- Chinese 101 (Simplified characters)

今年我很想参加今年汉语水平考试。巴塞罗那的孔子学院还没公布今年考试的日期但是我已经学习。我希望CFC的华人要帮助我练习汉语。

Spoiler :

This year I really wanna take part in the HSK exams of this year. The Confucius institute of Barcelona still has not announces the dates of this year's exams but I'm already studying. I hope CFC's Chinese people will help me to practics Chinese.

 

你好！ 欢迎在CFC中文101。 这里，人人可以学习汉语。 好运！

Spoiler :

Nǐ hǎo! Huānyíng zài CFC zhōngwén 101. Zhèlǐ, rén rén kěyǐ xuéxí hànyǔ. Hǎo yùn!

Spoiler :

Hello! Welcome to CFC 中文 101! Here, everyone can practice his Mandarin! Good luck!

本主题主要集中普通话， 但也可实行其他方言。

Spoiler :

Běn zhǔtí zhǔyào jízhōng yú pǔtōnghuà, dàn yě kě shíxíng qítā fāngyán.

Spoiler :

This thread is primarily focused on Mandarin, but other dialects can be practiced as well.

 

Ni Hao!

 

你好！
ni hao (Mandarin)
nei hou (Cantonese)
di ho (Hokkien/Taiwanese)

Minor nitpick on the title (justified as this is a language learning thread), it should either be:
(1) 学习孔子的语言 (normal)
or:
(2) 学习孔子之语 (more formal)

 

谢谢你！

Spoiler :

xiexie ni!

Spoiler :

thank you!

 

Always wanted to ask a chinese speaker if this video is accurate:

In this german video the moderator explains that scientists believe that early humans communicated with a kind of music language, where the tone carried the meaning. He then introduces chinese as an example and asks a street performer to tell the story of 'Mr Su who wanted to eat lions' in german first and chinese second.


Link to video.
The german narration starts at 0:50 and the chinese translation at 1:16.
To my ears he's only saying su su su su su su su su su su...

But is it true? Does he really say something sensible?

 

Yes, he is. Mandarin is a tonal language, which is in this case handy as Mandarin is full of homonyms. As you are aware, he is constantly mentioning the number ten and lions, but of course it doesn't help that in Chinese both 10 and lion are both spelled in pinyin as ”shi“. Chinese speakers thus use tones to destingiush the two in conversation, with the "shi" as in number 10 (written in Chinese as &#21313 pronounced as if it were in a question sentence, while the shi as in lion (written as &#29422 is pronounced as a continous high singing note. Chinese speakers also do not use tones to denote question sentences or exclamations, as in English, but use words instead (for example, 吗　pronounced as ma - without any tone - denotes a question sentence in which a yes or no answer is demanded).

Considering the video was about the common origins of language and singing, the choice of the example in the video made quite a lot of sense.

By the way, this was what he cited. It's actually quite a famous tongue-twisting poem in China. Most native Mandarin speakers would probably have trouble pronouncing as well.

Spoiler :

施氏食獅史

石室詩士施氏，嗜獅，誓食十獅。
氏時時適市視獅。
十時，適十獅適市。
是時，適施氏適市。
氏視是十獅，恃矢勢，使是十獅逝世。
氏拾是十獅屍，適石室。
石室濕，氏使侍拭石室。
石室拭，氏始試食是十獅。
食時，始識是十獅，實十石獅屍。
試釋是事。

Spoiler :

Shī Shì shí shī shǐ

Shíshì shīshì Shī Shì, shì shī, shì shí shí shī.
Shì shíshí shì shì shì shī.
Shí shí, shì shí shī shì shì.
Shì shí, shì Shī Shì shì shì.
Shì shì shì shí shī, shì shǐ shì, shǐ shì shí shī shìshì.
Shì shí shì shí shī shī, shì shíshì.
Shíshì shī, Shì shǐ shì shì shíshì.
Shíshì shì, Shì shǐ shì shí shì shí shī.
Shí shí, shǐ shí shì shí shī, shí shí shí shī shī.
Shì shì shì shì.

 

Isn't the gag that Classical Chinese is unpronounceable in Modern Mandarin? Not that this kind of issues exists now.

 

Thanks. The second spoiler is exactly what I heard.

 

我學過德語和漢語。這個視頻的例子不太好因為這個著名詩誇大文言文的特徵。現代漢語和文言文雖然都是聲調語言，一位母語者也許不要聽得懂這個詩。這只是一個為了譏諷文言文被一位現代作家寫的詩。

Spoiler :

I studied Chinese and German. The example of this video is not very good because this famous poem exaggerates the characteristics of classical chinese. though modern Chinese and classical Chinese are both tonal languages, a native speaker perhaps won't understand this poem. This is only a poem written by a modern author in order to mock classical Chinese.

不能發音的？有的唐朝書說明那時候的發音。文言文的發音對現代母語者肯定有一點難，但是他們只需要習慣它。

Spoiler :

Unpronounceable? Some books from the Tang dynasty explain the pronunciation of that time. The pronounciation of classical Chiense certainly is difficult for native speakers, but they only need to get used to it.

 

That one would need to be taught to pronounce it suggests just that. Keeping in mind that unpronounceable is more a relative term than an absolute one. I could teach you to pronounce Hanyokrokusumo but until such a time as I did, you wouldn't have the slightest idea how to pronounce it.

 

你說了不能發音的，你沒說難發音的。現代母語者需要學文言文的發音因為文言文是一個死語。拉丁語是一個非常容易發音的語言但是它也是一個死語。由於拉丁語滅亡了，你需要學發音拉丁語，但是它的發音在客觀上很容易。

Spoiler :

You said unpronounceable, you didn't say hard to pronounce. Modern native speakers need to learn the pronounciation of classical Chinese because classical Chinese is a dead language. Latin is a language easy to pronoubnce but it's also a dead langugae. Since Latin went extinct, you need to learn to pronounce Latin, but its pronounciation is objectively easy.

 

"Unpronounceable" is usually used in the sense of it being "hard to pronounce". Unless we're assuming that Chinese people can vocalize noises I literally can't.

 

Link to video.

DAFUQ?

 

How do I write "ching chong wallah wallah bing bong" in chinese ?

 

我是个臭王八蛋。

 

Oh my god that's so awesome

 

Add oil!

 

Aww it was an insult. Mr Chinaman is sensitive today..

I just wanted to know a funny phrase.