My 中文(ZH) & தமிழ் (TA) logs

[samothin]

I love this forum!!! I've read Iversen's guide to learning language, and iguanamon multi-track approach, and decided that my study plan needs some changes.

Firstly, I'm going to put TA on hold. I'm not as fluent as I need to for me to ladder revising TA with ZH. I will probably starts with learning the alphabets, instead of the basic phrases. When I'm ready I'll start with parallel text using Malaysiakini, while going through Colloquial Tamil.

I'm also going to start with parallel text of Malaysian news in ZH, as I need to acquire the vocabulary relevant to my country/society. This is in addition of L+R of a Harry Potter 1.

[samothin]

Finally finished Chapter 1 of HP1. Reading long text of Chinese is a bit weird. Felt like I won't be speaking as such. Anyway, might be more comfortable with this after more exposure

[samothin]

Signed up for November 2018's 6WC, and committed to writing a 相声 piece for East Asian Study Group's Challenge

[samothin]

Finished Chapter 2 just now. Took me 3 weeks to finish a chapter.
I still haven't started on the xiangsheng too.

[samothin]

买卖人的相声

大家好。我叫纳吉。我是一个买卖人. 我有一个手机工厂。 我有很多钱，太多可以制造塔楼. 我的希望是我的儿子会顶我的工厂，然后卖我的手机在亚洲遍地。

可是我儿子是白痴。我送他留学在美国大学。虽然他有企业管理硕士，他还不会做事业。

那天，我们有一个大的交易跟政府的员工。这是很重要的，所以我告诉他，“如果你要得到这个交易, 你必须送“蛋糕”给那个员工。平时要红包就得到政府的交易. 我儿子真是送一个巧克力蛋糕给那个人。

另一次，他上个月雇佣一位税务师。你看怎么样？我从来没有纳税。不管一块还没纳。我问他为什么他做那么样？他白痴说那是我们的负责。

还有我们的秘书的事。他上个星期没雇佣那个漂亮的女人。他知道我喜欢辣行的女人，可是他还雇佣这个娘炮的个子男人。秘书一般女人因为我们能摸一点，亲一点。这简单的事还不知道吗？

呃，其实他们都两位总是加班了.... 这样啊！我很高兴他还有脑。

Mǎimài rén de xiàngsheng

dàjiā hǎo. Wǒ jiào nà jí. Wǒ shì yīgè mǎimài rén. Wǒ yǒu yīgè shǒujī gōngchǎng. Wǒ yǒu hěnduō qián, tài duō kěyǐ zhìzào tǎlóu. Wǒ de xīwàng shì wǒ de érzi huì dǐng wǒ de gōngchǎng, ránhòu mài wǒ de shǒujī zài yàzhōu biàndì.

Kěshì wǒ érzi shì báichī. Wǒ sòng tā liúxué zài měiguó dàxué. Suīrán tā yǒu qǐyè guǎnlǐ shuòshì, tā hái bù huì zuò shìyè.

Nèitiān, wǒmen yǒu yīgè dà de jiāoyì gēn zhèngfǔ de yuángōng. Zhè shì hěn zhòngyào de, suǒyǐ wǒ gàosù tā,“rúguǒ nǐ yào dédào zhège jiāoyì, nǐ bìxū sòng “dàngāo” gěi nàgè yuángōng. Píngshí yào hóngbāo jiù dédào zhèngfǔ de jiāoyì. Wǒ érzi zhēnshi sòng yīgè qiǎokèlì dàngāo gěi nàgè rén.

Lìng yīcì, tā shàng gè yuè gùyōng yī wèi shuìwù shī. Nǐ kàn zěnme yàng? Wǒ cónglái méiyǒu nàshuì. Bùguǎn yīkuài hái méi nà. Wǒ wèn tā wèishéme tā zuò nàme yàng? Tā báichī shuō nà shì wǒmen de fùzé.

Hái yǒu wǒmen de mìshū de shì. Tā shàng gè xīngqí méi gùyōng nàgè piàoliang de nǚrén. Tā zhīdào wǒ xǐhuān là xíng de nǚrén, kěshì tā hái gùyōng zhège niáng pào de gèzi nánrén. Mìshū yībān nǚrén yīnwèi wǒmen néng mō yīdiǎn, qīn yīdiǎn. Zhè jiǎndān de shì hái bù zhīdào ma?

È, qíshí tāmen dōu liǎng wèi zǒng shì jiābānle.... Zhèyàng a! Wǒ hěn gāoxìng tā hái yǒu nǎo.

Businessperson's cross talk

Hello everyone. My name is Najib. I am a businessman. I have a mobile phone factory. I have a lot of money, too much that I can build a tower. My hope is that my son will takeover my factory and then sell my mobile phone throughout Asia.

But my son is an idiot. I sent him to study at an American university. Although he has a master's degree in business administration, he doesn't know how to do business.

That day, we had a big deal with government employees. This is very important, so I told him, "If you want to get this deal, you have to send a "cake" to that employee. Usually you need a bribe to get a government deal. My son really sent a chocolate cake to that person.

Another think, he hired a tax accountant last month. What do you think? I have never paid taxes. Not even a single cent. I asked him why he did it? This idiot said that it is our responsibility.

There is also the matter of our secretary. He didn't hire that pretty woman last week. He knows that I like women who are hot, but he then hires a beautiful looking man. Secretaries are generally woman so we could touch a little, kiss a little. Doesn't he knows even this simple thing?

Oh, in fact, both of them are always working overtime.... Ohhhhh! I am very happy that he still has a brain.

[samothin]

I've finally finished studying HSK4
This is the final vocabulary list I'm learning. From now on, I'd be solely using native materials to study. To fluency!!!!!

[samothin]

I created my own mini challenge for December. 100 tweets in Chinese. 8 tweets made, 92 left to go.

[SGP]

I've finally finished studying HSK4
This is the final vocabulary list I'm learning. From now on, I'd be solely using native materials to study. To fluency!!!!!

But what kind of native materials? Several possibilities.

[samothin]

But what kind of native materials? Several possibilities.

There's a lot of materials, but I'm going to stick with these.

Native materials
1. Youtube - Namewee Tokok series (he's a controversial Malaysian Youtuber, vulgar yet funny, and provides hard subtitles in 3 languages (i.e. Malay, English, Chinese Traditional)
2. Harry Potter 1, which I find awkward. I probably will start a simple Chinese novel after this, maybe San Ti.
3. Daily Malaysian news in Chinese from Malaysiakini.com

My ZH study plan
1. FSI Standard Chinese - A Modular Approach (as an audio course) twice per day, to and from work. Currently listening to Module 07 Social Interaction. The format is slightly harder than Module 1 - 6.
2. Review of SRS for HSK 1 - 4 word lists, in isolation.
3. Review of cloze-test SRS for HSK 1 - 4 word lists, in context (Clozemaster).
4. Review of SRS for target list in FSI module.
5. Review of SRS for sentences created based on words in HSK 1- 4 lists.
6. Translation exercise for 1 4-panel comic per day.
7. Read 1 entry of Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar.
8. Watch 1 episode of CCTV's Growing Up with Chinese.

My TA study plan (to revisit in 2019)
1. jblmflc.com/Tamil, 1 activity each day
2. cram.com SRS for each activity above
3. to memorize all of the alphabets
4. to learn all of the pronunciations

[samothin]

December's challenge comes to the end, and I failed. I aimed for 100 tweets in Chinese, but I completed at 86. I think this is beneficial as tweets are more colloquial, while I still need to form a more complex sentences to comment on the news and videos. I mainly commented on news and funny videos. I'm absolutely keeping this as part of daily language usage.