爬中文山

Today marks exactly 3 years from the day I signed up for my first Chinese course, studying Beginning Chinese. I’ve studied at least an hour, pretty much every day since then. I made a video of me speaking to record my progress. Still cannot speak very fast, but I’m not reading from a paper or anything, just trying to speak from my mind. Feel free to point out any mistakes or problems.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eL30qb3HLY4

Thanks to this post about improving sentence structure https://www.chinese-forums.com/forums/topic/62960-improving-sentence-structure/page/2/#comment-492407

, I've decided to do the Kubler Intermediate Spoken Chinese book. I purchased the Kubler Basic Spoken and Intermediate Spoken at the same time a few years ago. I finished the Basic and Basic Practice years ago, which I loved:

but never got around to the Intermediate Kubler books because I wanted to move away from Pinyin. Well, now I've embarked on the Intermediate Spoken and Spoken Practice Book.

However, after getting through part of the first unit of Intermediate, I had this nagging feeling that I should re-do the audio drills of the Basic book. I decided to revisit them and go through them at a fast clip, just the audio drills and the translation role plays. I've already finished half of this basic review. I can't decide if I'm wasting time or it's a good check of the foundation. I'm hoping to get through it is quickly as possible, and get back to the Intermediate. I guess about an hour and a half a day for 5 more days should do it.

A while back I watched a unit in YoYo Chinese upper intermediate video course where they went to a restaurant in Beijing and ordered duck. Just for the hell of it and to go somewhere I haven't been, I emailed them and asked for the name of the restaurant. They wrote back telling me it was 青年餐厅( qīngnián) Fēngtái branch and the other day I finally got around to taking the subway down there. Turned out to be EXCELLENT roast duck! My wife is not a fan of duck, so I got a half all to myself. 半只 was 118块, not the cheapest, but not terribly expensive either. Service was great. I also had a little win moment in that I did all the ordering for myself and my wife, including some adjustments and requests - all the while the waitress did not once ask my wife for any clarification, confirmation, or even look her way?. It also reminded me that I don't go for duck often enough. So now I'm going to make it a point to try as many duck restaurants in Beijing as I can and see which one I like best. I already passed by a random one in a Hutong near 东四 and tagged the location in my phone, so that will be next.

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I've spent 10 days reviewing all the audio drills and role plays in the Basic book. Now time to start the Intermediate book, which feels Hsk 4-5 ish to me. Last night while I was doing the last of the Basic book's role plays (by myself, out loud) my wife came over and peered at the screen. She was very surprised to see that what I was speaking aloud was actually a role-play written in English. She thought I was reading a conversation written in Chinese from a book, and said that my translations sounded really good. She is not one to hand out empty compliments either. I also found that after all the drills, it is very easy to translate the English in the role plays and feels very natural. So I'm psyched to get going on the intermediate! 

My game plan is to do the book on my own, one 课文 a day, around 5 days a week. I am also doing other stuff simultaneously ie. graded readers, listening, classes, so I can't do more than one 课文 a day. Each 课文 will entail a number of steps:

1. Listen to the conversation

2. Listen and repeat the audio 生词 and sentence build ups

3. Read the notes and grammar explanations

4. Do the Substitution drill - book open

5. Do the substitution drill at least 2 more times- book closed 

6. Do the Transformation drills in the same manner (ie. at least 3 times)

7. Do the Role Plays out loud playing both characters, repeat until smooth, repeat again following day as a warm up to the next 课文

8. Do the Listening Comprehension exercises

9. Do the Translation exercises

From Intermediate Spoken Chinese:

(edit) Tues Sept. 5th:

After having gone through 2 课文 I've decided to split it each 课文 over 2 days , like this:

Day 1:

1. Listen to the conversation

2. Listen and repeat the audio 生词 and sentence build ups

3. Read the notes and grammar explanations

4. Do the Substitution drills - book open

5. Do the Transformation drills - book open

Day 2:

1. Do the Substitution drill - book closed (until mastered)

6. Do the Transformation drills - book closed (until mastered)

7. Do the Role Plays out loud playing both characters, repeat until smooth (repeat again following day as a warm up to the next 课文)

8. Do the Listening Comprehension exercises

9. Do the Translation exercises

Which means I'll be spending some time with it, and doing the audio drills at least 6 days a week.

(edit)  Sept. 13th:

Took longer than I expected to get the drills and role plays somewhat smooth. Just finished the first Unit of Intermediate (unit 11), which took me around 10 days.

I was so glad to finally finish this book last night. I started working on the book some months ago and made slow progress, as I was only doing around two pages a day. My pace wasn't so much about lack of motivation, just that I was working other resources at the same time, rather than focusing on only one. When CNY hit and I had some days off, I vowed to finally do the book as it was designed , which is 1 unit a day. I still had 12 units to go at that point. I did my best, but each unit ended up requiting 4 hours and it took me a month to to get through those 12 units. Most days I put in 2 hours on it, there were days I did 4 hours and I skipped a few days altogether. It was an absolutely exhausting activity: 

1) Read the word 汉子 and English (once in a while the pinyin if I needed to doublecheck)

2) Read the English sentence and work out how I'd translate it into Chinese

3) Read their sentence in 汉子，compare to mine

4) Read their sentence few more times (and maybe the English again)

5) Say their sentence without looking until I could do it correctly and fluently - sometimes aloud, sometimes silently

6) On to the next word or sentence, each word had 1-3 sentences

*There are also some exercises and mini-tests and supplementary info, which I also did/read.

**100% of this was review for me, none of the words or structures in the book were "new" to me, other than around 150 incidental new words(non hsk or hsk 6+) that I added to my srs

Sometimes it's hard to know if something is effective or not. I do feel like I was nailing a lot of sentence translations and if not, I was getting the most important parts right. It really forced me to think about the sentences structures and compare them to the English way of saying things. I feel like lately I'm spitting out better and and better sentences. Is that from this, or one of my other resources, or watching TV in Chinese, or my mother in law staying with us over the holiday, or a combination of it all? Who knows.

I'm going to take a break from Hsk for the time being and work on some other things that are Hsk 5-ish, but not actual Hsk materials.

Finally finished Growing up with Chinese just before the new year. Glad I never have to look at it again to be honest.

I also tracked down a recent video from "Mike" 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44i7rygeWnc&lc=Ugym_GTr8qvjsclGksJ4AaABAg.9y3gqn74miU9y8TEP_3vZ4

His Chinese is sounding very good.

I've switched up my language learning schedule several times over the years, I'm really enjoying my current routine(somewhat influenced by Matt vs. Japan/AJATT). It's also simple to  follow:

1/3 time spent on textbook - currently Hsk Standard Course 4 and CME 4

1/3 time spent on reading (including videos where I read all hanzi subtitles line by line) - currently 奋斗 tv drama and Du chinese

1/3 time spent just listening - currently "Free to Learn videos", Native YouTube videos(on topics that I'm familiar with)

Other: 3-4 italki classes per week, Srs Flashcards, real life 

Been really looking forward to this roadtrip, setting off tomorrow morning. Tentative(very much just penciled in), trying to stick mainly to smaller cities. Route looks like this:

First stop Datong 大同, around 4hrs drive.

Day 1: 北京-大同

Gorgeous day for driving! Rest stop in 河北， and some rest stop Chinglish

Walking around 大同古城 (old town). City walls are re-built, but still has a really nice vibe. Everyone we talked to today was really friendly, different accent from Beijing. People are much more surprised at me speaking Chinese than in BJ. Actually, they seem friendly in a way that's aiming to make tourists feel happy in their city, not a bad thing at all, just my feeling.

Day 2: 大同 - 太原：

Absolutely beautiful weather at the Yungang Grottos. Definitely a place worth visiting. Interestingly on Trip Adivsor all the comments say you cannot take photos in the grottos, but this is certainly not true anymore(all the comments seem to be pre-covid). Caught a bit of the 山西 section of the Great Wall on the top of the mountain, couldn't get much of a shot from the moving car. Hear a lot of fangyan when the locals are talking amongst themselves, not even recognizable words. A local 山西 beer.

Completed this book in record time(for me), about 5-6 weeks cover to cover. Felt like an accomplishment as there is zero English or pinyin, and I was able to follow the analysis of all the questions and answers pretty well. This was all review, as I've already taken the HSK 4, though I learned some new vocab that was used for question analysis. My rationale in doing this book was just more repetition or sentence structures and vocab usage. I did 5 complete listening tests, plus 2 hours of audio breaking down listening questions into categories like "place questions", "attitude questions" etc. Also read every tape-script. 3.5 hours of audio with this book. Completed the writing section as well with broke the questions down by grammar type and included 6 practice tests with answers/sample answers. Not the most exciting book in the world, but certainly some good review. 

Next up is HSKK Intermediate. This will again be review, as I've already taken and passed the HSKK Inermediate. However, I took the speaking test with almost no specific test preparation, so I think this will be even more useful for when I take the HSKK again along with HSK 5 test sometime in the future. Over 4 hours audio with this book, and I'm looking forward to hearing the sample speaking answers/photo describing. I'm going to try and knock this one out in the same amount of time, around 5-6 weeks. 

Along with this, I'm still working my way through Kubler (on unit 15 of 24).

Current study schedule:

1. Kubler Intermediate Spoken and Practice

2. HSK 1-4 Vocabulary Master

3. HSKK Intermediate

Fun:

Chairman's Bao

《幸福的方向》 (kind of sappy soap opera, but language is easy enough to follow quite well.

Random Youtube videos

Various books

A nice milestone tonight: Finally finished the 5 book series of Chinese Made Easier. I started Book 1 with a teacher 5 years ago, the book was recommended to me by the school as being good for someone living "in country" and wanting practical everyday language. The series definitely lived up to that reputation. There is lot's of crossover with HSK books, but CME has plenty of vocab that is very useful in everyday life, but outside the HSK material. The overall level feels similar, CME 5 feeling roughly like HSK 5, with a more practical bent. The book did an excellent job of slowly weening off pinyin and a particularly good with introducing Surnames and given names - new ones in every story, adding up to a lot over the course of 5 books.  There is no "小明“ or ”马克“. Lots of place names, jobs, household items, office, countryside, medical etc language. The author was kind enough to supply all of the pdfs and mp3s free of charge, as the book is out of print. I did book 1 to 4 straight through but took a year break while doing different resources before starting book 5. Altogether it's been about 5 years, all done with various tutors, so it feels like an accomplishment to finally have finished. Tonight, on the last unit of book 5, I couldn't help but noticing how much smoother I was than even Book 4, let alone Book 1. Thank you Martin Symonds for an excellent and fun Chinese learning series!

**I have added a few more observations in the comments section below...

I made a video practicing for the speaking test:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kJR0dg2xiWk

I really enjoyed practicing part 2 and 3 and think I will do more of it in the future, whether specifically for the test or even just as something to practice talking about. I did two hours of it with a tutor on Italki last night and the time flew by. Seems that although I "know" all the vocab and grammar of Hsk 4, I don't readily produce it?.

Well, I took about 10 days break from studying Chinese while the virus news started breaking. However, over the last week, I've resumed studying.  I'm still somewhat distracted and finding it harder to focus. Partially because of the virus and partially because I've temporarily left China, in S.E. Asia at the moment. But, I'm with my wife and mother in law, so there's still plenty of Chinese spoken around me. I've doing a lot of Chinese podcasts and other online study material. I probably did about 3 hours worth today. I have been keeping up my Skype lessons with my teacher, who lives in Hubei. She looks totally normal, but I still worry for her and feel sorry for her that she's locked down in her house. I think she enjoys doing the lessons though as something to keep her busy.

 I'm going to really try and take advantage of having no work this month and do as much Chinese study and practice as I can.

Day 22:

https://journaly.com/post/31255

Day 23:

https://journaly.com/post/31315

Day 24:

https://journaly.com/post/31341

Day 25:

https://journaly.com/post/31401

Day 26:

https://journaly.com/post/31438

Day 27:

https://journaly.com/post/31469

Day 28:

https://journaly.com/post/31494

Day 29:

https://journaly.com/post/31547

Day 31:

什么让你紧张？What makes you nervous?

https://youtube.com/shorts/sup6hTC0qXY?feature=share

练习口语的问题挑战，第12天。 30 day speaking challenge, Day 12. 

Out for beers, no time to make a long video

Hit another milestone as I finished the last Chinese Breeze Graded reader tonight. Started the first one back when I had just started learning characters and remember really struggling to read it. Got the next level and probably let them sit on the shelf for a long time, read one, let them sit, read one, etc - reading is something I always have to really force myself to do. The last level (4) was kindly given to me by Chinese Forums member Becky82 and I breezed through them (pun intended) very quickly and easily.

21 books in all, 4 levels. The green ones I already gave to another learner after I finished them. I have to say that although the stories are a bit cheesy, I quite enjoyed reading most of them. There is no question that they are excellent practice for Hanzi, vocab, grammar, listening and even some culture. Also love the illustrations! I'm going to pass them on to Chinese Forums member TaxiAsh when he visits Beijing at the end of this month.

. T

Now on to some Intermediate Level Sinolingua Readers I bought...

My wife was busy doing something and asked me to cook. I said ok you instruct me something (in Chinese, of course) and I'll do the footwork. So I made these 2 dishes, nothing complicated, but they turned out damned tasty! 

1)String beans 豆角儿 

cubed Beef 牛肉块儿

potatoe 土豆儿条 ?

green onion 葱

garlic 大蒜 ?

oil 油

oyster sauce 蚝油

soy sauce 酱油

cooking wine 料酒 ?

sugar 白糖 

salt 盐?

Thirteen aroma 十三香

2)Water spinach 空心菜,

garlic 大蒜 ?

green onion 葱

soy sauce 酱油

red pepper that I have been drying for months 辣椒 ?️

oil 油

salt 盐?

I happened to be near Beijing Foreign Studies university today and saw there was a bookstore， so I popped in for a look. They had loads of Chinese study books, graded readers and so on. I need more resources like I need a hole in the head but I couldn't help myself. I can NEVER have enough listening, so I picked up 汉语听力系列教材( hanyu tingli xilie jiaocai). I assumed intermediate level but was surprised to see:

Elementary 上 = hsk3

Elementary 下 = hsk4.

Intermediate 上and下 comprises hsk 5

So I took the hsk 4 one for now and the hsk 5 for later. These have downloadable mp3s by scanning the QR code.

I also bought Short-Term Listening and Short-Term Reading, again Elementary corresponds to Hsk 4(Elementary sounds so low ?). This came with a CD of mp3s, so I will have to go to a copy shop and get them to put it on a usb for me.

Finally, I took a sort of Hsk4 dictionary 词汇学习手册 and a book of cloze practice for Hsk4 words. Altogether ran me 165 块. Not for dust collection, I will finish them all ?

I've achieved a big milestone recently. Up until the last few months my significant other(a native) would never speak mandarin with me. When I first started, I pushed it but she wouldn't budge. I let it go and decided not to push it anymore. Still had her mother to speak Chinese with.

As I've improved, expanded my vocabulary, grammar etc, I casually - even accidentally would slip in some mandarin and she kind of naturally started replying in mandarin. It has happened quite naturally. Lately she's even been starting conversations with me in Chinese sometimes. Also, if she says something in English to me that I want to hear in Chinese or that is well within my understanding, I say "再说一遍“, she's a good sport about it and says it again in Chinese. Other than that, I'm still not pushing it. I also don't bother her with grammar questions and the like. 

Right now I suppose it's 25 percent Chinese 75 English, but a huge change from zero. I'm sure as I continue to improve my skills the percentage will shift further.

练习口语的问题挑战，第16天。 30 day speaking challenge, Day 16. 

https://youtu.be/bWMfLw5UQRs

The project I am starting now (inspired by Imron's  https://www.chinesethehardway.com/article/train-what-you-want-to-learn/  ) is to record myself speaking about a topic freely - no reading, no stopping/starting Audacity and no editing out mistakes. I may record several times to listen for mistakes i can catch myself and trying to improve on it, choosing the best of the lot to post. I will try first to speak for one minute and gradually increase it. My aim is to improve my fluency, speed, pronunciation, grammar and vocab speaking about a topic. That being, for me, the most difficult aspect of learning Chinese.

I am going to post these on my blog to motivate me to keep doing this activity and maybe get some useful feedback as well.  Although I realize listening to a Lower Intermediate level 老外 is not a joy - feel free to listen if you feel like it and give any kind of feedback if you like.

Here goes, topic #1 慢跑 / Jogging

主题 慢跑.wav

I just completed all of HSK 4 and 4+ Flexi classes on LTL. 100 classes total, I did them all in about 3.5 months, basically a class a day almost every day. It was somewhat review, as I have already taken and passed the HSK 4, but I wanted some extra speaking practice with limited new vocab. I'd say LTL runs a little harder than the HSK levels though, and I ended up adding at least 400 words to my SRS from those classes. I left a lot of words on the table for later as well. It was good speaking and listening practice with many different teachers, some I liked a lot and a few I didn't care for. Buying 100 classes comes out to exactly 8 usd per 1hr class, and you have six months to use the credits. Pretty hard to beat the price. The pdfs that accompany each lesson are excellent and do not really really follow the HSK format too closely. Lots of lessons on technology , "modern" and interesting topics. The "Free Speaking" classes need to be re-worked in my opinion though. Overall it was well worth it. Now, as I start working on HSK 5, I will go it on my own for a while and may do the LTL HSK 5/5+ flexi classes down the road.

I hand an off hand compliment last night. I was at a 湖南饭馆 last night. I was sitting around a corner kind of out of the way. at one point, I called out 服务员， the waitress instantly stopped and looked around for who was calling her. She turned to the guy sitting at the table behind her and asked him what he needed, he said he hadn't called her. She did the same with another customer. I then called her again and she made eye contact with me. This was a small victory, because when I first started, I could never seem to get a response from saying 服务员, last night the waitress thought it could have come from a native speaker?

OK, this is barely cooking, but so delicious. Had this home 烧烤 a few days ago. The beef was sent frozen and vacuum sealed as a gift from my wife's friend in Guangzhou. She sent it to us to have during the impending BJ lockdown...which never happened - hooray! 

Due to my work schedule, I had to take a lesson with a different teacher than my usual one. She was friendly enough, but she did this common teacher thing that I find so irritiating: go through the vocab list before studying the unit and saying to me: "给我一个句子“。 I fail to see the point of me making a completely random sentence, with no context using 往返票 ， 决定，etc。 I tried to explain to her that this was a useless activity. In the end I said lets just spend the rest of the lesson chatting. Pretty much a waste of a lesson. For the life of me I cannot see how a teacher thinks making a random sentence, with no prompts or anything to give you ideas, is a useful learning method. ?

Had to give up on 人世间 for now. Too difficult for my level. Dongbei hua and the length don't make it any easier. Decided instead to watch 我的青春谁做主 -My Youthfulness (2009). This is the second series of the "Youth" trilogy 奋斗，and 北京青年 being the first and third. Have watched the first two episodes, there are 32 in total. I'm watching it on my 小米 wall projector, so it's not very convenient to stop and look up words. That's my goal for this one, just to watch it and get what I get.