Bill (比尔) » Chinese

Difficult Hanzi

Bill — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 05:30:55 +0000

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View on Flickr: 20091206_123925_IMG_2465

I recently took a look at the characters I’ve been having most trouble remembering and was surprised at what I found. Since starting to work my way through the Heisig method for remembering the Hanzi, I’ve been amazed at how easy it has been to remember some seemingly complex characters. So it struck me as strange to realise that the characters below are the ones I have most difficulty memorising.

Those of you not familiar with the Heisig method for learning to remember Hanzi Characters may want to take a look at some of Greg’s excellent posts on the topic over on his Mandarin Segments blog.

贯 – to pierce

One of the problems I face with 贯 is that I’m often replacing the 母 (mother) with 女 (woman). When recalling the image associated with this character, I don’t have a problem visualising the pearl earrings hanging from pierced ears. However, I’m not able to make the distinction between woman and mother. Perhaps this image would be more memorable if it weren’t the ears that were being pierced.
省 – to economize

This character is made up of two components, 少 (few) and 目 (eye). I often substitute these component parts for 小 (small) and 口 (mouth) respectively. I’m not too sure how, but somehow I think Mikey (from Monsters Inc.) needs to get involved in resolving this confusion: fewer eyes and all…
升 – metric liter

I can’t blame anything other than a lack of attention to detail for getting this character wrong so often. I’m forever confusing it with similar characters such as; 什 and 仟. But, a second glance at the character 升 reveals the 十 (ten) which is often associated with the metric system. Now all I have to do is somehow link this with a measure of liquids. Can anyone else see the ‘fl‘ in there? I know fluid ounces isn’t a metric measure, but you can’t have everything can you?
同 – same

For some reason, I regularly confuse this character with 如 (be like), 肖 (resemble), and 若 (as if). Show these characters to a native speaker and they’ll remark how completely different they are. To me, this highlights one of the shortcomings of the Heisig method; the dependence on a single keyword for the meaning. Look any of these characters up in the dictionary and you’ll find a far more descriptive explanation of the meaning. Fleshing out the stories for each of these characters with details from the dictionary definitions has helped resolve the difficulties here.
均 – equal

When writing this character, I find myself forgetting to include the 土 (ground) on the left. Without this, we are left with 匀 (uniform), which whilst not dissimilar in meaning, is in practice a separate character. Again, resorting to a more complete dictionary helps resolve the confusion. 匀 can also mean ‘even’, which can be considered as a grouping of two, i.e. an even number. So, all I need to do is to make an outrageous statement like, “For everyone in China to be considered equal, their land must be divided evenly, with each couple sharing an even plot of land.”
切 – to cut

With this character, I’m always getting the relative sizes of the components wrong. I have a tendency to write the 七 (seven) much larger than the 刀 (knife). To solve this, I just have to remember the seven tiny teeth on the large kitchen knife I’m using to cut my way through everything in sight.
越 – to surpass

This is another one of those characters where I have trouble remembering the relative sizes of the components. On the left we have 走 (to walk) and on the right we have a primitive component (not actually a character itself) meaning parade. I’d imagine that if two parades are trying to surpass each other for recognition, the participants are going to be more concerned with walking than they are with enjoying the parade. Walking is therefore formost in the minds of all involved, and also foremost in the character 越.

From this simple exercise I’ve realised two things I need to improve on as I progress through the book. Firstly, the more vivid the image associated with each character, the easier it is to remember. This is especially true for characters where the keywords have similar meanings in English. Secondly, when struggling to form that perfect image for a problematic character such as those listed above, turn to a dictionary. Very often, the subtleties in meaning help clarify the image you have formed.

我们包饺子

Bill — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 23:36:31 +0000

Relatively speaking, we had a rather quiet Chinese New Year celebration here in North West London. Not a single firecracker was heard (although I did see mention of fireworks in West Hampstead on Twitter).

We spent the evening making 饺子 (jiǎozi) or dumplings, a traditional new year’s dish in the North of China. Making dumplings is a relatively straightforward process. But, best of all, is that on surprisingly little food, you can easily end up feeling incredibly stuffed.

Anyway, here is how we made them. Although these are the best set of dumplings we have made yet, we are still yet to perfect the shape. For some reason I the traditional dumpling shape has proved elusive, with not one of the batch looking as it should. However, don’t let that put you off. With dumplings, it’s all about the taste.

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2889

Prepare all your ingredients; pork mince, chinese leaves, vegetable oil, Sichuan pepper, salt, spring onion, ginger, and of course the dough (three small bowls of white flour mixed with one small bowl of water).

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2913

Finely chop the Chinese leaves with a heavy knife. Don’t slice them, but chop them by bringing the knife down hard on a chopping board. This YouTube video shows the technique used to chop tomato.

Don’t be tempted to use a blender here. For some reason it just isn’t the same. Besides, there is something quite satisfying about the thud of such a heavy knife.

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2915

Once the Chinese leaves are chopped, squeeze out the liquid and retain. You will need some of this later.

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2929

Heat the oil in the pan and then add the Sichuan pepper. Fry until the pepper just starts to darken and then remove the peppercorns from the pan (chopsticks help here). Remove the pan from the heat and allow to cool.

Add the pork to the pan, along with the ginger, salt, and spring onion. Stir in the Chinese leaves and add just enough of the juice from the leaves to bind the mixture.

There is no need to cook the filling.

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2956

Roll out as many dumpling skins as you can into 7-8cm disks. Use just enough flour to prevent these sticking to the surface or the rolling pin.

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2957

Fill with a generous amount of filling before pinching the dumplings closed with your fingers. Ensure that they are sealed tightly so that they will retain their full flavour during cooking.

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Photo by Bill Glover

View on Flickr: IMG_2963

Boil a pan of water and add the dumplings to the pan. When the water returns to the boil add a cup full of cold water to the pan and allow it to return to the boil. The dumplings are ready when you can just start to see the filling through the skins.

Tip: cook the dumplings in batches of no more than 20 to prevent them sticking together.

Remove from the pan, drain and serve with a splash of rice vinegar.

Feel free to share photos or tips in the comments. I’m particularly looking forward to any comments on how to shape the dumplings correctly, a technique that I have spectacularly failed to pickup on every visit to China yet.

风油精 (FengYouJing)

Bill — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 15:16:18 +0000

风油精 - WD40 for the human body

Intrigued by this little green bottle, picked up in a chemist in Yangshuo, I asked on Twitter what 风油精 was normally used for.

@JunkFoodJo: “Everything and anything.”
@Mal_Asian: “It’s pretty much a cure all.”
@MrYap: “A WD40 for human body parts.”

It turns out that this isn’t too far from the truth. Amongst the uses for 风油精 are:

cure for headaches
cure for dizziness
cure for gas
treats nausea
treatment for stomach ache
ointment for bruises
cure for a blocked nose
pain killer
treatment for insect stings
treatment for mosquito bites

A quick look at the wiki entry on Baidu reveals the following additional uses (electronic translation used):

deodorant
cure for blisters
can be used on mouth ulcers
cure for a sore throat
to help you sleep
to remove self adhesive lables
to help remove correction fluid that has spilt on the table

It would seems as if this truly is a magic potion, but the jury is out on whether this can be taken orally or not. Some suggest you can, others suggest you can’t. Personally, I’m not going to try it.

Many thanks to: @JunkFoodJo, @Mal_Asian, @MrYap, @VeggieInLove, and @Puerhan for contributing on Twitter.

Have you used this magic green potion? Is there anything it can’t cure. The comments are all yours.

Jack of all trades, master of none

Bill — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 10:38:27 +0000

You’ve probably all heard the saying “Jack of all trades, master of none” before, but if not, you probably have a good idea what it means. However, the following equivalent sayings in Chinese might require a little thought.

Mandarin (Simplified):
门门懂,样样瘟
mén méndǒng ,yàngyàng wēn
All trades known, all trades dull
Mandarin (Traditional):
樣樣通,樣樣鬆
yàngyàng tōng ,yàngyàng sōng
All trades known, all trades dull
Shanghainese (Simplified):
三脚猫
sān jiǎo māo
A cat with only 3 legs
Shanghainese (Simplified):
万宝全书缺只角
yīwàn bǎo quánshū quē zhǐ jiǎo
An encyclopedia with one corner missing
Cantonese:
周身刀,無張利
zhōu shēndāo ,wú zhāng lì
Surrounded by knives, none are sharp

I take my hat off to anyone who can explain the cat with three legs. The full article can be found on Wikipedia: Jack of all trades, master of none

Credit to @alicialiu for finding these equivalent sayings.

Trip to China

Bill — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 16:10:53 +0000

Photos aplenty upon our return.

Discovering Mandarin

Bill — Sun, 11 Oct 2009 13:37:37 +0000

In my first ever guest post I attempt to recall how it was that I found myself learning Chinese.

I cannot remember the moment I decided to learn Chinese. It was not one of those decisive moments where I said to myself that I was going to learn a new language, it just kind of happened.

I managed to leave school (and university) in stereotypical British fashion, speaking only one language, English. Despite dabbling in Latin, Sanskrit, and to a greater extent Classical Greek, I wouldn’t consider myself a linguist by any means. I tried French a couple of times but spent more time outside the classroom than in and consequently never made much progress. So why Chinese?

You can find my post in full, along with some other great content for Mandarin learners over on Discovering Mandarin.

Marlboro on NeochaEDGE

Bill — Sun, 04 Oct 2009 14:51:48 +0000

I’ve recently discovered NeochaEDGE, a site which describes itself as “a daily-curated, bilingual website and discovery engine dedicated to showcasing leading-edge creative content and emerging youth culture in China.” I wouldn’t claim to be an avid follower of emerging youth culture, but I have discovered a couple of great music tracks on the site, the first of which is Marlboro. Many thanks to @ajschokora for highlighting both NeochaEDGE and Marboro.

Artist’s Profile: http://www.neocha.com/Marlboro

Watch CCTV on your Mac

Bill — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 13:12:46 +0000

I missed the 60th anniversary celebrations of the Chinese Communist Party for two reasons; the first being that I was in bed, and the second being that we don’t have CCTV (China Central Television) at home. CCTV 9 (China’s official English language channel) is available worldwide. In the UK it is available on Sky as part of the package of free-to-air channels. Unfortunately we don’t have Sky TV so we are forced to try and watch online. Nice try, but unfortunately the CCTV website is very Mac unfriendly and none of the plugins required to watch the video (even with Firefox) worked. If you are on Windows you will probably have more luck.

60th anniversary celebrations aside, without access to the full range CCTV channels I was missing out on a valuable source of real Chinese language to help me learn in my quest to learn the language. I’m sure I am not alone and so I’ve put together a quick guide to watching CCTV online on any platform.

If you haven’t got it already, download and install VLC (http://www.videolan.org/vlc/)
From the File menu select Open Network
Enter the URL of the channel you want to watch (see below)
Press “Open” and wait while the video starts playing
Press Command+F to watch in full screen

Channel	Category	URL
CCTV 1	general	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv1
CCTV 2	finance	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv2
CCTV 3	arts, entertainment	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv3
CCTV 4	international (cn)	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv4
CCTV 5	sports	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv5
CCTV 6	movies	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv6
CCTV 7	children, military, agriculture	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv7
CCTV 8	tv series	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv8
CCTV 9	internation (en)	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv9
CCTV 10	science, education	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv10
CCTV 11	chinese opera	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv11
CCTV 12	society, law	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctv12
CCTV News	news	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctvnews
CCTV Children	cartoons	?
CCTV Music	music	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctvmusic
CCTV HD	high definition	mms://cctv-live-cctv1.wm.llnwd.net/cctv_live_cctvhd

You can find more information on CCTV on Wikipdea (thanks to qimet888). If anyone knows the address of the HD streams for each of these channels or the address of the Children’s channel, please share them in the comments and I’ll update the table.

Labelling the House

Bill — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 06:14:52 +0000

Something I should have done a long time ago is to label everything in our flat in Chinese. Alicia was out quite a bit over the weekend and so I took the opportunity to run around the flat labelling everything in Chinese. She came back last night and just laughed: “You forgot 镜子 [jìngzi], mirror.”

In doing this, I’m under no illusions that I’ll somehow memorise all these words without actually making an effort. The aim is to prompt me to use the words in daily conversation. I’m also hoping they’ll act as a prompt for Alicia so that she knows what she can and can’t say to me in Mandarin. Whenever I’m put on the spot and asked to “说中文！” I struggle to know what I can say. By placing prompts around the house I’m hoping that I can work some Chinese into my daily routine and not find myself stuck wondering, 说什么?

Do you have any tricks for working Chinese into your daily routine? I’d love to hear them as I desperately need to work on my spoken Chinese ahead of our trip in October.

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Chinese Lesson: 然后 v.s. 以后

Bill — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 08:18:07 +0000

Last Monday I tweeted the following sentence as part of my contribution to #MandarinMonday:

There are a number of mistakes in this sentence which were quickly corrected by @GraceLee0806 and others. At this point, I really should say a big thank you to all the native speakers and Mandarin teachers who help out on Twitter.

Many of these mistakes were silly and would have been caught if I had reviewed my Tweet before posting, however one mistake bugged me: I could find no explanation for using 然后 instead of 以后. And so, I did what I usually do (but don’t recommend) in these situations and skipped over it in the hope that I’d remember it again another day.

Skip ahead to Wednesday and my Chinese class. We were running through a quick review of recent vocabulary by forming a couple of sentences with each of the words in question. And, sure enough, up came 以后.

下课以后你打算做什么？ [xiàkè yǐhòu nǐ dǎsuàn zuò shénme?]

And then I realised that if I had been asked to make the same sentence without being given 以后 as a starting point I probably would have said:

下课然后你打算做什么？ [xiàkè ránhòu nǐ dǎsuàn zuò shénme?]

Thinking back to the correction made by @GraceLee0806, I asked what the difference was. When should I use 然后 and when 以后? My teacher thought for a minute and then said 都可以。然后，以后差不多。 They are similar. But as to which one to use, the advice was to use the one that “sounds better”. This is not so useful if you aren’t a native speaker, but having given the same answer to my wife on numerous occasions, I was prepared to let this one go and just accept it as a “because it just is” moment. The lesson continued.

But a few minutes later, my teacher stopped and went back to the subject of 然后 v.s. 以后: It had clearly been bugging her. She came up with the following suggestion:

She stressed that this was not a grammatical rule as such, more of a rule-of-thumb. But, I’m OK with that. Where there appears to be no logical explanation, I’ll settle for a rule-of-thumb over “it just is” any day. And so we set about testing her theory by coming up with examples which led me to come up with the following sentence.

婚礼以后我们都先吃婚菜然后跳舞。 [hūnlǐ yǐhòu wǒmen dōu xiān chī hūn cài ránhòu tiàowǔ.]

And so there we have it, the difference between 以后 and 然后 in one sentence. I am sure there are numerous exceptions to this rule, but this was a start and I was happy. It is exciting when things fall into place. It may be simple for some, but it was a light bulb moment for me.

Have you come across any exceptions to this rule, or do you have a different way of remembering when to use 以后 instead of 然后? I’d love to hear them in the comments.