I guess your Chinese must be really good then.
On one instance when I asked for water the waitress brought me Coke, it's a liquid anyway...
I guess your Chinese must be really good then.
On one instance when I asked for water the waitress brought me Coke, it's a liquid anyway...
Who are these 'more intuitive' people? Where do they hang out? Most HK locals I know, socially and at work, get pretty impressed at the simplest little phrase of Canto. Even people I don't know - say the cashier at the local Cafe De Coral - get's real worked up over it. Waaaaaaaaaaa! Busting out the Canto is fun and useful but I doubt many expats do it to get some form of high-fiving respect or approval by the local folk.
When you learn a language, majority of people get into that 'high' state of wanting to impress (unless the language you learn is English where people will expect you to know the language) whether that is through impressing locals or impressing your friends through speaking with locals in that language. The form doesn't matter. It is not 'wrong' to feel the need to impress, but when the intent is no longer a pure focus on learning the language, mastery of it becomes inconsistent and difficult to follow through.
There are different depths when it comes to speaking a language. The ones with the best grasp of it are the ones w/ motivations distinct from those looking to impress.
By no means am I discouraging the OP.
Creative, until you mentioned it ,nobody was trying to impress anyone (except perhaps themselves).
The only Chinese radicals worth knowing about are behind bars aren't they?
Why do some people who have learnt to read CHinese characters think it is cool to discuss the structure of Hanzi - when it is not.
Even as a 10 a penny Mandarin speaker life in Hong Kong is more rewarding (5 years ago no one wanted to speak it now there is no shame!)
Last edited by East_coast; 19-04-2011 at 06:59 PM.
haha. man, I am laughing my ass off.
As you don't understand the subject matter ( radicals ) you are not in a position to judge how cool or uncool it is.
Actually, it is extremely useful as many different Chinese characters are pronounced in the same way. So mentioning the radical is the quickest way to let others know which character you mean.
But I guess all this is beyond your comprehension.
Last edited by Morrison; 19-04-2011 at 07:16 PM.