Sometimes a touch of winter blows down from the north, opens its icy mouth and lets loose a bone-chilling squall. And we're not talking about the weather. In this podcast prepare your ears for the Dongbei onslaught as we pay a Popup Chinese tribute to northern China, and the northeasterner.
 said on
December 21, 2008
I really like this podcast. Hope you guys do too.
 said on
December 21, 2008
wow that accent brings back memories. used to have a good friend from the northeast. he also spoke like that all the time. 啥啊?有啊,有啊!
 said on
December 22, 2008
What's that popular sit-com where the family are all 东北人? It's not 家有儿女, but I think it has an equally straight-forward name that eludes me right now...

And someone _please_ post a link to that wacky song. Is the 'yin' pronunciation of 人 from Korean?
 said on
December 22, 2008
This is a really good podcast.

I have a question for you guys. My wife is a 地道東北人 (from 長春), and she often says "w" with a "v" sound -- i.e., 味兒 she pronounces "ver."

She's not really sure why. Any ideas?
 said on
December 22, 2008
Haha,I also disagree with apple, "我们的笑是善意的", "我们不像上海人” ummmmm.. 可能是你有点与众不同--比我的北京朋友们善良一些 :P

我听过很多次 “我真的不喜欢外地人” 。。 “脏外地人” 之类的话。 The worst is after some poor darker skinned 外地人 tells them they can't park somewhere or (god forbid) tries to give them a ticket. That's gotta be the worst job in China.

I've 90% sure I've heard older beijing people errr-ize 人 too though, talking about 日本人r maybe? or like 小人r. I haven't known many 东北人 or traveled around up there, my main impression of their accents is from my Beijing friends, who find it hilarious, but not as hilarious as the TianJin accent.
 said on
December 22, 2008
@me,

Hi, 北京人 don't distinguish v and w as well when we talk. That is because in the most of north dialects, there is no "v", and that is to say, v is nothing to do with distinguishing meaning of words. As you know, one usage of Chinese pinyin and 4 tones is to distinguish words'meaning. We consider v and w are almost the same (can replace each other) because the pronounces are close and they don't make difference to meanings.

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
December 22, 2008
@toneandcolor,

I guess you mean 东北一家人, never seen that show myself though.

Try this: http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNDgzMzkxMzI=.html for that song.

I have no clue what the pronounce is to do with Korean. If there is sth to do with it, they must took it from us :P

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
December 22, 2008
@stratman1,

haha, that's me.

据我的感觉,北京人的排外情绪要比上海人好很多,我的一些外地朋友曾有过一些很不愉快的经历,他们对我说,有些上海人对某些国家的外国人也很排斥,因为他们是“外地的”。

有时候,儿化音有区别意思的作用,比如“小人”和“小人儿”就是完全不同的两个词。“小人儿” 的意思是可爱的小孩子。

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
December 22, 2008
@echo,

Thanks! BTW, how can I change my username? It gave me 'me' automatically, and no I can't change it! :)
 said on
December 22, 2008
@echo,

Nevermind, I got it!
 said on
December 22, 2008
>> The worst is after some poor darker

>> skinned 外地人 tells them they can't

>> park somewhere or (god forbid) tries

>> to give them a ticket. That's gotta

>> be the worst job in China.

No kidding. I actually think Beijingers are pretty inclusive as it goes. But that being said, Zhang Ziyi has taken a LOT of abuse for being a 外地人, and as far as I can tell she grew up in the outskirts of the city.

--dave

 said on
December 22, 2008
@yuehan,

Wanna share your Chinese name with us? Looks a great name from pinyin.

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
December 22, 2008
@echo,

My Chinese name is 岳撼.

My name is John, so everyone called me 约翰. I didn't much like that -- it doesn't really mean anything, and the sound comes from "Johann" rather than "John" anyway -- so I picked a name that was more interesting. 岳 is the only surname pronounced 'yue', and I just like 撼. :)
 said on
December 23, 2008
@岳撼,

这两个字在一起很有气魄 :)

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
December 23, 2008
Great podcast guys. And I love Beijingers Echo, so don't let the crowd get you down. ;)

I don't suppose foreigners really count as 外地人, but I've never felt ostractized or treated as a foreigner in Beijing in the same sort of patronizing way you get in other parts of China. While you do occasionally run into imperious government officials, Beijing is less flush with people showing off their wallets than other parts of the country too (can you hear me Wenzhou?), and the government is noticeably less corrupt than in most other places.

Have never been to Harbin, but am hoping to go there this winter to see the ice festival. Hope to look you guys up if I can make it. Schedule is a bit tight with courses right now so God only knows.
 said on
December 23, 2008
John - I'm pretty sure you're the only one I know with that surname. That said, my vote for the strangest last name (not counting the two-character ones) has to be 那 (first tone). Always causes me to do a double-take, as does when people toss the character 一 into someone's name too.
 said on
December 23, 2008
@barrister

I totally agree. Don't get me wrong, I love Beijingers, and hate going to places like GuGong where you get a million dirty farmers fresh from the provinces. But I think it would be a little disingenuous to say 外地人 feel warmly welcomed in Beijing.

I think that kind of discrimination is kind of unavoidable though, with the education and wealth gap between locals and non-locals.
 said on
December 23, 2008
@toneandcolor - Interesting thought. Northeastern accents tend to convert initial "r-" to "y-" in some cases -- a Northeastern friend of mine once laughed at a sign for 臺灣肉造飯 because she read it as 臺灣又造反 -- so I think this is probably just a function of the accent. Then again, the Korean reading of '人' is apparently 인 'in,' so who knows.

@yuehan - This also seems to be a feature of Northeastern accents in general. The stronger the 东北腔, the more pronounced it seems to be - though I remember hearing it even from speakers in Harbin and Changchun who had otherwise pretty standard accents. As Echo mentions, you'll get it (to a much lesser extent) in Beijing speech. The "v" sound isn't voiced (or at least, I don't remember having heard it voiced), so it's different from the "v" sound in Shanghainese.

On the topic of 外地人 and the 待遇 they receive: Stereotypes of different regions could make for an interesting lesson in the future -- some 外地人 have got it easier than others in Beijing. And in a sense, I think that's probably how it should be -- every great world city has got an attitude about people from elsewhere; c.f. New Yorkers, Londoners, and Parisians.

(I'd add in the Shanghainese, if I believed that Shanghai were a great world city, but I don't -- it's just an overgrown colony inhabited by a bunch of self-hating hicks who try to cover up their own insecurities with money, tacky glitz, and attempts to become white.)
 said on
December 23, 2008
@trevelyn,

Yeah, I'm the only one I know with that surname, too, but I'm in good company. :)

The strangest surname I've ever encountered, and I've only encountered it once, is 是. I noticed on our gas bills that the meter reader's surname was listed as 是, and one time when she came I asked her if it was right and she said it was, and that she'd never known anyone else with that surname, either. Strange.
 said on
December 23, 2008
I don't know why, but that was hilarious! Love the accent, great acting too.

I live in 上海, and hearing these accents just makes me think of chubby smiling friendly northerners.
 said on
December 23, 2008
@david & yuehan,

Our 民族英雄岳飞's surname is yue. John, you put 撼 after, that's why i said it's pretty 有气魄.

It seems that 那 comes from Manchu. Not sure though.

@maxiewawa,

"北京欢迎你" ! 北方欢迎你!

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
December 23, 2008
◎Echo -- 那 comes from the Manchu 'Nara.' There's more at Baidu Zhidao and Wikipedia, too.
 said on
January 6, 2009
FYI - no pdf/text option for this lesson either.
 said on
January 8, 2009
@bryanhassler - updated the site to fix a few problems that were affecting pdf production. New pdfs up for both lessons. If anyone spots any other missing pdfs, drop a line and I'll regenerate them.

--david

 said on
January 9, 2009
Thanks, David. The Modern Romance pdf is now fixed but this one (the-northeasterner) is still not working. Thanks.
 said on
January 9, 2009
@bryan - link on the right column works, so this looks like a problem the system is having updating older pdfs. Should be affecting iTunes subscribers predominantly. I'll look into the issue problem and try to get it fixed today, thx. - Update: appears to have been an issue specific to this lesson. fixed now.
 said on
March 8, 2009
Hi Toneandcolor

Here has the song and show as well.

http://v.ku6.com/special/index_2382528.html

seems like a bit like beverly hillbillys from the song.
 said on
June 11, 2009
this is possibly the best voice acting job i've heard on the site up til now =) great balance of clearness with true speech...nice dialogue and good levels...one item is that the 'text' page has the line: 我想您似乎不是特别合适吧。as 我想您似乎不是太合适吧。
 said on
June 12, 2009
@nadasax,

yes, you are right.

thank you.

and they are both correct and natural.
 said on
June 28, 2009
Regarding the use of 身边儿, is this used as an example of Beijing dialect? My understanding of standard mandarin has it as 身边. As a struggling mandarin student, I hear the 儿 with taxi drivers here in Beijing, but I avoid the 儿 in speaking. Overall, I am enjoying the lessons in popupchinese and laud your efforts and approach to learning. 谢谢
 said on
June 29, 2009
@ameristar888,

hi, actually we say both 身边 and 身边儿,and 身边儿 is casual.
 said on
December 22, 2009
我每次听这个播客就哈哈大笑起来! 演王翠花的角色的那个演员演得特别好!她假装自己不是个东北人即使我们听众们都知道她就是一个土生土长的东北人儿,这种情景特别搞笑!

“啊,北京,北京经典儿。。。可多啊!北京,北京比如那个什么天安门可出名儿啊!还有那个什么那个叫,那个叫什么玩儿意儿, 什么黄鹤楼啊! 怎么地,怎么地。。。!”

哈哈哈!笑死我啦!

演王翠花的演员是谁呢?我想求她的签名!我想那个超级村姑肯定已经出名儿了吧!
 said on
October 5, 2011
@Echo

I see that this Northeastern speaker puts an additional 儿 after 人.

So is Beijing erhuayin different from that of the Northeast region?

Thanks.

 said on
October 5, 2011
@jinshakira,

I'm not really familiar with Northeast "er". Actually there is no "er" sound in a lot dialects in China. People try to speak Mandarin or Beijinghua sometimes, and they think the most effective way is to add "er" at the end of whichever word they want, and that's why they put "er" at some weird places.

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com
 said on
October 5, 2011
@Echo,

Maybe there should be a whole series on Popup about how to properly erhuarize according to natural, colloquial Beijing Mandarin.

Not only do 外国人 think that by erhuarizing all over the place that they can sound like native speakers, but also people from other parts of China think that a foreigner who uses a little tiny bit of natural 儿化,for example 一点儿, 一块儿, that the accent sounds completely and totally Beijing and that, that foreigner MUST have learned their Mandarin in Beijing.
 said on
November 10, 2015
haha... I've been in the dongbei over 2 years, in a small city north of Harbin, (the first, and so far, only, place I've lived in China) and I'm afraid I've picked up lotsa bad habits... the deep gutteral `h's, and 儿 on the end of everything... actually there seems to be little rhyme or reason to when the 儿 is added. But the worst habit has to be the added `a', ... it just seemed to come so naturally. Monkey hear, monkey speak. When everyone around you is speaking like that you have the tendency to copy them.
 said on
March 25, 2017
Hello PopUp Chinese.

你好泡泡中文。

I've finally reached the intermediate level.

我终于获得中级了。

I have a few questions about the dialogue. I will attempt to use Chinese as well as English.

我有几个关于这个对话的问题。我试试写中文,还有写英文。

1. Regarding the sentence “可是我听您这口音?“, why do you use “这“? Does it have a meaning or is it just for emphasis?

1. 对于 “可是我听您这口音?“ 的句话,为什么用 ”这“?有一个意思还是只是强调?

2. Regarding the sentence “我们这儿需要的是一位。。。”, is there a word, such as ”事情" dropped after the "的" or is this just a grammar structure to emphasize "what we need is"?

2. 对于 “我们这儿需要的是一位。。。” 的句话,“的”后面应该有“事情”(因为一个词是刊落的吧)还是这句就是一个结构?

3. Regarding the clause “只不过就是身边儿东北朋友特多。。。”, I've never heard “身边儿” used this way. Does it just mean "to have"?

3. 对于 “只不过就是身边儿东北朋友特多。。。” 的句话,我没听说过 “身边儿” 这样用。这个意思就是 ”有“ 吗?

4. Regarding the clause "...所以那个说话就带东北味儿...", is there a particular reason why "那个" is used instead of “我的"?

4. 对于 “只不过就是身边儿东北朋友特多。。。” 的句话,以 ”那个“ 代 “我的” 有没有特别原因?

 said on
March 30, 2017
@jaq.james,

1. emphatic, colloquial manner of speaking. You'll hear it in other dialogues.

2. 需要的 (that which is needed). The noun is implied and optional. Grammatically, this is the use of 的 to nominalize the phrase which precedes it.

3. 身边儿 = around me (lit. my body). "It's just that I've got a lot of Dongbei friends."

4. 那个 often comes out the way “um..." might come out in English. You'll also hear this in other intermediate level shows.
 said on
March 30, 2017
Got it! Seems so simple now! Thanks David!
 said on
February 19, 2020
enjoyed the lesson... really funny!