Tag Archives: language

Shangke Errday

Chinese class 4 hours a day, 4 days a week.  On top of that, a language pledge that relentlessly requires us to speak Chinese for the better part of the day.  The IES Beijing Language Intensive Program is designed to put a full years worth of Chinese in one semester.  How do they accomplish this?  By quadrupling the work, and hoping half of it sticks.  Every class kicks off with a dictation quiz, which to be honest is not unlike the ones we had at home.  Except rather than having one or two a week, we have one every day, with two times the materials.  The best way I can summarize is that our quizzes are like tests back home, and our tests are like finals.  I can’t even imagine what our finals are like haha.  

But not all is gloom and doom.  After a few weeks of looking awkwardly at my classmates and saying, “Wo… yao… chi…fan” and having them respend, “Wo… ye… yao… chi… fan”, I think we’ve finally gotten the hang of things.  Everyone is here to learn Chinese, and we there is no shame is asking questions to teachers, the Chinese roommates, or even other more experienced IES students.  As much as we dread the inconvenience of the language pledge, we somehow get through the day with a combination of our oh-so-limited Chinese, wild hand gestures, facial expressions, nudges, winks, sign language, and ever useful “INSERT ENGLISH HERE zenme shuo?” (How do you say ______ in English?”.  As my Chinese roommate once said, “If you don’t learn to fail, you will fail to learn”.  Is this the famous Confucius wisdom that is innate to the people of China?  
It amazes me how quickly people pick up on the language while here.  Half the students right now are new students to this program, but the other half are continuing students from last semester.  Most of them didn’t intend on doing it again at first, but it seems that they just loved the study abroad experience so much they extended it to a full year at the last minute.  I feel thats a good thing.  I was once sharing a cab with a bunch of classmates, and one of the returning students was able to pick up a conversation with the cab driver very well.  I was shocked and amazed.  And I though to myself, maybe by the end of the semester I can do that too.  And maybe thats not such a long shot goal; last semester she was in the level I am in currently. 
I always just thought the tongue would come naturally, and I realize that maybe not.  I need to put a lot of work into this semester if I want to improve my Chinese.  Talking with cab drivers, picking up new phrases and increasing fluency with my Chinese roommate, learning from other students, going out there and exploring Beijing with no inhibitions and delving into the culture.  This is the kind of mindset one needs.  
Oh and FYE, some photos
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My Chinese Class.  From left to right: Kaili, Lide, Jieke (Kelly, Cliff, and Jack, respectively).  Why are there only 6 desks in the shot?  Well, you guessed it.  Only 6 students in the class, which seems to be the average for all the classes.  
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Just another manic monday.
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Calligraphy Class!  Don’t be fooled, harder than it looks.  
And don’t forget about…
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THE PANDAS!!!  It doesn’t really fit with the class theme, but it had to be done.  This one might know kung-fu.
Will update soon, with Chunjie adventures.  Chunjie is Chinese new years/spring festival, btw.  
Till next time!

Location: Room 407 at Beiwai University, Beijing, China

Language Intensive…? @_@

OK, so I’m officially freaking out because apparently, the Beijing Language Intensive Program is mad intense.  I had to take a language pledge that said I’ll only speak Chinese during my time in China, with few exceptions.  This is crazy!  I only took 3 semesters of Chinese… As far as I’m concerned I only know how to say nihao and xiexie.  

So I talked to John Cho about it and all he had to say was:
“Suck it up. it’s really not that bad and it’s the main reason why you will improve so much. surround yourself with chinese speakers as much as u can and don’t be afraid to practice with random people you meet like taxi drivers and people at the mart. keep an open mind, remember to love others and not look down on others reasons for being there. you’ll be fine danny, i’d be surprised if you didn’t adjust well”

Sounds like tough love.. haha.  But its reassuring.  I’ll be fine.  No one didn’t like their experience abroad; I won’t be the first.  I’ll learn a lot and explore a lot and grow in lots of different ways.  T minus two days.  Lets get packing!  

Till next time,
Dannie


Location: Upper Dublin (home), PA

Language, language, language

achebe.jpg I may be stereotyping here, but I love African writers because of the way they use the English language. It’s so emotive, so powerful.

In particular, I’m talking about Chinua Achebe, Ngugi wa Thiong’o and Mbwil a M. Ngal — and I suppose being exposed to the writings of these three figures is enough to warrant that above statement, because at least these guys have something that other writers don’t.

So I really believe in the use of language, which is brought about by my comparative literature major that I mentioned in the last entry (this discipline compares literature from different cultures and languages, hence its emphasis on language itself). By the way, I call comparative literature by its short form, CMLIT, a lot.

That said, not only CMLIT, but also my upbringing shaped my perspective on language. My family hails from Peru, so I grew up in a bilingual household (Spanish and English, that is). You notice certain discrepancies between languages in a setting like that: little things like certain phrases or humor not translating quite the right way. Then you start to realize that language even codes the way you perceive yourself, others, the world.

Fascinating stuff.

So I’m going to escribir en espa�ol cuando me da la gana, just to keep you on your toes. Since I’m going abroad to Latin America, I thought it’d be a cool thing to do.

Now I’m going to post this really cheesy video of a Pablo Neruda poem (number 20 from 20 Love Poems and a Song of Despair). I’m a sucker for poetry being read out loud, especially in other languages. There’s a certain music to it, no?

lo


Location: State College, PA