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Post by OZgronk on Jun 8, 2006 14:25:36 GMT 7
We just got back from our week in Shanghai, and next week its back to OZ after almost 18 months here.
Our week in Shanghai however has answered many questions that have bothered us during our time here in the bowels of Hunan.
We have always wondered where the meat from ducks and chicken ends up, as all our meals here in Yongzhou consist only of bones, beaks, heads and feet. Now we know. The good bits all end up in Shanghai.
Then there has been the nagging worry that we are no longer capable of learning a new language.
For months when we first came to Hunan, we went to our weekly Mandarin classes, only to be extremely disappointed when, despite all our efforts, we could neither understand or be understood when we ventured out onto the streets. We gave up trying to learn, as it was a pointless exercise.
But in Shanghai something strange happened. We could suddenly be understood when we asked for things in Chinese, we could correct people talking about us and explain we were actually from Australia and not from America, we could even order meals without having to drag the people into the kitchen to point out what we wanted! It was as if a "cone of silence" had been lifted.
Then there was the silence of the streets. We had become so used to the continuous blaring of bus and truck airhorns, that we thought that Chinese drivers must be instructed to actually lean on the horns...but not so in Shanghai..you can have a normal conversation in the streets!
We also found that In Shanghai the locals have discovered that tiles aren't just for sticking onto outside walls, that floors too can be tiled giving a nice clean and shiny appearance to the concrete floors that we have become used to.
And what about the spitting? There was barely a hoik to be heard!
Whats more we obviously don't have two heads. Not once in the week were we subjected to stares, we could stop in the streets without causing a a crowd to build up around us or cause nose to tail prangs as drivers, intrigued by the sight of us, plough into each other.
No wonder the Westerners we spoke to who were on their "Ten day Best of China" tours would gush about how modern and civilised China was and wouldn't believe us when we pointed out that it was a bit like declaring what a friendly and happy country America is after spending three days at Disneyland!
I know that my rantings here at the saloon are getting those nods of agreement that actually mean "well what did you expect in China's biggest city".
However I must say that when we got out of the three wheel taxi when we arrived back to school yesterday it was great to have the Principal and several teachers come down to welcome us home and help us with our bags.
It was delightful too to have the Senior Threes run up to us to tell us about how they went in day-one of the College entrance exams, and to have the lady in our little hole in the wall eatery make us our special Blood Duck dish and sit with us with a bag of sunflower seeds as she tried to teach us the names of the weeds with which she had garnished the dish.
Yes, its great to go away but its always great to get back "home".
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Decurso
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Post by Decurso on Jun 8, 2006 14:46:48 GMT 7
I hear you OG.I had very mixed feelings about Shanghai.I liked it largely because I went at a time when I really needed a break from China..and Shanghai is a good place to do that.A week of shooting darts,eating western food,meeting other foreigners and sipping draft in a pub was just what the doctor ordered.
But I would NEVER want to live there.Shanghai sucks compared to Beijing.There are few sights to see,the nightlife is awful,it's too civilized and it's even more expensive than Hong Kong.
Interesting to hear your Chinese was better understood in Shanghai.I found few oppurtunities to practice Chinese there.Part of it was due to mostly keeping western company.But also most people in Shanghai had better English than my Chinese so it was easier to just speak English.
If your Chinese isn't working at home..my guess would be people just aren't making the effort.Hunan has a reputation of being backwards and somewhat unfriendly to foreigners.They probably automatically assume you're speaking English and don't bother to listen.Happens to me sometimes and it's maddening.And don't forget most people over 40 only speak local dialect in smaller cities.
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Post by George61 on Jun 8, 2006 14:54:26 GMT 7
Probably can't find that in Shanghai. It's only there for the money!!
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Post by Dr. Gonzo on Jun 8, 2006 15:08:36 GMT 7
"Shanghai" covers a large tract of humanity. The SW suburb we lived in had its share of staring and hoiking. If you couldn't speak Mandarin you became dependant on others; fortunately I didn't have to do this. Many older people speak only Shanghainese, and many of the migrants speak their local dialect and maybe a bit of Mandarin: they'd beam with pleasure when we established a common language. So, its linguistically diverse. More expensive than HK? Well, if you really tried, but in HK its near impossible to live cheaply. Suburban SH you needn't fork out much more than Changsha or Wuhan. And you get more variety. All the different regions are represented and the street food [away from the centre that is] is very good. Visiting SH doesn't give a full picture.
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Post by OZgronk on Jun 8, 2006 15:29:50 GMT 7
They probably automatically assume you're speaking English and don't bother to listen.Happens to me sometimes and it's maddening.And don't forget most people over 40 only speak local dialect in smaller cities. You are spot on there Decurso, So often we find that as soon as they see us and we start to open our mouths they get all flustered, look away and don't even try to listen or make an effort to see what we want. At the bus station here last week when we were heading to Shanghai, we finally got to the ticket window after waiting in line for a good ten minutes and the girl looked up, a look of terror crossed her face and she ran into the office. After about 15 minutes (I am not joking) and with the line now out the door (only one window open), another ticket seller came out to serve me (whilst the first lady peered around the door). Now how hard is it to understand "er piao Changsha" when all you are selling is bus tickets at the bus station that only has 10 buses a day to Changsha and 2 a day to Guilin, ...even if my Chinese is shonky!
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Post by Stil on Jun 8, 2006 15:41:04 GMT 7
If your Chinese isn't working at home..my guess would be people just aren't making the effort.Hunan has a reputation of being backwards and somewhat unfriendly to foreigners.They probably automatically assume you're speaking English and don't bother to listen.Happens to me sometimes and it's maddening.And don't forget most people over 40 only speak local dialect in smaller cities. I live in Hunan in a very small town and I believe that reputation is totally off the mark (except for Changsha). Hunan people are amoung the most friendly I've met in China. It is however true that when you travel outside of Hunan it is easier to understand and be understood by Chinese people, especially going east. Most of the local languages here are nothing like Putonghua and so when they speak Mandarin it is not even close to standard. Ask anybody here where they are from and they will proudly tell you "Fulan"
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woza17
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Post by woza17 on Jun 8, 2006 17:10:21 GMT 7
Ozgronk all our drivers are from Hunan and when I listen to them it sounds sort of Japanese. I liked your insights. I agree the Hunan people are lovely except for that dog faced bitch that I have to travel with every morning.
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Post by OZgronk on Jun 8, 2006 19:24:13 GMT 7
Most of the local languages here are nothing like Putonghua and so when they speak Mandarin it is not even close to standard. Ask anybody here where they are from and they will proudly tell you "Fulan" You are right Still and only when you live here do you realise how hard it is to communicate. I have had two examples where even the Chinese in Hunan have trouble. One was last week on the bus to Changsha where the Chinese bloke sitting next to me is an engineer who travels around maintaining paper mills. He lives in Yongzhou like us and he said he hated going to other provinces because he cannot understand what his customers want. Another example was a doctor who had just come from Hubai which is the Provence imediately north of here, to work in our hospital and he explained he was worried as he couldn't understand what his patients here in Yongzhou were saying and they couldn't grasp what he was telling them either so he had to have another doctor with him to translate! Oh, and our locals call it Foonan
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Post by Stil on Jun 8, 2006 19:52:03 GMT 7
Oh, and our locals call it Foonan I've heard that too! The local language here is tough. I had been thinking about moving to the northeast somewhere to have a better chance to improve my listening skills but an interesting thing happened when I went travelling recently. I had met up with some local foreigners who have been here a little longer than I but could speak much better.They had a lot of trouble with listen comprehension if the Chinese person wasn't speaking standard Putonghua. I found myself translating for them. Now this wasn't in Hunan. Trying to understand people here had actually made my listening skills better, i just can't undrstand my own locals!. If a person is from places like Shandong or Haerbin, it's a breeze understanding them (by comparison) It really is different here though for example jidan is egg. In my town it's bobo. An hour south of me it's gaga. go mali ge - what are you doing? gan shenme? cha fon la bo? - have you eaten? chi fan le ma? da la ja? Where are you going? dao nali?
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Decurso
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Post by Decurso on Jun 8, 2006 21:13:07 GMT 7
Yup..this is a toughie.Handan hua is completely out of my grasp..everything is different.My mandarin is coming along pretty well..but it's useless with older folks.
Fortunately you can practically have a full conversation just using grunts and gestures here.I think "Uh" and "Ah" are the two most frequently used Chinese words.
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Post by Mr Nobody on Jun 8, 2006 22:47:09 GMT 7
My small experience gives a slight recommendation. I can speak a little Guangdonghua, understand quite a bit more. This, plus the local dialect which is similar, has completely stuffed my attempts at learning putonghua. I get so confused. Now, I am a language retard. If I was in your class I would be the poor bastard that couldn't get it straight, even if I tried, and by the time I got to college, I would be the guy in the corner who had given up. BUt seriously, folks, learning the 'dialects' before the bloody main so called putonghua has me stymied. I would AVOID LEARNING ANYTHING ELSE LIKE THE PLAGUE until I was fairly good, if I were you. Which I am not. When I go back to HK, now I can't even understand Guangdonghua. Its a complete poo.
Trying to sort it out in my head, but not succeeding. So far.
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Decurso
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Post by Decurso on Jun 9, 2006 2:02:30 GMT 7
Nobody..your neck of the woods sounds difficult.Is it it Mandarin or Cantonese there?It's not your fault..the south is m'kayed up when it comes to language.
But learnining Pu Tong Hua isn't that difficult.Using it is another story.It's not uncommon for me to speak Mandarin to a local...not be understood..and have an eavesdropper translate into Handan hua.It's inefficient(like everything else here)..but it works.
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Post by Mr Nobody on Jun 9, 2006 6:27:25 GMT 7
We have at least 15 dialects in the area, largest in china except for Yunnan. About 4 major ones. Zhong, Dong, bai hua (subdialect of Cantonese - the majority), dunno the rest. Lots. They are only partly or not at all related to each other - some are related to Thai, or Vietnamese. Nothing related to Putonghua, though. Virtually every cultural group is represented here too.
They also use it differently.
Don't forget, putonghua isn't Chinese, really, but a dialect of Manchurian, from the invaders, 1600 or so onwards. And Cantonese only missed out by one vote in becoming the people's tongue, and that because Mao asked the academics in Bejing to choose a language. THe idiot scholars chose what is now Putonghua, not even a chinese language, because they were Mandarin speakers, and high 'caste' or whatever you want to call it.
Dumb as dogpoo.
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Post by Mr Nobody on Jun 9, 2006 6:29:25 GMT 7
Oh, yeah, I know it isn't that it is hard as a language. I just can't sort out what to say because I have to go through the list of different language bits I know. SOmetimes, for some reason, french and german and others get mixed in.
My brain hurts.
My wife on the other hand, all of her students can speak their native dialects in class, and she can answer in local, their dialect, or putonghua, or english.
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Post by OZgronk on Jun 9, 2006 13:03:34 GMT 7
Another example was a doctor who had just come from Hubai which is the Provence immediately north of here, to work in our hospital and he explained he was worried as he couldn't understand what his patients here in Yongzhou were saying and they couldn't grasp what he was telling them either so he had to have another doctor with him to translate! That Doctor actually raised the language problem with us after the waitress rattled off something about what we had ordered and Mrs OG answered her. The Doctor asked us what we had been talking about as he had no idea what either had said. Trying to understand people here had actually made my listening skills better, Our ears now have to strain so much in order to pick up just a few words that will give some meaning to conversations with us, that when we were in Shanghai we could eavesdrop, and whisper to each other..."hey, they're talking about such and such" which has made us feel so much better about ourselves. This thread has shown that so many of us out in the sticks are having similar problems with the language... its not our pickled brains causing it! But then I suppose similar things can be said about the English language in other countries. I gave up watching Brokeback Mountain within the first 10 minutes because I couldn't understand what they were saying and I'm blowed if I can understand what Irish, Welsh and Scots are saying half the time either. But then I also failed Advanced Circuit Analysis at Tech' because the lecturer, a Mr Papadopalus, fresh from Greece, had such a hard time with pronunciation that I spent most of my time arguing with him about his speech rather than concentrating on the subject. I have since found out that it was a deliberate ploy by the college to employ him to teach that subject as there were too many of us on the course and they needed some way of weeding people out.
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Post by acjade on Jun 9, 2006 13:20:16 GMT 7
Most of my conversational Chinese occurs in the village so I find it easier to understand Shaanxi dialect. Instead of Shi they say si and every word sounds like it's in the fourth tone which makes them sound as if they are perpetually arguing.
They have a lot of trouble understanding my Putong hua unless they have children who translate for them.
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Post by Lotus Eater on Jun 9, 2006 13:42:22 GMT 7
I too get the Shaanxi-hua, and quite a few of my friends speak it and try to teach me. Out in the villages I speak the minor bits I know, and then have friends translate both my English and Putonghua so their families can understand me.
My hairdressers will launch into their local dialects - they all come from different places - and then I am really lost and they have a great time stirring me.
However, I find all of this re-assuring. If they cannot understand each other, if the tones change with Putonhgua in different places, if they have to frequently ask each other 'gong li de li?" then I don't feel so inadequate!
My students tell me that many of them spend the first couple of weeks of their first year adjusting to each others (and the lecturers) Putonghua.
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Post by Stil on Jun 9, 2006 16:09:02 GMT 7
Shi to si accent is common throughout the south as is n to l. Those I don't find hard to understand but h to f and d to t are not easy to cope with. I find people in the south speak faster than those in the north too. It's hard enough when people here are speaking putonghua, but when they speak the local dialect all I can say is "tam bu ton, ne fei ja butoufua buo?" (Ting bu dong, ni hui jiang putonghua ma?)
They definitely don't expect you to speak it though. Other Chinese don't speak it. I have a friend that's lived here for 15 years and she only understands a little and can't speak at all. In my little city there are 4 versions of the dialect, north, south, east and west. All are a little different and create some confusion but generally they can understand each other. There is also the problem of names. Everybody gives their name in Putonghua, but they use dialect when calling out to each other so it's hard to know who is talking to whom. Yang Mu becomes You Miao and everybody calls her Miaomiao. So someone asks me if I've seen Miaomiao and I have no idea.
This is truly the only reason I have considered moving.
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Post by Mr Nobody on Jun 9, 2006 16:21:04 GMT 7
Oh, yeah, I left out the country village and town and city dialects of each regional bloody language thing. Plus accents. Plus, many people here seem to speak more than one dialect, since they grew up around so many. So, from one person to another, they change, in the same conversation, at times. ARRGGHHHH!
like Mei you is mee yu in dhong dialect. 'dhong' sounds almost like 'drunk', which fits. Then there is the miao, zhong, god only knows. And a lot of these are bonefide languages, not just dialects. THey have their own dialects, eg, the ones here speak a dialect differently from the same 'nationality' in Yunnan. Or in VIetnam, or Thailand. Ad nearly bloody infinitum. Then there is the accent. People from Yulin speak putonghua with the high tone extra high, because of their own dialect does that. Makes it sound weird. Stuff like that.
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Post by acjade on Jun 9, 2006 16:27:22 GMT 7
It's weird, isn't it. We end up speaking the lingo except the locals don't understand us because they speak they're own regional dialect.
Still, I think it's a matter of experience. Imagine a Chinese English student leaving China and going to live somewhere like Cornwell. And my Dad's mother spoke very strange English with a Southern, County Clare accent. As a child I was always saying, 'What did you say, Nana?'
She made great honeycomb but.
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Post by Stil on Jun 9, 2006 16:41:12 GMT 7
like Mei you is mee yu in dhong dialect. Are you sure they are not saying "I am a fish"? We should get a list of the different Mei you's. It's the most common thing I hear. In Hunan, Dayao town Mei you is Mou die
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Post by Mr Nobody on Jun 9, 2006 19:17:42 GMT 7
Look, down here, to some people it could be "I am a fish" but to the guy standing next to him, it is "nothing" and to the next guy, it is asking for a date. Who knows?
That is why I am having such problems.
Anyway, I probably have it wrong.
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Post by Lotus Eater on Jun 10, 2006 3:22:14 GMT 7
Problem with learning the dialect is that when you leave the village it doesn't work any more. I have a friend who has learned the local dialect, comes into town (from less than 1 hour away) and can't make himself understood.
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Post by Dr. Gonzo on Jun 11, 2006 14:35:20 GMT 7
I had weekly conversation classes with a group of business people, all MA/PhD holders. One was from Hunan and spoke very good English and German. Well I guess his German was good, as he'd lived there for several years. I asked him to speak some Hunanhua to the class, and no-one had any idea what he was saying. One country, one hundred languages.
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Post by Mr Nobody on Jun 11, 2006 21:17:55 GMT 7
A country divided by a common language.
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