Jane, Mandarin, Nell, short people, BLECH, and tones
Jane W. sent an email thanking me for my gift of a picture frame, which was nice and polite. I replied to Mandy's email as I did this morning, too. Nell J. wanted to add me on FB via the Puckheads, so why not? Corey then got on MSN to tell me that short people suck; I knew he was doing it on purpose to get me to yell at him, which I did anyway since I've missed that. Yes, I do miss the strangest things, haha! Apparently, old ladies won't get things from the low shelves for him, but that's understandable! He says he had a class on prank calls today, too. I also asked him if he'd heard about those nasty urine-cooked eggs, then we talked about Mandarin / Cantonese and McDonalds. "Well, even if the tones are right, there's still like a billion words that all have the same sound AND tone. It's not a very good system in my opinion... have more possible sounds :P Longer words, maybe... something to differentiate between all the things that sound exactly alike."
"Jane says it's because Chinese people are smarter and can tell the difference. I say it's because the person that invented it didn't think things through well enough. :P English is kind of a big mess, too, but at least our words are mostly distinguishable, and we have writing that's possible to read without years of study. Even I can say 'Happy Birthday.' :P Well, sometimes people tell me I'm perfect, and sometimes people tell me they totally can't understand me since I usually forget the tones. At McDonalds a couple times, they tried to give me #10 instead of #4 (4 is si, 10 is shi) I held my fingers up when I said it, and other people say I pronounce it PERFECTLY, so I think they were just dumb. Some people are afraid of using Chinese with me anyway, so they just switch to broken English and make mistakes. They really don't even listen to my Chinese, unless I want them to speak English... then they can't speak a word. :P"
This is what he had to say about teaching: "I had a class about prank calls today. The classes yesterday were okay, the ones today weren't that enthusiastic, but my afternoon class (which is normally dead) was extra small because it's Tomb Sweeping Day tomorrow, so not many people came. Small classes generally will talk more. the more people that come, the quieter they get. They're mostly afraid of each other, more than me. My night class is usually terrible, but a lady that knows all my complaints recently encouraged a new girl to talk to me. That worked, and this girl is like my new best student, and now SHE is encouraging other people to talk, too... if that chain continues, we just might fix everything for a while. Last night's class was great, and I have heard about pee eggs. Blech. They say Chinese people will eat anything... that might not be literally true, but I think it's close. :P"
Then I said that I should try sleeping at 2:33 AM. He replied with, "I should try eating now. It's 5:35 PM, and I have to leave in 45 minutes to go teach my Superior class about the Razzies for two hours. It's the Superior class, and they talk a lot. I need like three hours with them regardless of the topic, most of the time. They actually use English, which is why they're in the Superior class. :P The problem with them is that they like to hear themselves talk, and don't want to listen to much of what I say. That's a better problem than my other classes, though."
"Jane says it's because Chinese people are smarter and can tell the difference. I say it's because the person that invented it didn't think things through well enough. :P English is kind of a big mess, too, but at least our words are mostly distinguishable, and we have writing that's possible to read without years of study. Even I can say 'Happy Birthday.' :P Well, sometimes people tell me I'm perfect, and sometimes people tell me they totally can't understand me since I usually forget the tones. At McDonalds a couple times, they tried to give me #10 instead of #4 (4 is si, 10 is shi) I held my fingers up when I said it, and other people say I pronounce it PERFECTLY, so I think they were just dumb. Some people are afraid of using Chinese with me anyway, so they just switch to broken English and make mistakes. They really don't even listen to my Chinese, unless I want them to speak English... then they can't speak a word. :P"
This is what he had to say about teaching: "I had a class about prank calls today. The classes yesterday were okay, the ones today weren't that enthusiastic, but my afternoon class (which is normally dead) was extra small because it's Tomb Sweeping Day tomorrow, so not many people came. Small classes generally will talk more. the more people that come, the quieter they get. They're mostly afraid of each other, more than me. My night class is usually terrible, but a lady that knows all my complaints recently encouraged a new girl to talk to me. That worked, and this girl is like my new best student, and now SHE is encouraging other people to talk, too... if that chain continues, we just might fix everything for a while. Last night's class was great, and I have heard about pee eggs. Blech. They say Chinese people will eat anything... that might not be literally true, but I think it's close. :P"
Then I said that I should try sleeping at 2:33 AM. He replied with, "I should try eating now. It's 5:35 PM, and I have to leave in 45 minutes to go teach my Superior class about the Razzies for two hours. It's the Superior class, and they talk a lot. I need like three hours with them regardless of the topic, most of the time. They actually use English, which is why they're in the Superior class. :P The problem with them is that they like to hear themselves talk, and don't want to listen to much of what I say. That's a better problem than my other classes, though."
Labels: chinese, corey, emails, facebook, food, hockey, jane, mandy, msn, phone calls, presents, reading, school, taiwan, weird stuff, words
posted by Flami at 2:43:00 AM
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