for years, with depressingly low success rates. But it did seem to be getting easier. Just that progress was painfully slow. But I figured, what else was I going to do with my evenings? So I kept watching, and pausing, and then watching...and then pausing...etc

 

Flash forward to earlier this year, I finished the fantastic 武林外传 (highly recommended), but after having such an annoying time with what you might call 方言-interference in my everyday Chinese tones (from the non-standard accents in the show), I then switched to something more 'clear' - the classic 甄嬛传 (avoided for years because sadly I thought it was too 'girly' - imo this show is actually a legit classic and must watch for intermediate-advanced Chinese learners). It was still pretty tough going, but by the end I would say I felt 'relaxed' and enjoyed it without any language stress - ie. minimal pausing, I would guess maybe around 98^% listening comprehension.

 

Recently I took a break to read 左傳 in the evening instead of TV. This evening I sat down feeling pretty tired (dissertation translation submitted...finally!) and thought, hey, why not give 琅琊榜 a try again, would be good to rewatch it. I was shocked to find I could understand everything, the plot, the subplot, insinuations, jokes, you name it. Must have been 99.5^% comprehension or something. I just sat and watched five episodes straight without a hitch. In fact the language is actually easier than 甄嬛传, and obviously way way way easier than 左傳. I almost cried it felt so good.

 

So thats all I really wanted to say really, in a really long-winded way...

 

Hopefully some will read this and remember what the struggle was like, others might realise, it will come, don't give up.

Edited September 13, 2019 at 12:36 AM by Tomsima
edited because a book called 左轉 is probably not that interesting to read

[ZhuoMing]

As someone who struggles with listening comprehension and finds tv shows frustrating and terribly painful to get through, this is very inspiring. Would you attribute your advances in listening comprehension solely to the daily Chinese dramas, or were you also getting listening practice in other forms (like talking to people in China)?

[Tomsima]

I have been getting listening practice from all sorts of different sources - I watch cctv news daily, speak to friends and family in Chinese, and have had to read an inordinate amount of official speeches in Chinese in the last year as part of my interpreting and translating course. I'm sure all these things do contribute, but the tv shows I like watching use language very different to these colloquial or official flavours of Mandarin/dialect. I think the thing that has helped the most in getting comprehension up for tv was reading, reading 武侠小说 helped a lot for shows like 鹿鼎记、射雕英雄传 etc. and I definitely noticed how useful 古文观止 has been for 宫鬥.

[zander1]

3 hours ago, Tomsima said:

I think the thing that has helped the most in getting comprehension up for tv was reading

 

Agree, and I'd also say vice versa. Watching palace dramas, where 成语 come by the bucketload has helped me a lot with reading, both of novels and of news.

[Weyland]

When it comes to me media consuming habits I vastly prefer reading over watching content. Especially TV series are just too slow for me and I tend to skip forward. What has helped me in getting me finally so far to just sit down and watch a series is... well, by not sitting down. I tend to watch my Chinese series while on an exercise bike. 



Then I have a tablet with Pleco on it to search for words without having too large of an impact on my exercise.  The series I'm watching is called 《大江大河》 and I'm halfway through it. When it comes to reading and listening comprehension for me it comes down to catching myself in the act of not knowing things, so when I am watching a series and pause the video to look up the word only to find out Pleco already has it saved as a flashcard it helps me bring down my ego somewhat; give the necessary punt.