duminică, 28 februarie 2010

Insights into Chinese Language

I've recently found a forum about the Chinese language and by far the most interesting topic was the one regarding how foreigners managed to use Chinese in China.

As you already know, and if you don't you should know, Chinese is a tonal language, which means that they talk on 4 different tones. So... the same syllable has between 3 and 12 different meanings. For example, ma could mean mom, horse, ant, to scold someone and some final particles, depending on how you say it. Thus, the pronounciation is very important.

One of the stories on that forum was that a guy went to the cafeteria and asked for 女肉 nu rou (woman meat) instead of 牛肉 niu rou (beef). Apparently the cafeteria guy didn't understand what he had asked for and acted quite weird. The poor guy went home confused and looked it up, to his amusement.

Another one was about a guy who started dating a Chinese girl and while they were at home, he wanted to tell her to sit down 坐 zuo but instead he told her to 走 zou (to leave). He couldn't understand why she instantly wanted to leave :)).

There were a lot more stories, I had a good laugh. However, it sort of freaked me out about the whole studying in China prospect. I mean there was one guy who mistook a word for a sexual one in front of the whole university while he was giving a speech; of course everyone laughed really hard and he had no idea what had just happened. It's not hard to make mistakes like that, considering that 性 xing means sex and 行 xing means OK :P.

Although I've been studying Chinese for just 5 months, I have a funny story too. At one Chinese course, the conversation between me and Miss Liu was something like:

Liu 老师:你的发音很好。
Liu Laoshi: Ni de fayin hen hao.
Miss Liu: Your pronounciation is very good.

我:我不知道法语。
Wo: Wo bu zhidao fayu.
Me: But I don't speak French.

Of course, this happened when I was a novice :P. I don't mistake fayin for fayu anymore but I do have problems at times with 法语 fayu (French) and 语法 yufa (grammar). As you can see, same syllables, same pronounciation, same characters, just the order is inversed.

I think I'll always be amazed of how Chinese works :P. It's just too different from the other languages not to be into it.

Btw, this is how one of my notes looks like:



PS: Last night's party was fun :P.

再见!

vineri, 19 februarie 2010

Stuff

Since I stopped playing DOTA and poker or any life consuming games I might have become quite productive. In the past month, besides getting pretty high marks in my exams (10, 9, 9, 8, 7, 7, x) I've finished watching 4 TV series (scrubs, glee, it's always sunny in philadelphia and modern family), went to around 4 parties, read 3 books and seen some movies.

Scrubs isn't that funny. The jokes are good, but the script is quite badly written because it only made me do "hmph, that was a good one" and not get a proper laugh. However, it gave me an insight into the way hospitals - not in Romania though - work.

Glee isn't my type either. It's... well, it's a musical and takes place in a highschool. I always liked watching highschool-related movies/series because I wanted to know how that particular period is lived in other parts of the world. However, I only watched it for that.

Gasca, the only guy I know who likes The Office <3, told me about a series which was supposed to be funny, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I had read some comments on IMDb about it and one person said that it's "Seinfeld on crack". So obviously I immediately downloaded it. Too bad... it's not. I mean, it's not even close to Seinfeld's humour. Nor is it to any other humour. It was dry and God knows I love dry humour but I didn't like this series. It just didn't click to me. At times, I might've caught some good jokes but all in all it's not worth it. Charlie is a fake copy of George and sadly, I didn't find Danny de Vito funny. And yes, I've seen all 5 seasons.

I found out about Modern Family when it was nominated at Golden Globe and decided to give it a try. It features the actor who played Al Bundy in Married with Children, who got kinda old. I watched it with my mother and neither of us found it funny. Again, some good jokes at times but all in all it's kinda dull.

HOWEVER, I have read an exceptional book, 1984 by George Orwell. My gosh was it good! It's written in 1949 but the action takes place in 1984 and it's about a totalitarian political system, mainly about communism. It's made up of 3 parts; the first one presents the main character, who hates the system and whose actions and thoughts are completely parallel because he could go to jail at any moment, the second part presents his 'love' story with a young girl who also hated the system and the third part tells the story of how they got caught and what happened to them. It is oficially the only book that gave me the shivers while I read it. You just have to read it for yourself to know what I mean. The guys who thought up the TV show Big Brother got their idea from this book, btw.

I have also seen a really great Chinese movie, Chibi 赤壁 - Red Cliff, which tells the story of the 3 kingdoms' war. I usually don't like action movies, but this one was so well written and the procentage between the war parts and the way they planned the fight is so good that I love it. Too bad that 10 minutes before the end of the movie I realized there must be a second part because the final war hadn't taken place yet and, as a matter of fact, I was right. I finally downloaded the second part, 赤壁下, but hadn't had the time to watch it. It's becoming harder to watch a Chinese movie properly, as I had 2 subtitles - one in English and one in Chinese - and I was paying attention to both of them - one for the actual meaning and one for the Chinese characters - and I also paid attention to their pronounciation and the actual movie :))). I had to go back a lot, when I kept looking at the characters and didn't get anything of the action. Fun, nonetheless.

Anyway, these were the reviews for today. Meanwhile I have started school and my Chinese teacher taught us the new Chinese lesson in... Chinese. It was a bit of a shock for us, soon it became interesting and then tiring which led to my lost of wallet, which I still haven't find. I didn't lose much - my ID, my ING Card and my Student Card, but for what I lost I have to wander about a lot. I didn't lose it just because of the Chinese course of course, I was also up since 4 o'clock so yeah...

My mom got in the hospital, she had an operation and I must say that Romanian hospitals are shit. Honestly. She had to buy everything, even medical tubes, nevermind the medicines. Also the staff are so insensate, so cold-blooded, it's like the patients aren't people. It was definitely nothing like what I've seen in Scrubs. Yes, I know, they were always this way just that I haven't gone to one for a long time. I also realized that I never had an operation, nor have I had a broken bone. It is going to be awful when I will, since I'm definitely not used to it. Well, let's just hope that my mom is going to be ok, since she still has to stay there for a week. Btw, my mom's problem appeared mainly because of smoking and she hasn't smoked ever! Just me, my father, my brother and his girlfriend smoked and my mom smoked only passively. So when she comes back we won't be smoking in our house anymore and most likely we won't smoke at all. Sucks.

Tomorrow is the final day of Nights Awards voting, so do go on to http://awards/nights.ro and vote for Vania as the Best DJ. He was nominated at a lot of categories like: Best DJ, Best Musical Production with OK Corral - pink shue, Best Underground Musical Project with OK Corral, Best DJ Set with OK Corral @ Selectro, Expirat, Most Representative DJ in Foreign Countries with OK Corral, Best Party Brand with Groove++, Best Clubbing Radio Show with Nightgroove with Vania @ PRO FM Dance and Best Flyer with Shades of Grey. Good luck, Vania, Modelu, Thornado, Victor Stancov, Silas and Gojira!

If you're willing to party tonight come to The Ark, preferably dressed as a seaperson - seaman is mysoginistic, of course :P. It's the "Yacht Week Romania Release Party" and the music will be provided by Mike Rigler, French Cuisine and OK Corral! See you there!

luni, 1 februarie 2010

Exams'n'parties

So I had my first 6 exams, I've got just 1 exam left. Happy happy, joy joy! :)

First one was English Texts - a typical english exam: translations, exercises, idioms, etc. Fun. Second one was the Linguistic Concepts exam which kinda sucked magically. Before my third exam I went to a little party at Fabrica, had a bit of fun. Third one was Chinese Language Structure, which I actually enjoyed - it's Chinese related, of course I enjoyed it. I really think I've done well.

4th was *druuums* CHINESE! Both written and oral where I got an average of 9 <3. For the first time I answered really well in my oral exam. Miss Liu is a sweetheart and I didn't feel awkward at all. Of course, though, I got the most horrible subject "Please describe your major". You just didn't have what to talk about... Anyways, the 5th exam was Chinese Civilisation which was okey but I wasn't in the mood to study that much, as I only had one day between my 4th and 5th exam and because I also had to write a 7-page essay. However, I managed well enough, I think I'm gonna pass.

Saturday I went to another party, at Studio Martin - A guy named Gerald, which was fun. Yea, I love going to parties between exams. Remember the weekend between the BAC exams? Gosh, that was fun indeed :D. It sort of relaxes me, although yesterday I did have a massive hangover *blush*.

And *drums* today I had my British Literature exam for which I did not study at all. I had to read quite a number of books and this semester I have focused more on Chinese - of course. As always, I had read 3 books but the test included none of them :)). Oh well, hope I'll get a 5. Btw, I couldn't cheat at all, gosh, it was prison-like. And I'm kind of upset that after I left the exam amfitheatre, I remembered that I could have written something really cool and on the subject but during the whole exam I was completely tired and out of my mind. I mean, I wrote 'dissappear' instead of 'disappear' god damn it! I didn't quite give a rat's ass about this exam so why worry?

You're not a student if you pass all your exams, righhht? :))

The only reason I'm mad about myself is that I really like English and although I don't like literature that much, if I had spent a bit more time reading or studying I could have done a hell of a work. Oh well, maybe next time :).

I still have one exam left but thank God it's in 5 days.

Although Saturday was quite fun, music, drinks and all, what's the problem with chicks going clubbing?! I mean honestly, why do men have to apologize if they barely hit me and chicks hurry and hit me all the time? Firstly, why hurry in a club? Secondly, why not be more gentle as a girl? I also hate girls that like to stand in the middle of a dance ring and get really angry if you hit them while dancing. Why stand? Why not take a seat if you're not in the mood for dancing? And I also hate girls that dance as if they're on Love Pill and shout from every last body part OH FUCK ME, DO FUCK ME! Why not get a room and fuck all you want instead of coming and acting all hormonally in a club while flirting with 3 different guys at once? It's easier if you get a room, ya know..? :>

I'm off to watching Scrubs again. During this exam session Scrubs has been my closest companion as it's really cold and I'm in no mood whatsoever to go out.

Ta-ta!