Awesome Mandarin! Must listen!

[self-taught-mba]

I have to disagree with self-taught-mba, whose very name implies a certain degree of pomposity (had to say it, I think that every time I read it lol),

Thank you for your honesty. I have often regretted naming myself that. However, it is the most descriptive way to describe myself and is not meant to be arrogant at all. I am after all self-taught and an MBA. Being self-taught is nothing special-believe me, I'm not trying to make myself out to be a hero or anything. If you read my story about how I learned you realize that it was forced upon me because the system failed me.

Like I said before being self-taught is totally within the realm of possibility to get to a basic level. The biggest problem I have is with the attitude the "Chinese must be hard." That is absolutely ridiculous but a common misbelief. Note how no one is lauding his English skills! As if somehow Chinese were more difficult than English!!!! This is a very American point of view, but very common. We do not appreciate how hard English languages to learn and I am most impressed by his use of the English language.

Why is it that we say "Wow, you speak Chinese!" but we don't say "Wow, you speak English!" Think about that.

If you have developed that speaking skill solely from self study I would be blown away.

Come meet some of the people I've met and you'll be blown away then. Last week I sat down with Da Wei (you know the guy that's had his own TV show) for 3 hours, who was also self-taught for the most part. (But then again people pretty much tried to chase him off the board for advocating reform that more closely mimics the methods self-taught people have been using)

[bomaci]

I also would like to know if you had any language partners bomaci? How often did you speak with your Chinese coworker? If you have developed that speaking skill solely from self study I would be blown away.

I have an opportunity to use chinese daily, so I get alot of speaking practice. However I still feel I need to study. I don't think speaking practice alone gets you anywhere. I have met countless of immigrants in Sweden who get tons of speaking practice everyday and still have a thick accent. You still have to do a lot of listening and reading on your own. Where speaking practice can help is to confirm that you are on the right track, that people actually can understand your mandarin.

[necroflux]

self-taught-mba, your post totally dispels any assumptions I made from your name, I fully withdraw that comment. Well said. I was fully expecting a return jab at "necroflux" lol.

[necroflux]

I have an opportunity to use chinese daily, so I get alot of speaking practice. However I still feel I need to study. I don't think speaking practice alone gets you anywhere. I have met countless of immigrants in Sweden who get tons of speaking practice everyday and still have a thick accent. You still have to do a lot of listening and reading on your own. Where speaking practice can help is to confirm that you are on the right track, that people actually can understand your mandarin.

No question I think every aspect of a language is equally important. I personally can feel when I've been ignoring one in favor of the others.. it's like filling up multiple pools with water if you will.

[carlo]

Thanks for the link to the complete script of 我爱我家. I searched for this a couple of years ago without success (I think they had only finished transcribing four episodes last time I checked), it's nice to have the full version, I'm sure many learners of Chinese will appreciate it.

[imron]

Don't know about the other scripts, but watching the first episode while looking at the script, there were quite a few mistakes. Usually it seemed to be that the person doing the transcribing was just using a different way of saying the same thing, but at other times, there are complete sentences in the script that aren't said in the show.

[Gestalt]

Bomaci,

I'm impressed. If your patented method costs less than Steve Kaufmann's, I'll buy it

How many hours a day/week did you spend speaking Mandarin, and how much on self-study? I presume you must have spent quite a bit of time each day to get that good that fast?

[bomaci]

How many hours a day/week did you spend speaking Mandarin, and how much on self-study? I presume you must have spent quite a bit of time each day to get that good that fast?

I approximately speak mandarin for an hour every day. So of course that helps. However I had to study alot to be able to do that without the conversation turning into english. I self study on all the spare time I have. I try to get in at least an hour of self study a day, sometimes i manage 2. However I would like to point out that while being able to converse in mandarin alot helps with fluency it does nothing to correct your tones unless you train yourself to hear your errors. Also vocabulary used in conversation tends to be a bit limited so you still have to study on your own.

[self-taught-mba]

self-taught-mba, your post totally dispels any assumptions I made from your name, I fully withdraw that comment.

No offense taken originally and thank you for being cordial with a withdrawal.

[mandarinstudent]

Bomaci, thanks for the links to the scripts for 我爱我家, but it seems what Imron said was true:

Don't know about the other scripts, but watching the first episode while looking at the script, there were quite a few mistakes. Usually it seemed to be that the person doing the transcribing was just using a different way of saying the same thing, but at other times, there are complete sentences in the script that aren't said in the show.

My chinese is not good enough to pick out what the mistakes are sometimes...i.e. I know that what they are saying isnt in the script, but i cant pick it out..or I hear an extra syllable or a missing syllable but dont know what it is. Given that they are speaking so fast and using "native speak" (今儿 instead of 今天 which is what im used to hearing...etc.), it is taking me forever to muddle through the first 5 minutes of the show because the script doesnt exactly match. Im used to recordings where they speak "perfect" Chinese very slowly. Im trying to get to the next level and after listening to your interview and how well you speak, I thought it would be a good idea to try this to improve my listening ability and help me speak more fluently. This show is perfect for practicing "practical, everyday" Chinese that gives you an idea of the speed and manner in which real (not from the tapes that come with your textbook or people reading the news)Chinese people sound, but Im stuck because the scripts dont match perfectly. How did you get around this? Is there a place to download the exact scripts? Maybe there is another show that is similar that also has scripts to go with it? Is there a kind soul willing to correct the scripts for us beginners?

[imron]

Given that there are 120 episodes, and that most of the mistakes are reasonably small and still more or less preserve the actual meaning, I'm not sure you'll find someone willing to go through and do this :-)

In the meantime however, check out this thread which contains links to cctv shows with scripts for downloading.

[mandarinstudent]

Given that there are 120 episodes, and that most of the mistakes are reasonably small and still more or less preserve the actual meaning, I'm not sure you'll find someone willing to go through and do this :-)

Well, I was hoping that some benevolent "chinese masters" with some extra time on their hands could make the slight changes to correct the script and post them up here:wink: . I wasnt thinking of all 120 episodes at once, maybe something like one episode per week. I was just so disappointed...I went out and got the series only to find that the scripts didnt match. The link you suggested is nice, but the language on those CCTV shows is more like "news standard" chinese whereas 我爱我家 is more like "real" chinese. You know, the kind of chinese where someone says a sentence that you SHOULD be able to understand because the sentence is made up of vocabulary you have already studied, but you cant understand because they speak so fast, blurring the words while throwing in tons of "rrrr"s. I wanted to practice this sort of chinese. Anyway, if someone knows where you can find the correct scripts for the show, or if someone is kind enough to make the slight revisions to the existing scripts, I would be eternally grateful.

[imitation]

Mandarin Student try downloading tv series which have subtitles, I think 中国式离婚法 is good and can be found at bt..china .net at least two of the ..s from this need to be removed.

[Mugi]

Certainly impressive given that Max/bomaci has never lived in China. 让我感到自己也非得再加油不可。

One thing both speakers may want to refine is their pronunciation of [ɕ] (pinyin x), which was consistently pronounced as ... I'm afraid it got on my nerves after a while...

[imron]

Not all of the shows are too "newsy". For example 为您服务 is more like a lifestyle programme, giving useful hints and suggestions for everyday life. It has different segments, usually containing several people all discussing a certain problem, using everyday normal language. You can download short clips of each different segment, so there's no need to download the entire show, just the parts that you're interested in. You do get the ads thrown in, but you can skip over these without too much trouble.

Anyway, once you can get to a point where you can listen and understand the language here, then following 我爱我家 from the script shouldn't be too hard.

[bomaci]

I know that what they are saying isnt in the script, but i cant pick it out..or I hear an extra syllable or a missing syllable but dont know what it is. Given that they are speaking so fast and using "native speak" (今儿 instead of 今天 which is what im used to hearing...etc.), it is taking me forever to muddle through the first 5 minutes of the show because the script doesnt exactly match. Im used to recordings where they speak "perfect" Chinese very slowly. Im trying to get to the next level and after listening to your interview and how well you speak, I thought it would be a good idea to try this to improve my listening ability and help me speak more fluently.

I think if you are only used to listening to perfect chinese very slowly this show might be a little too much. Before starting this series I worked through two movies, also in the Beijing dialect and I have also listened a bit to audio books in chinese. I have also used the "Standard chinese a modular approach course" which also has speech at a more natural speed. I think you should perhaps first get used to clear chinese being spoken fast before you tackle this show. Actually I don't get all of it either, but I get enough of it to be able to continue using it for study.

[mandarinstudent]

So, where did you get scripts for the movies? Did you just write it down from the subtitles or something?

[bomaci]

So, where did you get scripts for the movies? Did you just write it down from the subtitles or something?

At first I used subrip and made the subtitles into bmp files, which I then could "read" on my computer. But this was very painful since I couldn't look up uknown characters directly electronically instead had to do it by radical. For the second movie I studied I found the subtitles in MS-Word readable format on shooter.cn. If you are thinking of stuying from movies it might be a smart move first to see if the subtitles are available there.

[gato]

There are many subtitles on this site. For example, "Fearless."

http://www.shooter.com.cn/sub/?searchword=fearless

[mikeedward]

If anyone's using www.3xia.com to listen to 我爱我家, I highly recommend downloading the episodes from verycd.com and ripping the audio using Xilisoft RM Converter, Cool Edit Pro, or a similar program. The audio quality is a fair bit better. With Cool Edit Pro, you can also time stretch the audio while keeping the same pitch.

Mike