#chinese progress

[rigelmejo]

11/2/2024 update - chinese:

1. Listening to something "harder" in chinese (poyun audiobook) seems to be helping. I listened to an audio drama today instead, just whatever my recommendation gave me (a crime solving BL which is the genre I'm comfortable in), and since it's an audio drama I definitely know at LEAST 95% of the words. I hear a few unknown words per minute, and when I look them up they're usually what I vaguely guessed when listening (so words I've read but struggle to recognize in listening). Since audio dramas are nearly all dialogue, I understand almost everything (i miss a few details per 5 minutes since theres still a few words I dont know and don't look up). I am not even paying attention, just letting it play as I scroll reddit ToT. I still understand almost all. So I think my quick-understanding speed is improving for more words. Poyun still feels equally hard lol, I catch dialogues mostly and then it's hit or miss if I understand descriptor paragraph's main idea when listening to the audiobook. But just listening to Poyun, while multitasking and just listening-in when I can focus, seems to be helping. So that's awesome! Maybe my test in a month will be if SaYe is clearer to me by then.

2. If you're a beginner learning Chinese, I again recommend dongchinese.com's Pinyin guide and tone pair drills. I'm begging you to spend a couple hours going through it. If you watch cdramas, even if you're watching with english subs, the ability to HEAR a word and type the pinyin into google translate app or Pleco app quickly for the translation is SO USEFUL. Early on, its useful for picking up new words and remembering them. But even now, as I'm listening to audiodramas, the skill of looking stuff up by pinyin as a beginner helps SO much now. I can hear unknown words in audio and instantly hear what pinyin I should type (zhi or zi or si or j or zhe or zha are very clearly different to my ear) and I'm used to expecting most words to be 1,2, or for phrases 4 hanzi long (so 1-4 initial-final pinyin pairs), with most words being 2 hanzi long, so if I hear an unknown word I can quickly identify WHICH 2 sounds are the new ones I just heard and look up the unknown word. These basic recognition skills get developed early on as a beginner, as you look up words and get used to the common patterns, and as you start reading and notice beyond the common 1 hanzi words, just how many are 2 hanzi.

3. If you're learning chinese and don't have the benefit of cognates with a language you know, chinese is still a bit "easier" to guess new words at a certain point. For reading, it's the multi-component hanzi which allow you to start guessimg rough pronunciation and meaning, and the 2 hanzi words which allow you to start guessing meaning is the 2 hanzi combined or perhaps related to the meanomg of the 1 of 2 hanzi you already know. With listening... there is also a benefit. Say you hear xiangfa - xiang think, fa method, you can guess it has something to do with thoughts or ideas or trails of thoughts. Xiang is a common verb so you probably already know it, or can guess it's THAT xiang based on context of a scene, and fa is also a fairly common word so you can guess it might be That Fa. It means idea. So guessing "thought" would be close enough to undersrand meaning. (And of course seeing it written 想法 thought+method xiangfa easy to see hanzi meaning and then guess idea or something close).

4. I'm hoping the comprehensible input/ALG suggestions of a LOT of comprehensible input actually help me with speaking tones. Even though I did tons of explicit study, which ALG thinks "damages pronunciation"... but I didn't actually speak much yet. At a certain point (around a year imto learning?) I stopped studying tones of new hanzi and words and just used audio in pleco or google translate (or TTS, shows, audiobooks etc) to hear how new stuff sounded if I didnt remember. Since I read a lot, so I just felt I needed to add more sound to not learn the wrong pronunciation... so idk how that will go.

[obsidianquill]

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop." – Confucius

[malevolentconfessions]

I find people who say "Because of the time period, this character is this bigoted group/bigoted towards" really annoying and sometimes mischaracterizing

Like yes it's the 1930s all the Malevolent characters will have to deal with sexism, racism, homophobia, transphobia and whatnot, which can include some degree of prejudice. But I find it really unlikely that most of the Malevolent cast will be racists, or homophobes or etc.

Especially when it comes to Arthur, who has been vocal about his very contrasting beliefs. He doesn't support marriages of convenience, he's anti-religious, after Faroe he's probably very pro for dad's taking period expected maternal roles, he hates aristocrats, he grew up angry at the status quo. So I don't think he'd actually be sexist, or whatever. I think he'd have hidden prejudice, 100% it is the 30s, and he's a middle aged man (that a lot of people see as white, and sometimes well off).

Also my friend said Parker would be sexist, transphobic or something. It was mostly jokey, but they did seem to believe it. (I'm going to talk about fanon like it's canon, cuz it's Parker, he has no canon) He's a gay Chinese man. The queer movement especially in older decades were very revolutionary and not only in queer issues. If you were an outcast in one way, you supported all the outcasts, and he's an outcast in 2

Also it's annoying cuz people like these characters and have personal issues with these bigots. Ik aside from what I said, it did hurt to hear those things cuz I like those characters

I do like internalized bigotry, it's usually in stories and self acceptance and character growth and it's relatable

Yeah in general I think it's pretty obvious that many of the characters in malevolent would be pretty progressive for the time, and failing that, simply too busy to care (antoine there's no time for us to care that you're gay, kayne is going to kill us all)

[haveyoulistenedtothisalbum-poll]

Tracklist:

The Art of Parties • Talking Drum • Ghosts • Canton • Still Life In Mobile Homes • Visions Of China • Sons Of Pioneers • Cantonese Boy

Spotify ♪ YouTube

[thebirdandhersong]

???? something something deep discomfort with body image is it generational?????????

[flipflops007]

画一半发一下

[peepersponies]

Oh guys she's SO pretty 😭😭😭 She's amazing. I love her so much. I thought I understood the appeal of BJDs before I held her but actually I had NO idea. I just adore her, I want to dress her up and carry her around with me everywhere.

One thing I wasn't expecting is that she's HEAVY!! She feels so solid and nice to hold!! And also she stands up really nicely on her own, which is always something that amazes me about BJDs.

I'm so excited to do her faceup :') I don't know how I'm going to decide on what it should look like....

[rigelmejo]

Okay so 33 hours listened to Chinese so far, since starting my experiment to listen to as much Chinese as possible. Some thoughts:

The strategy I used for novels, kind of also works for audiobooks. It is: read/listen to something 'hard' and look up words at least every 5 minutes (so maybe 5-20 words looked up per chapter), re-read/relisten a few times, go to next chapter. Then read/listen to something slightly less hard, and it should feel easier than it did prior to doing this. So basically you are gradually moving up the bar of what is 'easy' for you to read/listen to. I did this in reading with Mandarin Companion graded readers, then I moved up to Tian Ya Ke, Zhenhun, and a pingxie fanfic Hanshe, as my 'harder' read and look things up for a while, then I went to try and extensively read Xiao Wang Zi without looking words up which was doable (but difficult). Then I read more 'harder' stuff where I looked up 5-20 words per chapter to understand main idea, and Xiao Wang Zi became easy to read for both the main plot and most details without looking words up, and stuff like Zhenhun became doable to read extensively (but difficult). That's basically been my reading strategy to push up my reading level - read something 'hard' where I need to look up key words to understand the main idea, read something 'doable' where I can read extensively to follow the plot but don't understand all details, read some 'easy' stuff I can extensively understand the plot and most details in. And then gradually the unique word counts/complexity of what's 'easy' to read extensively increases.

Well, the strategy seems to be kind of working for audiobooks too. I listen to MoDu chapters which are 'harder' to understand main ideas and I look up 5-20 words an hour especially if it bugs me I can't understand them (they seem like keywords to understanding the main idea), then I re-listen to MoDu chapter a few times (re-listening to what is now 'doable' with extensive listening to follow main idea without looking up words), then I go re-listen to some EASIER audiobook and notice OH WOW this is so much easier to understand now.

I listened to a little bit of HP1 audiobook in the Fall, since the audiobooks are all free on Libby and I wanted a kids book. I remember it took intense focus to catch any details, and mostly I could only identify 'generally what scene I was listening to' since I know the plot from english. I just tried relistening, and definitely knew a MAJORITY of the words I heard. It is much easier to listen to extensively, I AM recognizing words i know quicker (which also helps me comprehend more since I'm not puzzling out if I know a word for 5 seconds a piece), and the single to 4 words I don't know in a given minute stick out to me, and it's easier to guess what they might mean. Like hearing jumang and being able to guess that means python/big snake. *I also notice how MUCH the MoDu audiobook has helped me comprehend stuff like facial expressions, appearance descriptions, talking descriptions/dialogue tags, quicker. MoDu has way more complicated phrases that deal with these kinds of things, so a kids book where they just say geze gao? Very easy to recognize in comparison. Or MoDu saying yansu de biaoqing, zhoulezhoumei versus just 'yansu de handao' in a kids story. MoDu has soooo many more complicated descriptions compared to HP1, with comparisons of nouns to other nouns, and intangible nouns/things words idea/focus/point/reasoning/abyss.

I am unsure if the strategy I have of listening to 'harder' audio is helping in the sense of lots more words to learn, lots more surrounding context to guess the meaning of more words, or if my time would be spent better listening to to 'easier' audio where I can understand almost every word.

I do think, regardless, listening to something you already know the plot of helps a lot. It helps you guess more words than you could otherwise. And some audiobooks have sound effects/music which also help a lot (you can tell the setting somewhat from that, and the mood descriptors, and sometimes the actions they're doing, which helps with guessing words).

[candy-goat]

Made some new characters for my comic that’s in the works- I mean what? Who said that? Anyway their names are Tracy and Seth, they’re very chill siblings and are band mates with Ash.

[robinsceramics]

Happy Lunar New Year! I've been making dragons to celebrate, and this is the biggest and best of the bunch. Porcelain with copper and cobalt pigment, he'll end up celadon green with blue claws!

image description: an unglazed porcelain sculpture of a Chinese dragon. Its horns, whiskers, mane, and paws are all white, and its scales are colored light green. It sits with its back and tail arched in high loops and its mouth open in a grin.

[thebleedingwoodland]

Another Work in Progress

Mooncake Maker as default replacement for Fortune Cookies Maker from TS3 World Adventures in Shang Simla, China.

As you know, Fortune Cookies are cookies originated from United States of America, which is not correct to portray cakes/cookies/pastries that are supposedly from China.

Not sure to publish it because it feels not finished yet.

In Buy Mode CAS is alright: High resolution (1024), right texture.

After click finish to exit CAS mode, it reverts to Low resolution (default EA texture is 512) and wrong texture (bad UV-Mapping) for preset 1. Other presets have right texture, but in low resolution.

So far the GeoStates (Full, half, empty states) are working.

The mesh of Mooncakes are fine.

I'm not script modder, therefore cannot remove or change functionality of default EA's Fortune Cookies lucky number and paper thing.

Happy Mid-Autumn Festival!

Mid-Autumn Festival is one of important events in Chinese calendar.

Falling on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month, it's celebrated primarily in East and Southeast Asia and is a time for families to gather to sample autumn harvests, light lanterns and admire what's believed to be the fullest moon of the year.

In 2024, the Mid-Autumn Festival, or the Moon Festival, falls on September 17. 

Mid-Autumn Festival became an official celebration in China during the Tang Dynasty (618-907 CE).

It was described as a day for emperors to celebrate the year's harvest by giving offerings to the moon and hosting a great feast.

Today, the Mid-Autumn Festival is an incredibly important family gathering – it's when "People and the moon reunite to form a full circle," as an old saying goes.

Mid-Autumn Festival is shrouded in myth. One of the most beloved – and tragic – pieces of folklore tells the story of how a woman named Chang'e became the moon goddess.

One of the biggest stars of the Mid-Autumn Festival is the Mooncake. The term "Mooncake" was first found in 1274 AD in author Wu Zimu's "Book of Dreams," and the first cookbook on how to prepare mooncakes was published in 1792.

While there are many variations of mooncakes, the most famous is the classic Cantonese version: a soft pastry filled with sweet lotus seed paste and savory salted duck egg yolk.

source: CNN

[haveyoulistenedtothisalbum-poll]

Tracklist:

Red Dahlia • Ga1ahad and Scientific Witchery • RTRT • Unidentified Flavourful Object • Meatball Submarine • Vulnerability • 与我共鳴 -NENTEN- • Bathtub Mermaid • Cerebrite • Space Colony • world.execute(me) ; • Utopiosphere -Platonism- • Painful Death for the Lactose Intolerant • YUBIKIRI-GENMAN (special edit) • Sl0t • Past the Stargazing Season • Colorful • Komm, susser Tod

Spotify (track 18 unavailable) ♪ YouTube

[wigglybunfish]

girl and her hawk, a birthday gift for my friend.

Chinese painting Gongbi on rice paper

[coquelicoq]

watching cdramas with french subtitles is the best idea i ever had. if the show is in a language i don't speak i'm already going to have to be closely reading the subtitles, so why not also use it as language practice? the subs go by so fast i don't have time to translate them internally into english, i just have to absorb the meaning without doing that (which is how it's supposed to work but i've never been fully able to do that before). AND the best part is that when i'm going about my day i'm finding that some of my internal monologue is just in french now?? i think it's because subs are almost entirely dialogue...i'm getting hours of dialogue practice without actually having to converse. it's also fun with cdramas specifically because i have by now picked up some chinese vocabulary from watching tv and i get to see how that vocabulary is translated into french. idk man i'm just having a great time.

[benjaminallhope-fulltimemind]

MY THOUGHTS ON THE CHINESE COMMUNIST PARTY And The People's Republic Of China! 🇨🇳🇨🇳🇨🇳

1. Divergence: I do not support the Chinese Communist Party and the People's as they've strayed from the path of Marx by embracing the free market and capitalism, they've also abandoned their duty of care to the people and don't deserve their position in power as it's clear they have strayed and have abandoned the people.

2. The importance of skeptical thought toward the CCP: We must not fall prey to mindless dogma and interrogate how we and our fellow brothers in Marxism-Leninism practice and act. We shouldn't swallow and promote PRC propaganda or defend surface level lives. Only by interrogating and keeping a level of healthy skepticism can we improve the movement both at home and abroad. Simply and blindly defending the actions of people who share our beliefs regardless of circumstances or evidence doesn't help us.

3. Don't bow to the west even as we criticize our allies: don't take my words as an admission that I simp for western capitalism or America, simply put I do not like America despite being born a citizen of the nation and I absolutely hate capitalism with a passion. capitalism is deeply flawed and inherently destructive. So please don't try and hit me with that fake leftist or fake communist shit just because I don't aggressively defend the People's Republic of China and their actions. You can be critical of Communism and clean communist regimes while being a communist.

4. Debate and discussion: If you see this post and you have thoughts and comments please reblog and comment if you have thoughts, I want to start a discussion and see people talk about this even if it gets messy. Have a great day everyone and I hope you all see this.

[qilingxiong]

finally my 3.5 years of chinese study has paid off and reached its ultimate purpose: i can comfortably and (relatively) quickly read fics now