Our alternate lesson title for today is "how to pickup Chinese girls or guys". So those of you who are single pay attention as our site designer and veteran clubber Baifan delves into the art of the chase with its first step: the fearless, persistent and somewhat oblivious pursuit of the ever-critical telephone number.We'd say we hope it works out smoothly for you, but who are we kidding? China is to romance as the Hindenburg is to air travel. Once you've got the number you're on your own.
trevelyan
said on January 5, 2009
We've put up the fix for this lesson and feedback is appreciated. There are two versions and there is a trade-off involved:(1) The version with audio normalization, linked to on your right, and at the address below:http://popupchinese.com/data/238/fix-orig.mp3(2) A version without audio normalization.http://popupchinese.com/data/238/fix-orig.mp3"You can hear the difference in background levels in the version with audio normalization, since the background noise is getting amplified along with our recordings of the words and phrases. Conversely, the audio stitching is pretty seamless in the non-normalized version, but I'm not sure how the volume will work for you guys in the wild. We'll have to redo the original introduction and sidebar recordings at a lower audio level so the difference in volume is less jarring if we go down this route, but it's my preferred solution. Just listening to the fix again, I think this is probably the better approach.Thanks for the kick in the pants to get this back up chronos and toneandcolor. Experimented with noise removal, but distortion ended up being and is not immediately feasible.
brett
said on January 5, 2009
我不给! :)
Absolute Beginners
said on January 5, 2009
mp3 up, thanks chinopinyin.
toneandcolor
said on January 5, 2009
Excellent lesson as usual. Quick comment on Brendan's remarks on nǚ (a sound that doesn't exist in English): It's actually not a sound that depends on the size of the hole the lips make, but rather the size of the cavity in the inside of your mouth. Moving your tongue forward will make the space in your mouth that produces the vowel smaller and smaller, approximating the strange combination of "eee" and "ooo". Another way to think about it is to imagine whistling: if you whistle the highest note you can, the cavity of your mouth is as small as possible, which is where it should be for ǚ. If you whistle the lowest note possible, the cavity is as large as you can make it, which is where the the pinyin "u" (without the umlaut) is pronounced: 五，出，不 etc.As far as the fix is concerned, I think the normalized version is fine. The white noise is almost indiscernible when listening in anything but a completely silent room.
orbital
said on January 5, 2009
@toneandcolor - just wanted to say that's the best explanation I've ever run into of how to voice those two sounds.
bryan
said on January 9, 2009
David - I agree with you 100%. Yes, the original, non-normalized version is much cleaner and yes, it does provide too much of a jolt with the volume change. I think the normalized version isn't terribly bad but the background noise is quite noticeable. If you can redo the intro and sidebar and stick with the original, that would make a big difference. I'm very excited that you're starting to put out the "Fix" again. Do you have a copyright on the term?
bryan
said on January 9, 2009
David - both 1) and 2) point to the same url (original fix) while the link off of the mic icon does indeed link to the normalized version. Some people might have been confused and believe that there is no difference between the two when in fact they were listening to the same exact recording!
jon.davis
said on February 11, 2009
When I first learned French, I was told this method of making the ǚ sound: Say i (eee) and round your lips as if saying u (ooo). There you are.
Echo
said on February 13, 2009
@jon.davis,
Yeah, that's the way in Chinese too :)
--Echo
echo@popupchinese.com
woaibento
said on September 11, 2010
Really enjoyed this lesson! Thanks!
palafx
said on March 24, 2011
"说不话". Does that makes sense?
Echo
said on March 24, 2011
@palafx,
Nope :( It has to be 不说话, because 话 is not the complement of 说.
--Echo
echo@popupchinese.com
Brendan
said on March 25, 2011
@palafx - A better way of saying it might be that when you have an "X不Y" construction of this sort, both X and Y are verbs that work together. The reason 说不话 doesn't work is that 话 isn't a verb in modern Chinese, it's a noun.
palafx
said on March 25, 2011
@Brendan, Echo
Okay then, how about 过不来? What would this even mean? "To be unable to come over"?
Echo
said on March 25, 2011
@palafx,
Yes. The original word is 过来. 来 is the verb complement of 过. It is used to further explain the verb. There are a lot of "verb + complement" words in Chinese. For example, 回来，进来，过去，出去 etc. When you want to negate this kind of word, you usually just add a 不 between the verb and its complement.
--Echo
echo@popupchinese.com
pedro.rezende100
said on January 8, 2019
Do you guys know how to say: "give-me your number in" pinyin?谢谢
