Yes, this is fun.

[mangosteen]

As some of you know, I'm taking first-semester Elementary Chinese. As the university sees fit to partially pay me in product, I might as well get my money's worth. Right now, we're up to lesson 3, which pretty much feels like they hauled us up to the top of the roller coaster and we're just starting to drop. Screaming will likely commence shortly.

That is to say, the class has just switched into high gear, and the pace has picked up considerably... two hours of study for every hour of class isn't just a good idea; it's necessary for survival. This has forced me to resort to.... drastic measures.

For example, for remembering that the same word that is used for a pronoun can be a possessive pronoun by context, I ended up with:

D: "Luke, wo3 shi4 ni3 ba4ba!"
L: "bu4!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Alternately, for those whose browsers can deal with it:

D: Luke, 我是你爸爸！
L: 不！！！！！！！

In short, I'm having insane amounts of fun. The syllabus indicates that we'll know 320 characters by the end of this semester. I will note that you need 1500-2000 characters to be functionally literate. Hence, "insane" and "fun".

Note: If any of you out there want a Chinese-writing penpal with the literacy level of the average 2 year old (who has been lovingly put in the speed-aging tank), drop me a line.

Back to studying.
zai4jian4 (再见）

Comments

[nisaa.livejournal.com]

I don't know how to make my computer make Chinese characters, or else I'd say, yes, I'll be your pen pal. I'm taking a class in Chinese Medical Terminology, which also happens to be Introduction to Conversational Mandarin, or so it seems.

I recognized the character for "bu" that you wrote :) And I figured out what you wrote, even if you didn't have the D and L. Hee hee. This could be fun!

Mostly, I'm learning the characters for Yin and Yang and the elements. Hmm . . . the character for "qi" could be "the force".

[bookly.livejournal.com]

D: "Luke, wo3 shi4 ni3 ba4ba!"
L: "bu4!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Thank you. My brain hurts now.

I'm taking Intensive Intermediate Chinese 1 this term. Insane amounts of homework, and I didn't attend the second half of Intensive Elementary Chinese 2 last term (talk about insane), but I seem to be managing OK so far. Let me know if you want to exchange emails in pinyin, or show me how to set up my computer so that we can exchange emails in han4zi4.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Let me know if you want to exchange emails in pinyin, or show me how to set up my computer so that we can exchange emails in han4zi4.

Me too!

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

And what does "zai4jian4" look like in actual characters? And what does it mean? (Seeing as I can't paste it into Sherlock...)

(I was going to say, "heck, this is what Sherlock comes back with for my query in Chinese." But I can't because it seems to have died a horrible death on me...)

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

And what does "zai4jian4" look like in actual characters?

再见

And what does it mean?

Literally, "see you again". Idiomatically, "goodbye".

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

Ah so. Thank you.

[lillilah]

I took Chinese while in college and loved it. Certainly my favorite language.

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

Say, what are you using to input characters? I've been looking for a good method.

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

I'm pretty sure he uses a Mac, which has really good built-in support for all sorts of international text entry and display. My Chinese co-worker said that the Mac's support for Chinese text entry was much better and more sophisticated than the Windows equivalents.

再見 (The second was the closest I could find that matched your character above, 见) when using the Pinyin entry method. I hope I haven't just seriously insulted your mother...)

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

Oh, it took me about 5 minutes to turn on and start working on inputting the characters. zai4 came up immediately, once I stopped trying to type it as zia4, but, as noted, jian4 didn't come up with one that perfectly matched your example. So I picked the one that looked closest. :) )

[r-ness.livejournal.com]

You got the unsimplified character, while I got the simplified one.

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

Ah, I think that I was using traditional Chinese Pinyin, as opposed to the various simplified Chinese entry methods, none of which said Pinyin in their names. (There's about six different traditional and three different simplified Chinese entry methods in Mac OS X.)

[mangosteen]

The three methods I have access to on my Mac are:

1. pinyin entry
- it works, it's accessible, but it's slow).
- most systems have built in frequency tables, to make good guesses as your most likely character.


2. Wubi Xing
- it works, it's very fast, but requires intimate knowledge of Chinese stroke order and radicals
- In short, a subset of radicals is mapped to the QWERTY keyboard, and you type in combinations of them (representing different amounts of strokes) to get a single character. Typically, you are typing no more than four letters to get to any character, and occasionally less.
- One can get up to around 160 cpm with it, but like I said, it's hard.

3. Wubi hua
- It's a stripped-down version of Wubi Xing, using only the numeric keypad, but a given character code can match tens of characters. Still faster than pinyin, though.

I'm using pinyin entry right now, but Wubi Xing is way too cool to ignore.

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. Still on 10.3?

[mangosteen]

Nope. Currently running 10.4

[whitebird.livejournal.com]

Hrm, I have

Simplified Chinese:
ITABC
Wubi Xing
Wubi Hua

Traditional Chinese:
Hanin
Cangjie
Jianyi
Dayi(Pro)
Pinyin

(This by looking in the International preferences pane.)

[mangosteen]

See my comment to whitebird further along in this thread.

[hissilliness.livejournal.com]

Skimming my friendslist, I found myself trying to parse "Luke, wo3 shi4 ni3 ba4ba!" as l33t speak. I just thought you should know that.

[mangosteen]

...thus proving the eternal truism that one man's l33t-speak is another man's roman-alphabet encoding of an asiatic language's pronounciation and tonality.

[armandae.livejournal.com]

Chat to luckdr4g0n - he is also studying elementary chinese ;p

not my ling fam - i do altaic

さよなら

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

*waves at you*
*is the partner of docorion's you met at the art festival thing and recognized from Arisia - the Very Short girl*

I took Mandarin in ninth grade.

Unfortunately, I was simultaneously taking French.

See, I'd requested Mandarin as my language elective, with French as a backup if I couldn't get in. One of my other electives ended up filling up, though, and I ended up with Mandarin fourth period and French fifth.

Made for a hell of a brain-shift walking from one building to the next between fourth and fifth.... *shakes head like an Etch-a-Sketch*

Because I am a masochist, I took both languages again my sophomore year, that time on purpose.

Anyway. Hi. *nod*

[mangosteen]

Hey there! Rest assured that I remember you. :)


I took Mandarin in ninth grade.
Unfortunately, I was simultaneously taking French.


Heh. I'm recalling my morning routing of the past few weeks, where I'd end up exposed to 3-4 languages before noontime, and didn't hear any substantial amount of English until around 12:30pm.

When I really get into heads-down mode studying Chinese, I forget how to speak and spell in English.... the words just don't come out. Now, I know that this means that I'm genuinely learning the language and that new neural pathways are being burned. It's disconcerting all the same. :)

Good to hear from you!
If I may ask, how did you find this posting?

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Rest assured that I remember you. :)

Keen. :)

Oh. Um. That is a good thing, right? *hopeful look*

Heh. I'm recalling my morning routing of the past few weeks, where I'd end up exposed to 3-4 languages before noontime, and didn't hear any substantial amount of English until around 12:30pm.

Wow. What else are you up to?

When I really get into heads-down mode studying Chinese, I forget how to speak and spell in English....

I'm scarred by learning too many languages. :) There are words and phrases that just come out primarily in languages other than English now, that I have to think about to say in English. Strawberries are fraises; if curious, I ask "Was ist?"...

It's interesting to actually feel the new neural pathways being created, isn't it?

If I may ask, how did you find this posting?

docorion visited this weekend; we were talking about the people I'd get to know when I moved to Boston, and he mentioned that the Speaker To Mundanes I'd met had an LJ. This was the first post on your page (first public post, anyway), and I felt moved to comment, given the memories it brought back of Madam Wu's class...

So. Hello. :)

[mangosteen]

Oh. Um. That is a good thing, right? *hopeful look*

Yeah. You certainly seemed like good people. :)

As for what else I'm up to, well, there's:

1. Dance Dance Revolution in the morning for the daily aerobic exercise (mostly Japanese pop songs)

2. The Israeli hip-hop/funk CD I've repeatedly been listening to in the car on the way to work (entirely in Hebrew)

3. The Chinese class

4. And then I end up at work, likely not talking with anyone until later in the day.

It's interesting to actually feel the new neural pathways being created, isn't it?

Yup. More importantly, I'm learning what it feels like, and I'm recognizing it as such. For me, at least, it's the vague feeling of anxiety as I'm learning. It has gotten less pronounced as I'm now more persistent at learning languages.

docorion visited this weekend; we were talking about the people I'd get to know when I moved to Boston[...]

That would imply that you're moving to Boston.
Well, then! Do go on... :)

[shadesong.livejournal.com]

Yeah. You certainly seemed like good people. :)

Excellent. You too. :)

1. I want DDR, but Tom and my husband Adam (yendi) make growly noises. Fie upon them, I say. Fie.

2. *perk* Shiny. (Raised Jewish. Only person in the family who's retained any Hebrew.)

More importantly, I'm learning what it feels like, and I'm recognizing it as such.

Are you bouncing off the walls geeking out about it? :)

That would imply that you're moving to Boston.
Well, then! Do go on... :)

Ah, yes! We're moving in with Tom, actually. Soon as my husband gets a job up there (we're currently in Atlanta). I am currently in the headspace of having made this Important Decision, and having the bright and shiny future spread before me, and just noooot being able to get there quite yet. So there's a mixture of excitement/glee and gnashing of teeth. I'm so ready to go NOW. :)

I could talk forever about that, though...