# Forum Other Languages All other languages Chinese  Let's practice our Chinese

## Pravit

你好。 我叫Pravit。 我会说俄文。俄文很好。 我学中文。 我是中国的人。 我在北京工作。 我会写中文。“人民画报”很有意思。 共青团很好。 我是共青团的人。 我喜欢共青团。 
ni2hao3. wo3jiao4 Pravit. wo3hui4shuo1e2wen2. e2wen2hen2hao3. wo3xue2zhong1wen2.   wo3shi4zhong1guo2de1ren2. wo3zai4bei3jing1gong1zuo4. wo3hui4xie3zhong1wen2. "ren2min2hua4bao4" hen2you3yi4si3. gong4qing1tuan2hen2hao3. wo3shi4gong4qing1tuan2de1ren2. wo2xi3huan1gong4qing1tuan2.

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## Pravit

Come on, someone talk with me in Chinese. I'm lonely.   ::

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## JJ

Ni hao ma? Wo shi JJ, wo shi rossia(?) guo ren. Xie-xie.
That's almost all I can say in Chinese.   ::

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## Pravit

The word for "Russia" is "e guo." The "e" is pronounced with 2nd tone. 
Maybe noone responded to me because I used some vocabulary you usually wouldn't learn. Here is vocabulary:  俄文 Russian language -e2 wen2
俄国 Russia -e2 guo2
人民 - people - ren2 min2
人民画报 - The People's Picture Magazine - ren2 min2 hua4 bao4
共青团 - Communist Youth League - gong4 qing1 tuan2 
To JJ:
If you want to say your name, you can also say this: 我叫 (name)
wo3 jiao4
My name is....  我姓 (last name)
wo3 xing4
My surname is....(remember, in China, people are usually adressed by their last name)  张先生
Zhang1 xian1 sheng5
Mr. Zhang
This was the title used before Communism. It is now returning to regular use.  张小姐
Zhang1 xiao3 jie3 (xiao2 jie3)
Ms. Zhang
Polite title for women in use now  张同志
Zhang1 tong2 zhi4
Comrade Zhang
This was the title used earlier, but now it is old-fashioned sounding. In Taiwan and Hong Kong, the word "comrade" has now developed a double meaning of "homosexual." "tong" means "the same." "zhi" means "will"(earth and heart). People of the same will are comrades, or...

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## Propp

你好!
Ура! Я нашёл альтернативную программу для печати иероглифов! http://uk.geocities.com/BabelStone1357/ ... elPad.html 
你写你是中国的人.
I thought you were Thai. Or Somali prince.
However, таец, китаец... almost the same in Russian.  ::   
你也写 "我是共青团的人".
我想你不知道,共青团这是什么.

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## Pravit

As I said before, we are everywhere  ::  There is a large population of Chinese in Thailand who speak "Dae Jiu"(dialect of Southern Min).  
I'm not really in the Communist Youth League, but it was one of my vocabulary words this week, and I thought I would use it   ::   ::   
你们会这儿念“人民画报” http://www.china-pictorial.com/chpic/htdocs/index.html
也有俄文
人民画报很有意思 
我从朋友哪儿来... 
By the way, I learned today Russian word "Kitai" is derived from some Mongol word for northern Altaic peoples...

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## squidward

Ni hao, wo jiao Greg ("Tong Zhi.") Wo xue zhuengshung Zhong Wen. Wo xue zuengshung Ewen. Ni jiao shemne mingzi?

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## squidward

How do I type in Chinese?

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## squidward

Tong zhi has been my nickname for a long time b/c I'm Russian, so my friends call me Comrade or Tong Zhi now.... 
My friend is from China, so we all made each other funny names in Chinese. My one friend is "Shu ma" (water horse) and my other friend is "Mi mao" (honey cat). It's just interesting...
yes my life is that crazy   ::

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## Pravit

If you have win XP, it's really easy to enable Chinese support(I'll make a new topic on it). If not, you can still do it, but it gets a little harder. 
Most of what you said was understandable but I didn't get "wo xue zhuengshung zhong wen." "xue" is a verb meaning "learn" - "wo xue zhong wen"  - I'm learning Chinese. "Xuesheng" is a "learn-being" or a "student." Wo shi zhongwende xuesheng." I'm a student of Chinese. 
As for your friend's nicknames, I think they are rather pretty. I don't really think nicknames make life that much crazier, for instance, my nickname(among some) is "White Chocolate" and another guy I know is "Fooles."

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## maraone

Hi,everybody,I am Chinese too  :: 
I am a beginner of Russian Learning, so nice to meet you guys!
I speak Mandarin,Cantonese,English,French,and now try to learn Russian.
你们好,我来自中国广州,我是俄语初学者,请多多指教,谢谢!

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## JJ

> I speak Mandarin,Cantonese,English,French,and now try to learn Russian.
> 你们好,我来自中国广州,我是俄语初学者,请多多指教,谢谢!

 Ni hao and nice to meet you! You're in a right place to learn Russian, I'm native speaker and I can help you. BTW, I'm going to study Mandarin so may be I'll need your help soon.  ::

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## Pravit

> Originally Posted by maraone  I speak Mandarin,Cantonese,English,French,and now try to learn Russian.
> 你们好,我来自中国广州,我是俄语初学者,请多多指教,谢谢!   Ni hao and nice to meet you! You're in a right place to learn Russian, I'm native speaker and I can help you. BTW, I'm going to study Mandarin so may be I'll need your help soon.

 YAYYYY!!!! Now we have a Chinese expert who can help us, and another Chinese learner! Rejoice! 
My wordcount has unfortunately been sitting at 222 for quite a while(Jasper's count staying at 130 made me lazy), but I htink I will start picking it up again. If I hadn't been really getting back into guitar playing then I would ahve more time for Chinese...

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## Propp

你们好 again, my 朋友们!
Since we have a true Chinese expert, may be he can help me a little.
Maraone: what's the difference between 
下边, 下面, 下头,
上边, 上面, 上头,
里边, 里面, 里头,
前边, 前面, 前头,
后边, 后面, 后头,?
Or are they used in absolutely any cases without any difference?

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## maraone

Hi Propp,
    Actually,generally speaking,these words can be used in the same way without causing any confusions, only a little bit difference. Let me take some examples:
     他在楼下边/面/头等你.  He is waiting for you downstairs.(In this case,"边/面/头" make no difference,but "头" is more informal than first two ones)
     好戏在后头.  The climax always lies in the latter part.(In this case,people only use "头", because it is a proverb with fixed form) 
ok,hope that can help you in your Chinese learning.

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## maraone

> Ni hao and nice to meet you! You're in a right place to learn Russian, I'm native speaker and I can help you. BTW, I'm going to study Mandarin so may be I'll need your help soon.

 Wow,so good!!! I can help you learn Chinese,and you may give me a hand in Russian learning  ::

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## Propp

> Hi Propp,
>     Actually,generally speaking,these words can be used in the same way without causing any confusions, only a little bit difference. Let me take some examples:
>      他在楼下边/面/头等你.  He is waiting for you downstairs.(In this case,"边/面/头" make no difference,but "头" is more informal than first two ones)
>      好戏在后头.  The climax always lies in the latter part.(In this case,people only use "头", because it is a proverb with fixed form) 
> ok,hope that can help you in your Chinese learning.

 Yes, especially the last one.  ::

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## Евгения(Женя)

Правит, вы говорите по-китайски?

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## Pravit

Вы правы, сударынья, правильно сказать, что Правит говорит по-китайски. Если Вы интересуетесь китайским языком, Вы можете его выучить в этом приличном форуме.  Здесь только пристойные джентельмены.  
Кстати, если Вам не трудно, пожалуйста перестаньте называть меня на "Вы." А мне все эта формальность слишком удушлива.

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## Jasper May

Hey, you shouldn't blame her for saying 'вы', after all, it is very hard to find out how old you are (seeing how secretive you are of your age and how mature you act).

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## Pravit

I just told her I was 16 in another thread. And not to call me "vy."

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## Евгения(Женя)

I'm sorry, I forgot.  Are you Chinesse? Is Chinese your native langauge? How many languages do you speak?   ::

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## Jasper May

I know what Pravit's going to say, so I'll say it for him, just in case:  :: 
English - fluent
German - very good
Russian - good/very good
Thai - few words
Japanese - few words
Chinese - 222 characters
Korean - the syllabary
French - _bad_
Dutch - Ik heb eene tandarts notig
Spanish - out of principle, bad 
Did I miss anything?  ::  In other words, he knows three languages well. 
[edit:]Oh yeah, and he is Thai, lives in America but prides himself for having a Chinese background.  ::

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## Pravit

Hey, my French isn't that bad. I would rank it under German which I'd rank under Russian. Last year I was 3rd in the state for the French National Exam, so hush(I just like joking about my French being really bad). It's Japanese I know next to nothing about.  
As for my Chinese background, the only ancestor of mine that was Thai was my the father of the mother of my grandmother. Which makes me around 6.25% Thai and 93.75% Chinese. Not that there is anything bad about Thai people, but the two cultures are different. Chinese people generally maintain their culture from household to household. I'm a foreigner in Thailand too   ::

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## Jasper May

Yah well, but is that an accomplishment in America? Being the third best in French?  ::  I doubt you Americans learn French all that well...
Oh, I _did_ forget one language:
Arabic - ~300 words

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## waxwing

Jasper, do you know any letzebuergesch? moyen?  ::  
my virtual hat is taken off to you whizz kids btw.. but i bet i know more than you about ..err.. about ... nuclear physics?? Peruvian basket weaving techniques??  ::

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## Jasper May

That was a list of Pravit's accomplishments, btw.  ::  My list goes something like this:
Dutch - fluent
Afrikaans  ::  - comprehension fluent
English - near fluent
German - very good
Frisian  ::  - well, it's understandable anyway
Latin - very good comprehension, bad composition
Spanish, Italian, French - rather good comprehension
Arabic, Hebrew, Hindi - alphabets   ::  
Chinese - not telling you...
Ancient Greek - bad bad bad 
I'm sure that if you'd learn German and remember the differences between that and Letzebuergisch, Yiddish or Swiss you can understand practically anything.

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## waxwing

> That was a list of Pravit's accomplishments, btw.  My list goes something like this:
> Dutch - fluent
> Afrikaans  - comprehension fluent
> English - near fluent
> German - very good
> Frisian  - well, it's understandable anyway
> Latin - very good comprehension, bad composition
> Spanish, Italian, French - rather good comprehension
> Arabic, Hebrew, Hindi - alphabets   
> Chinese - not telling you...

 Enough already! My list:
English - weird.
French - appallingly unfluent considering I've spent 3 years living in Francophone countries
Portuguese - learnt for a few months .. survival .. managed to forget half of what I learnt.
Russian ..   ::  
Latin - two years learning the Gallic Wars by heart -> cr@p
German - atrocious. Haven't even tried to use it for 15 years.
My Perl and C++ aren't bad though  ::   

> Ancient Greek - bad bad bad

 как стыдно! . How do you expect to get a job in the modern world???    

> I'm sure that if you'd learn German and remember the differences between that and Letzebuergisch, Yiddish or Swiss you can understand practically anything.

 Eh? You lost me Jasper. 
Btw does that "you'd" = you had or you would? Something funny going on wiv dem dere conditionals.. ( 'if you would' is possible as a special construction for requests, but usually it's not right)   :: 
Seriously, if your English is 'near fluent' then so is mine ..   ::   
One more question: wtf is Frisian??

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## Евгения(Женя)

Here is my list:
Russian-Good(I will be fluent again!)   ::  
Ukrainian- A little bit
Spanish- Okay
French- none
German- none
Sign Language(ASL)- Good

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## Jasper May

> как стыдно! . How do you expect to get a job in the modern world???

 Non scholae, sed vitae discimus, eh?  ::    

> Eh? You lost me Jasper.

 Misunderstanding #1: grammar
I did mean 'you would', because you can't say 'if you had learn'. It wasn't a request. 
Misunderstanding #2: meaning
I meant that, if you know German and the differences between that (German) and other dialects, it isn't that difficult to understand those as well. E.g. yiddish for 'we' is 'mir' in stead of 'wir', the 1pl of 'to be' is 'zaynen', not 'sind' and all umlauted u's are i's. So you can understand quite easily what 'Un mir zaynen ale brider, oy, oy, ale brider' is. And if you know what 'azoy' means ('gleich') you know what this means as well 'Un mir zaynen ale shvester, oy, oy, ale shvester, azoy vi Rakhl Ruth un Ester oy, oy, oy.

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## Димон

你们好！我叫Димон!
Давненько я не был на форуме. Очень рад, что появился раздел, посвященный великому и могучему китайскому языку! The matter is that I've been studying Chineese for about 6 months at the university. I can say it's so intresting to speak more than 2 languages! 
中文很难，也很有意思！我学习了六个月的中文了。现在我会写五百多汉字。我在符拉迪沃斯托克（  娥国）住, 在东大学东方学院学习。[I live in Vladivostok (Russia), study at the FarEasternNationalUniversity, Institute of Oriental Studyies.] 
Here is a topic from my exam. Perhaps it would be interesting for some of you. Если будут какие-нибудь проблемы с переводом, буду рад помочь!   ::  
今年我十八岁。我研究中文。我们班有二十四个学生。三位老师教我们汉语语法，汉字和口语。汉字很有意思也很  漂亮。
大学生一天。我是大学生。每天都我很忙。我有很多课也有很多事儿。我的一天七点开始。早上我吃了早饭就去学  院上课。常常有三个课或者四个课。每天我们班有汉语课。我两点下课。| 下课以后我跟我同学一起去食堂吃饭。我很喜欢在食堂作的反。我们食堂不太大可是很漂亮。我们常常一起去那儿  坐一坐。| 星期二汉语老师给我们辅导。她回答我们问的问题。| 星期五我没有课。我去阅览室看报和杂志。我们阅览室的杂志很有意思。| 有时候我跟我朋友一起去看新电影。| 晚上我回家。九点我复习汉语语法，写汉字，念课文。十一点半我睡觉。 
That's enough for the first time  :: )

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## Jasper May

Ну ну, 500+ иероглифы за 6 месяцев? Даже китайцы учат медленнее этого...  ::  Я никогда не понимал, почему говорится что языки выучатся куда быстрее детьми чем взрослыми. Никогда не услышал о младенце знающем 500 китайские иероглифы, или в моем случае, 6000+ русских слов и почти* все правила грамматики... 
*Да да, почти, bad manners и VendingMachine.  ::  И их применение ещё не так свободное, знаю.

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## waxwing

> Eh? You lost me Jasper.
> 			
> 		  Misunderstanding #1: grammar
> I did mean 'you would', because you can't say 'if you had learn'. It wasn't a request.

 In that case you needed to form either a 1st or a second conditional:
1:
I'm sure that if you *learn* German and *remember* the differences between that and Letzebuergisch, Yiddish or Swiss you *will be able to* understand practically anything. 
->if + present simple, will + base form 
2:
I'm sure that if you *learnt* German and *remembered* the differences between that and Letzebuergisch, Yiddish or Swiss you *would be able to* understand practically anything. 
->if + past simple, would + base form 
I suspect you meant the latter. More realistic, in my case, would have been to use the 3rd conditional   ::   About requests, I simply meant that there are _some_ cases in which it is OK to put 'would' in the 'if' clause : _if you would be so kind as to..._. Kind of a hangover from some older form of the language I guess.

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## Jasper May

Ok, now I see the ambiguity (and appaling ugliness) of my original sentence. I wasn't paying much attention to the grammar. I _am_ familiar with English grammatical structures, you know, after all, I'm half-English!  ::  Don't you get all smarty-alecky with me, eh?   ::

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## waxwing

Hey Jasp you did kind of force my hand  :: 
Anyway you have to allow me my little Pyrrhic victories, considering how totally outclassed I am here, 'nall   ::

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## Pravit

> Ну ну, 500+ иероглифы за 6 месяцев? Даже китайцы учат медленнее этого...  Я никогда не понимал, почему говорится что языки выучатся куда быстрее детьми чем взрослыми. Никогда не услышал о младенце знающем 500 китайские иероглифы, или в моем случае, 6000+ русских слов и почти* все правила грамматики... 
> *Да да, почти, bad manners и VendingMachine.  И их применение ещё не так свободное, знаю.

 Well, I learned 222 over the course of about a month. Had I kept up the same pace, I would have certainly reached 500+ in six months. 
Dimon, I'm very excited that you are studying Chinese! I am learning Chinese by myself, unfortunately my university doesn't offer Chinese or Russian. Jasper doesn't know it, but I have been continuing my Chinese learning, disregarding learning how to write the characters - for now I'm content if I can recognize them in reading. The book I have will soon be finished and I am going to pick up another one fairly soon, I think. Да здравствует великий китайский язык! 
你有中国的先生马？我学了二百二十二汉字了。我学中文学得很慢。中文很难！
Кстати, твое маленькое сочинение было для меня очень полезным, спасибо. Было также очень забавным!! Мне кажется, что ты очень подобный другим студентам, о которых я читаю в моем китайском учебнике. Им всегда нравится ходить в столовой, и какая она красивая!  ::  После того, они всегда смотрят новый фильм. Но я очень удивлен, что ты не сказал, что тебе нравится петь китайские песни, которые Товарищ Жанг тебе научил... ::   ::   ::

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## Димон

Jasper May, thanx a lot for the comliment! The rate seems to be unbeliveable, but it's true!
Восточный Институт Forever! By the way visit it's homepage on www.vostochnik.ru 
Мы занимаемся по учебнику "Практический курс китайского языка" Кондрашевского (Russian translation of the 实用汉语课本)
And it is very, VERY difficult! Я знал, что будет трудно, но не знал, что ТАК трудно!
中文真难! Older students say that the first year is simply a holiday comparing to the real HELL of 2nd and 3rd years.
Students on the 2nd year have to learn about 150-200 汉字's per week! On the 3rd year, if still alive, they can easily work as guide with Chineese tourists... 
***********
Pravit, I see u use the same book! Какой урок ты сейчас изучаешь?
U live in PRC, or it's a joke? 
Our teacher from China don't speak Russian at all, so her lessons are very usefull for learning both English and Chineese : - ) 
And here is another topic from my exam: 
我的房子。 我们的房子不太大，也不太小。 我们房子有两个卧室，一个客厅，一个洗澡间，一个厨房。
我的卧室很小。窗户对面有一张床。床右边是我的桌子和椅子。桌子里有很多英语和俄语书也有一些中文书和英语  词典。桌子上是我的电脑。
我的卧室左边是我们的客厅。客厅很大。我妈妈很喜欢花儿，所以客厅里边有很多花儿。窗户旁边有  一个电视。
 客厅左边是我们的厨房。厨房里边有一张大的桌子也有四把椅子。我妈妈常常做好吃的菜。我们的朋友常常来我们  这儿。他们很喜欢在厨房坐。
 客厅对面是洗澡间。这个房间很大也很漂亮。
 现在我不在家里住可是我常常回家。我很想我的家也很想我的房子。

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## Pravit

We aren't using the same book, but in books, Chinese and Soviet students tend to be big fans of refectories and reading "Renmin Huabao" in the library...  ::   ::   ::  I am using Beijing University's "Modern Chinese: A Basic Course." 
I don't really live in PRC. Maybe I will go there someday. 
I'm really tired right now, so I'll read your thing later.

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## Jasper May

> Jasper doesn't know it, but I have been continuing my Chinese learning

 Waah! Jerk! That's not fair!
Though I must say, I've also been learning a lot more Chinese up till now. I know 220 hanzi as well. In effectively two weeks.  ::  Nananananaah.   ::   ::  I'll just do my Latin essay and watch some German movies, then I'll continue with Chinese. Just you wait, you backstabbing Thailanderman!  ::

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## Jasper May

Could you good people check these sentences, please?  要是想买好书, 就二十块钱多半儿会不够  我们星期六晚上六点钟在"东南"酒楼外头见 
谢谢!

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## maraone

> 要是想买好书, 就二十块钱多半儿会不够 
> if you wanna buy good books, these twenty yuan will  not possibly be enough. 
> 我们星期六晚上六点钟在"东南"酒楼外头见 
> we will meet outside "Southeast" restaurant  at 6 o'clock saturday night.

 Jasper, je Chinees is heel goed   ::

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## Jasper May

::  Someone posted in the Chinese forum!  ::   ::  He can speak Dutch?   ::    哪儿的话! 我的中文真不太好, 因为我学了就一个月的汉语. 可是我感谢你检查.  ::

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## maraone

> 哪儿的话! 我的中文真不太好, 因为我学了就一个月的汉语. 可是我感谢你检查.

 wow,你说的中文蛮有味道的嘛,才学一个月就有这样的效果,可喜可贺! ：） 
如果你有什么关于中文学习的问题,我很乐意提供帮助.也希望你能帮助我学习俄语  ::  
I am so glad to help you guys with Chinese Learning problems.

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## Jasper May

谢谢! (or is it considered impolite to acknowledge compliments?) 我很希望学了一年的二千字 in order to sit the HSK-exam. Maybe just wishful thinking.  ::  
Btw, 你怎么会说荷兰话? 你在荷兰住吗?

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## maraone

用"谢谢"回应别人对你的称赞是很合适的. 只要你下了功夫去学习,相信你一定会顺利通过HSK考试的,先预祝你成功!  :: 
我只会一点点荷兰语, 不过我以前学过德语,两者之间还是有不少相通之处  :: 
我住在中国南方的广州市(Guangzhou or Canton),你知道这个城市吗?广州是广东省的省会城市,人口超过600万,而广东全省人口超过600  0万.广州人在生活中一般讲当地方言-粤语,但是在正式场合都说普通话. 
希望以上的资料能帮助你学习中文,就当作小短文来阅读吧.  ::

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## Jasper May

@Димон: Пожалуй, тебя больше не будет, а я хотел бы сказать что давеча я снова постарался читать твоё сочинение, и мне удалось.  ::  Спасибо! Было очень интересно.  
@maraone: 虽然我看不懂十分你小小的正文, 可是谢谢. Maybe in a couple of months.  ::

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## Pravit

Haven't bothered to read most of your conversation. I'm still in learning Chinese, it's just that at present I'm at a lack for good books. My new book, "Teach Yourself Chinese", reached the point where they give you pictures of a house and then give translations of various household objects. Boring! There's no way I'm going to remember 200 or so words for "toaster", "toaster oven", "microwave", "DVD Player"... From then on they have such interesting chapters as "Exchanging Money" and "At the train station." Blech. I think I'll just have to order something good online.

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## Jasper May

I've also looked through that book, and I've noticed it doesn't even teach you characters...  ::  Well, what's the point in that? As if I'm ever going to meet a Chinese in person. I just want to be able to read and write. 
Hope you start again soon, Pravit. I've also been very busy and banned from doing my Chinese, but now I'm back!   ::

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## Roderick_Glossop

Try this one: http://www.chinawestexchange.com/

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## Pravit

Thanks for the link, Roderick. It always surprised me that there were so many good courses on the net ready to teach people basics of Chinese, whereas for other languages you'd be hard-pressed to find something similar. For instance, there is almost nothing like that for Arabic.

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## Sean

我也学中文。我喜欢学中文。 Pravit，你学中文和俄文。你很慧。你学也语言？我也学日本文。

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## Pravit

Hi Sean,
I've been lazy and can't be bothered to pick up my Chinese books. But I understood what you said. In high school I learned German and French for four years. I don't plan to do anything with French but I'm going to continue studying German in university and get a double major, perhaps. There's Chinese courses being offered next year at my uni but the time always conflicts, I'll try again in the spring semester. I'm still really interseted in learning Chinese and I might go somewhere else to study it.

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## Jasper May

Ah, my kingdom for some spare time...

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## shibo77

我是中国的人。
(I) (am) (China) ('s) (person).
I am China's person.  
One usually says: 
我是中国人。
(I) (am) (Chinese).
I am Chinese. 
中国人 -Chinese is one unit by itself. 
意思 yi4si3 
It's actually: 
意思 yi4si5 
si5 is a neutral tone.
-------------------------------------------------------- 
My list: 
Chinese (Simplified/Beijing Guan): Native
English (American Heritage): 10 years
French (Larousse): 9 years
Arabic (Modern Standard/Riyadh Najdi): 1year and continuing next school year 
Self-study:
Esperanto: understand, working on speaking
toki pona: fluent 
-Shibo

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## CaMieyLaAa``--

> Ni hao ma? Wo shi JJ, wo shi rossia(?) guo ren. Xie-xie.
> That's almost all I can say in Chinese.

 wow ,, same with me   ::   *LOL* 
ni hao!!! wo shi camiLa *read my nickname as camila* 
wo shi yi shi jiu sui le .. *again ,, am i correct??* 
wo shi yindunisia guo ren .. 
wo shi ba ... o god , what should i say for college student??   ::   
xie xie .. zai jien .. hohohohohohohoho .. that's all d simple words i can remember

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> Ni hao ma? Wo shi JJ, wo shi rossia(?) guo ren. Xie-xie.
> That's almost all I can say in Chinese.

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> Come on, someone talk with me in Chinese. I'm lonely.

  

> I want learn chinese too, Wo shi brasilian,26....help me!!

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## Immortality

Just curious, are you guys chinese want improve your chinese, or you guys are foreigners need to learn chinese?

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I'm learning chinese. Are you from China? And you are learning Russian do many Chinese people want to learn Russian? Actually I think not many Asians learn Russian in my class I am the only Asian now. And it is a very big uni( but only a small Russian class).

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## Pravit

I'm Chinese-American with parents born in Thailand who don't speak Chinese as a mother language. So I have a bit of difficulty in learning it  ::  There's a beginning class at my uni but it's all filled up this semester, unfortunately.  
Hey, I wonder what happened to Jasper? And Lindzi? And all those funny people I admired.

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Do you learn russian at university? actually I think it is more interesting learning in a group than by yourself I learnt for a while by myself. how come no one ever replies to guests?

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## brett

Ni hao, ren2. Wo3 kan4 bu2 zhe4 yi4gen1. Wo3 ye3 gu1du2 he2 Zhong1guo2. Wo3 shi3 chux1xue2zhe3 Zhong1guo2 de. Qing3 ni3 shi4 zi4you2 dui4 wo3de cuo4 zi4. Xie xie.  ::   
My language list; 
English- native, hence fluent, though deliberately deface it with my own grammatical conglomerations. 
French- I have moments of fluency. So I can feel it coming, but I bumble around most of the time. (My concentration as a person is quite dismal).  ::   
Swedish- I know stuff 
Danish- I can follow the films to the same degree as Swedish ones (not great), but I don't know as many words so have catching up to do. 
Others- I know the alphabets and the basic phrases ('yes', 'how are you?') etc. in maybe 10 other languages. And a further 10, the same deal but haven't stuck them in my mind yet.  
My priorities; Perfect my French so I'm 'consistantly' good at it. Become fluent in Mandarin or Cantonese (yet to be decided which one I'd get most conversational interactions with), and Arabic. After that, I'd like to be able to make small-talk in Turkish, German, Spanish and Hindi.
Zen3 me yang4?  ::

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## uno

I know html  ::  Hyper text markup *language*  ::

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## Pravit

Brettyugan, 你怎么不要学俄文?  ::  你常常在MasterRussian,学俄文把!  BTW I couldn't understand your pinyin that well, other than that you were saying you learn Chinese and asking to correct you in the last part. What were you trying to say? 
BTW, if you can't read characters, download the excellent DimSum program from this site: http://www.mandarintools.com 
Copy, paste, "Annotate Again", and you get popup defs for the characters. Cool, huh? 
As for my language list, I used to want to learn bunches of languages, but it's too hard for me, за двумя зайцами погонишься, ни одного не поймешь. I'm concentrating solely on Mandarin Chinese now. I don't know what to do about my Russian; I still make mistakes from time to time and I can pick up most of what they say in movies and news, but I still miss some. I think a trip to a Russian-speaking country is the best thing.

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## brett

This is what I attempted to say;  1. Hello everyone. 2. I didn't see this thread. 3. I'm also lonely with (my learning of) Chinese. 4. I am a beginner at Chinese. 5. Please feel free to correct my mistakes. 
I'm struggling to understand the set-out to my Starters Dictionary. In the English>Chinese part of it, it seems to integrate grammar. (Measure words, perhaps?). Whereas, the Chinese>English half has just raw word I want on its own. So, my context and grammar is not quite existent at this point in time. 
Sentence 2-
"yi4gen1" is supposed to be 'thread'. But, I didn't find any translation for it on the Chinese>English side. Perhaps a knowledge of characters is needed before I know exactly which word and accent mark, to look up  the word 'thread'.
In my attempt to say "I didn't see (...this thread)", I don't know how to 'past tensify' Chinese sentences. I don't know any non-present tense grammar. I just looked for the word 'past' in the dictionary, but didn't use it because I'd have been just clutching at straws to say "Me no see _word for past tense_ this thread". It felt, i dunno.. just not correct.
Sentence 3-
I looked up the word 'lonely' on the English side of the dictionary and found "gu1du2". But again, I couldn't find this pinyin in the Chinese side. So, I most probably (certainly?) mis-used this word. 
I dread to find out what Bretyugan means in Russian. I think *VM* or *bad manners* suggested it was a derogatory thing? The reason I dread it is because Professor Brettigan was my nick-name, and one freind still calls me that. So I hope he doesn't discover any derogatory Russian translation. 
At this time, I've not gone into characters with any depth at all. I only know how to recognize a couple of the simpler ones, and know how they came into being. Basically, I've only pursued character 'theory', as yet. 
Sometimes the characters do show up on the screen, sometimes it doesn't. I don't know why that is.
I'd like anyone's take on what I wrote in pinyin, and see if you can enlighten some of my short-comings? Xie xie.

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## Pravit

A valiant effort, Brett! But oftentimes you can't translate directly from English to other languages and this is no exception. I really doubt that the Chinese use the word "thread" as in "a piece of string you use to sew stuff" in the meaning "collection of replies to a post on an internet forum." Problem is I don't know the right word for it either. But I'd say something like "wo3 mei2 kan4jian4 zhe4ge...(thread)."  
3. I'm also lonely with (my learning of) Chinese. 
It sounds kind of strange in English but I think that the use of "lonely" in the English version is almost idiomatic, and you know how it goes when you try to translate that type of thing. 
1. Hello everyone
I think 大家好(da4 jia1 hao3) is probably the best way to say this. 
4. I am a beginner at Chinese. 
Hrmmm...I could rephrase it, but I'm not sure how I would say it exactly like that. 
5. Please feel free to correct my mistakes. 
Ah, I dunno! 
BTW learner's dictionaries often leave out things here and there on either side, but I'm a bit confused why you couldn't find it. It's a pinyin dictionary, right? Thing is, say you are looking for "yigen."  There are many characters which are pronounced "yi", so you have to find the right character and then look it up. At least that's how the one I have works. 
I suggest you start looking at radicals and that you buy one of those books that shows you how some of the characters developed, the ones that have a symbolic meaning, anyway. They account for less than 10% of all characters I think but it's fun to look at how they developed.  
About the characters showing up it's an encoding problem, they should show up if you pick any GB encoding.  
Also, I was writing why don't you want to learn Russian? You certainly spend a lot of time on MR  ::

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## brett

I just found da4jia1 in my dictionary. I didn't realize they were two sepreate words. But, I'm now reminded that every multi-syllable word is always made up of two seperate ones. So, yes I've found it, the hard way. You wrote the two words (da4 and jia1) seperately this time. I assume though, it was for my benefit? But, in the greeting, it'd be one word I'd guess? "Da4jia1 hao3"? 
I need to learn characters to better utilize my dictionary (and learning in general). It does explain character development. I'm only now starting to realize that learning characters does actually help your ability to find your way around pinyin, somehow. I really must read all the sections in my dictionary. I tend to jump into the deep end too early. No patience  ::  . I think I've been mistaken that ignoring the characters is helpful for beginning. It seems I'm missing some helpful learning tools for the spoken language.  
Why my Russian's not going anywhere? I've made a conscious effort to finally get my footing in Arabic and Chinese. I've neglected these two languages for too long. But I've got a fun Russian cassette/book program that I busting to use, but I've been exercising discipline by saying "No, your Chinese and Arabic are the ones you'll use everyday. Do one of those". So, it's out of sacrifice, not dis'interest that my Russian has taken a rest before it's really even begun.

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## Pravit

Yes, it's one word, can't remember why I wrote it like that. 
Characters are awesome, and they will help you learn Chinese. So you should learn them.  ::

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## brett

I've got a miniscule repetoire of characters, and was just flicking through a Japanese friends Japanese book. They have three written forms of their own, Chinese characters for words their scripts haven't accounted for, and romanization. Except for romanization, all these scripts are mixed together. I didn't know that. I was pleased with myself when I correctly recognized a few character amongst the tumoil. She explained how they all fit together though. Only one of the Japanese native scripts is an alphabet. The other two are characters. As is my understanding. Having this little success has inspired me to click into Chinese mode again. And pick up a bit of Japanese too. My country has so many Japanese people, though I don't know how many have permanent residency. Not many, I'm sure. I think most of our Japanese are either tourists, on work visas, or on work experience for their companies. Maybe to pick up a lived-in competence of English in their field of expertise, rather than just rigid formally taught English.

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## Pravit

As far as I remember Japanese use a combination of Chinese characters and two syllabaries. The hiragana is for writing grammatical endings and Japanese words that don't have characters(for example, "anata") and the katakana is for writing foreign-derived words. Or looking cool. I used to have a little book that explained etymologies of some characters, although it explained the Japanese usage and pronunciation, not the Chinese one.

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## Valiullina Guzel

你好! 我叫古丽. 我也学习汉语. 你学汉语多年了?

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## Pravit

我学了几个月了。但是现在没有时间，功课太多！

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## brett

Wo3 kan4 le3 zai4 forum yi1. Ta1men xie3 yi2ge pinyin dan1ci2 he2 er4 bu4fen. Ye3 ta1men gei3 kan4 le3 tones.
- I was reading another forum, and they wrote double-syllable pinyin words seperately. eg wo3men---> wo men. And, no-one seemed to use this number code that we use to denote the tones.
I know that each syllable represents one character, but I thought in pinyin a double-syllable word was supposed to have both syllables joined. Is this not a rule? And, it seems counter-productive to not use the numbering code to denote tones when in the learning process. 
This is how they would write what I wrote- 
Wo kan le zai forum yi. *Ta men* xie *yi ge* pin yin *dan ci* he er *bu fen*. Ye *ta men* gei kan le tones. 
I find this less educational as far as prepping one's memory of tones for the spoken language.
If I was to write the way I do (but with comprehensible grammar  ::  ), would people find it strange. I guess I don't trust the group's judgement to ask them directly, even though some of them are Chinese. Because I have no intention of not using this number code (eg. xie4xie etc.), because it totally helps me remember the tones for when it comes time for the spoken language. And, when I read others, I can sound the tones out in my head, too. I don't understand why beginners don't use it. Maybe this code just isn't that common.
(Though, I have now posted a thread showing this code. But, I don't really get the impression anyone will use it). 
And, on that Chinese site you mentioned Prav, I resistered. Providing I get in, wo3de ming2zi shi4 "Ulven"  ::  .

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## Pravit

Hmm. It just might be a habit of people over there. Technically, it should be "yi ge", spaced like that, though I usually see "women." At any rate, you shouldn't concern yourself too much about ways of writing pinyin; I'm sure there is some official way of doing it that some people follow and some don't. I haven't been on Chinese forums lately; it's actually kind of boring compared to this one.

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## waxwing

I don't think there's any 'official' way as such, at least not in practice ... nobody ever uses it (except to help them type on a computer). Kids, I think, are shown it and use it but I don't know exactly how or how much.

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## brett

All my learning products join the words 'women' and yige', including my Oxford Starters Dictionary, Routledge Colloquial Chinese and Language30/Chinese, so it can't be too unusual for others, I'd assume. In any case, I have no intention of changing the number system, anyway, and I quite like joining the word's syllables. It's just good to know what others are doing. 
Xie4xie.

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