A crash Chinese course by NBC's Al Roker

This is a clap during the Beijing Olympics and in this crash class you will find something you may already be familiar with, say, Pinyin (tone) and still can learn something new:



wǒ shì ...(我是...) =wǒ jiào... (我叫) =My name is...
wǒ shì:
wǒ jiào:
Obviously, it's just a way to introduce. wǒ(我) means 'I','me', shì(是) is just 'is','am', or 'are' in English.

wǒ yào(我要)...=I want...

As you can see or guess, yào(要) means 'want'. For example, you can say: wǒ yào nà (that) běn shū=I want that book. Here, 'běn(本)' just plays the role similar to 'piece' as in 'a piece of paper'.

tīng bù dǒng(听不懂)=I don't understand.

Actually this is different from I don't know. Say if some is speaking Chinese and you have absolutely no idea what she is talking about, you should say 'tīng bù dǒng(听不懂)', as Al in the clap. In fact, some of my American friends find this a useful way to refuse to answer questions:)
wǒ è le(我饿了)= I am hungry.




Read more...

Add Post To:

'Hello','Thank You' and 'Good Bye' in Chinese

Today we will learn some most frequently used sentences in Chinese with the following clips. Some of them are elaborated, but some are not, so I hope my explanation will help a bit.

For xiè xie (谢谢, Thank You) you might notice that for the second 'xie' there is NO tone. It is because in oral Chinese, when the word is composed of two exactly same characters, the so-called 'light tone' applies on the second one. This is the same as bà ba (爸爸, father) and mā ma (妈妈, mother) as mentioned in previous posts.

There are many ways to respond to 'xiè xie', as in English,such as 'You are welcome!', 'It's all right!'.

bù(bú) kè qi (不客气):
This has great interpretation in the clip. Notice again, though 不 has the fourth tone originally, here (and you can also listen to the man in the clip) the second tone is what we usually pronounce. Normally it's because when two four-tone characters are together, the first one changes to the second tone--just because it sounds not that awkard.

méi shì er (没事儿):

Formally, méi shì (没事) will be enough, which literally means 'There is nothing', showing that what I have done for you is no big deal--Yes, a sign of eastern humility. Also, I guess the last 'er' part may confuse you since it does NOT look stardard anyway. Well, Ture! But it's one element of oral Chinese, especailly in northern China, to make people sound more natural and fluent. There are some, but for now let's just remember this one.

bù(bú) yòng xiè (不用谢):
It literally means 'no need to thank'.

zài jiàn (再见):
This is so commonly used, yes, it means 'Good bye!'

Read more...

Add Post To:

Counting numbers in Chinese

I remember when I started to study English counting numbers seem to be a useful way since you can almost immediately increase your vocabulary by more than 10 words in just several minutes! That is encouraging! Do you feel the same way if you can count numbers in Chinese?


Read more...

Add Post To:

How to say 'I LOVE You' in Chinese?

Do not recognize Chinese characters? That's fine! Let's blurt out Chinese first!

From now on, 'Daily Bite' will introduce a series of useful sentences denoted by Pinyin. I hope in this way you can gradually accumulate more Chinese in the sense that you can actually speak!


Even Valentine's day will only come in about 2 weeks, but I guess it might take a longer time to speak this correctly, so I just post this at this 'early' stage. So do you want to know how to say 'I LOVE YOU!' in Chinese?

In case that you may forget how to follow Pinyin to pronounce them, try the 'Pinyin Pronunciation' under the 'Useful Link' to practise.

As you may already see, the 3 characters just match the 3 English letters perfectly and their mearning is just obvious.

Below is a video of a Chinese song 'Say Love Me' (shuō ài wǒ) with Pinyin subtitle. Thus, even you don't know what it actually means, you can follow the singer (Jolin ) to sing this song with the help of Pinyin! Want to try that out?

CC's Note:

1. There are some typos in the lyrics of the video at (0:31/3:44), where the last one should be 'jing' instead of 'jiang'. At (0:38/3:44) 'gon' should be 'gan'. One minute later(1:30,2:46/3:44), the 'ning' is 'ming'.

2. The singer is Jolin Tsai. Well, in Pinyin, this 'Tsai' is 'cài'.

Read more...

Add Post To:

Pinyin-tone

Writing does not help too much here, so I will keep it simple:

1. 4 tones in Standard Mandarin:



2. It's something like this:

Read more...

Add Post To:

Three role models

Before we officially get started, I would like to share with you some people who can speak perfect Chinese with English as their native language. You might not need to be as good as them, since maybe half of that is way more enough, but at least it shows that it is absolutely feasible to make it. OK, now let's check them out:

1. 大山(dà shān* Lit: Big Mountain)-Mark Rowswell
There should be no doubt that he is the most famous and popular foreigner in China but I believe less than 0.001% of us know that his real name is Mark Henry Rowswell! Back to 20 years ago, he was the first foreigner many Chinese people had ever seen. Many people (including me), watch his program to study English. You can have a look at how he speaks Chinese just with the finger tip. Below is his performance in a 'solo Xiangsheng'(单口相声, one kind of Xiangsheng), a style similar to talkshow, with the aim to send audiences laughters:


2. 陆克文(lù kèwén)-Kevin Rudd
He is definitely the one who speaks the best Chinese among prime ministers or presidents (of course, I deliberately rule out President Hu Jintao:). He has the academic background in Chinese and has done some profound research back in university. Below is his speech in Beijing University in 2008:



3. 江喃(jiāng nán)-Jonathan Kott
To be frank, I was deeply shocked when I first saw his TV program because I have never seen a foreigner who can speak Sichuanhua (Sichuanese) so well. I am from Sichuan, a beautiful province in Southwestern China, and I have to admit that the first responce that my friends and I had when we knew such a guy is like crazy, especiall when things that come out of this guy's mouth are in your local language. Here is a clip:



I hope you can speak better Chinese than them someday! Enjoy!

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
*: This is Pinyin spelling which we will come to soon.






Read more...

Add Post To: