I just got back from a short trip to the interior of China to a lower-tier city. The kind of place that barely any foreigners live.  As I navigated around town, I was somewhat nonplused by how little reaction my Chinese got.  None of those 你的中文说得很好 remarks I get all the time even here, on the east coast. Nobody reacted at all when I spoke, nobody tried to speak English to me (except one darling little girl in the airport line)  and  it was all completely normal.  It got me thinking, back in the day, speaking Mandarin was something that Chinese people never expected foreigners to do. What's it like today? Do more laowai speak Chinese than in the old days(i.e. approximately  2000-2020)? Where I live I haven't noticed any improvement among the foreigners, it's always the same, most don't, a few can poorly, a small number are quite good.   What's it like out there?

In case you're not aware, I'm the author of Regular Script Graphemics. I've considered doing this for over a year, but I think no matter what I do, I might piss some people off, so here's what happened. If I did things correctly, the first edition will no longer be available soon. Some people who paid for the first edition might be pissed that the second one will be free. Oh well. Don't ask me to send you the first edition while it's unavailable to buy. It's been pirated long ago so if you really want it, you can get it. Here's the plan. Large revisions. I'm pretty unsatisfied with the book. Overall explanations can be tighter. The handwriting is kind of ugly in some places. The cold calls have gotten old and what they aim to achieve can be integrated in a less disruptive manner. The writing also takes a tone that doesn't reflect my current views. Some of the hedging and speculation can be better supported. Some stuff is too long; some too short.  If anyone wants to help in a substantial way, let me know. As some of you might know, I'm currently prioritizing a largely unrelated PhD and would appreciate help from someone who cares about this more than I do. If you help enough, I don't mind putting you as an author. I'll admit I haven't been reading in this area. In my defense, there's so much crap everywhere. I never feel like looking for it. People can also give feedback or suggestions in this thread.   As for why it will be free, the first edition has never made enough sales to get my attention, so my goals would be better served if more people read it. That said, making it free isn't an invalid monetization strategy; some of the most successful products are freemium, but let's not get into that. For now, I'll provide some non-obnoxious method of expressing appreciation for those who want to.   When it's available. I'll probably make a new thread and post a link.

Feeling quite confident in my reading and listening abilities, I decided it is finally time to take an official language test. Since it is significantly cheaper than the HSK, I opted for taking the TOCFL reading/listening test. And because why not, I just went straight for the band C test, which upon passing it, attests a C1 or C2 level depending on the score. After taking the test, I am not too confident that I have passed it though..   I did a detailed write-up of my experience here on my blog for those interested. Has anyone here taken the TOCFL recently? How did it go? I am very curious what kind of score I will get. I would not be surprised to have failed it miserably, but deep down I am also hopeful that some of those gut-feeling answers were correct 😄

Hello! I have a final exam in my Chinese class and I need to present a speech. If anyone could grammar check what I have written I would really appreciate it! Thank you! (also if anyone has any ideas of what to add that would be great)     大家好，  今天我會談談我打工經驗。去年我想找到打工為了賺一點錢。既然我是法律學生，我就想在律師樓工作。   倒是你是學生的時後，可難找到辦公室的打工！我正要放棄，然後我的朋友這就打電話給我，他說《這家餐廳找到服務員！》我非常興奮！   從我的第一天工作起，先我的老闆介紹一下我的同事，等客戶來餐廳，再我请他们点菜。   我還不到一個星期打工，已經我打破了五個盤子了。我真是笨手笨腳！ 老闆罵我，再加上他拿我的小費！服務員各賺各的小費！他小氣得沒話說！   早知道老闆的個性不好，我就沒去打工這裡。動不動就我被老闆叫我走路了。   就是我不打破那麼多盤子，我也覺得我是不好的服務生。。。   我多少學了一點，我不該做服務生！   谢谢大家！  

https://english.www.gov.cn/news/202411/22/content_WS67407351c6d0868f4e8ed533.html   Pretty cool. They added 9 other countries too, mostly small ones, except Japan. Very easy for Europeans to go to China now. USA, UK and Canada are the three ones not on the list yet....

2025 HSK test dates released:https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/O--1HiVqG5iFn5QTPKijeQ

My son has just switched from iPhone to Andriod (Samsung) and can't find many of his favourite apps.   He's used my wife's Chinese iTunes account up until now on the iPhone, but as Google Play doesn't work in China there's no point using a VPN for it. We tried using a VPN to Taiwan & Singapore (my personal VPN is offline right now) and logging in to the Galaxy Store, but it immediately detects that we're in Zürich even without the SIM card.   There surely must be some 老外 with Android phones Samsungs even that they bought overseas and want to use the local apps in China. How did you download them?

Hi there, I have a problem.I am creating account in CSC scholarship, while creating account there is a requirement,they want a validation code but I don't know concerning, could you please help me...

There were around 500 test takers all over the world.https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/oOhPNzUMp2Va0sC50wh2SQ

I was watching snooker last night, and a discussion about the pronunciation of Xiao Guodong started. ( 肖国栋)  The short exchange here was about his family name, but in the show, I noticed they pronounce guo as gu - but that's an aside...   A native speaker said I and someone else were wrong with the pronunciation. What's your take on it?