::headdesk:: chinese. argh.

[permetaform]

TONE SHIFTS.

dude, no WONDER I was getting so confused with the accents. asklhdfukjh.

Comments

[andmydog.livejournal.com]

Chinese breaks my head. Why do all the fascinating languages have to be so damn complex?!

[penm.livejournal.com]

Mandarin. I used to take Oriental studies in grade three and gave up because it was too hard. I wish I'd stuck with it. I want to learn so badly now but I'll never have a native accent.

Can you speak cantonese?

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

Japanese does my head in more than enough, I don't think I'd ever consider trying Chinese!

[ninhursag.livejournal.com]

Urgh. Yeah, I guess Chinese is pretty much out of the question for those of us who are mostly tone deaf.

[permetaform]

Latin? ::ganders.quails.ducks:: heh, see, with chinese at least all I need to learn is how to write it; with Latin, god, I think I would turn into one big puddle of "buh?"

[permetaform]

heh, you know, I wonder now if people from cultures with tonal languages are less tone deaf than people from other cultures. o.0

[permetaform]

XD You sorta know half of it already, no?

[permetaform]

nope, mainland. Actually some of it might've filtered in if you're around family who speak it often...I'm trying to teach myself more of it and finding that I knew more than I thought I knew. =)

[kokkoryuha.livejournal.com]

... Having heard Sinhalese (the language of Sri Lanka), this sounds almost easy 0.o (Our friend spoke to us in his native language and it seriously sounds like a bunch of "aws" strung together... And then I went "0.o")

(And yet, Japanese makes sense to me... And I'm excited about learning it)

[penm.livejournal.com]

I can say some words in canto. Words that are absolutely useless, like 'fat girl' and 'pork spare ribs' and chinese buns and things like that. But mandarin is a lot different, and the parents, if I must learn an oriental language, want me to learn Mandarin instead of canto because canto is dying out.

Aside: why are there so many different dialects? I know that cantonese is also called 'namsoon' or it is by the speakers of Chinese in Mauritius. I know there's a different kind of Chinese called Hakka or something like that. And then there's Mandarin which is dissimilar to both. It's rather disconcerting.

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

It's always fascinating, actually, to see how the uses of the kanji have drifted - the areas the meanings are the same, and where they've changed. But that's a passing interest and doesn't involve trying to learn how to speak it XD. Plus Japanese gives additional hints by tacking useful things like verb endings and noun markers onto the kanji!

[permetaform]

but verbs make things difficult! they change yanno! Chinese just has lots of adverbs. _{which, granted, all 'sound the same', buuuuuut ::wry grin::}

[ninhursag.livejournal.com]

Interesting point. I hope so, otherwise a certain percentage of those populations are doomed to be incomprehensible, aren't they? Scary thought.

[tiggymalvern.livejournal.com]

But I'm used to verb endings that change, every language I've ever dealt with has them. Okay, you have to actually learn them, which sucks a bit, but I wouldn't know where to start with a language without them!

[permetaform]

details! ;D

[permetaform]

non-tone deafness out of self-preservation? ;D

[permetaform]

I think it's partly like Europe...it might've been interesting if Napoleon (or Charlemange) actually succeeded in uniting everybody, we'd all be speaking a form of 'French'. But in essence I think that's what happened with Chinese.

wait, didja ever see Hero?

[permetaform]

but it's so pretty! _{would it be facinating if it's not complex? ;D}

[permetaform]

I don't think I've ever heard Sinhalese before, which actually would be interesting, 'cause do their language derive more from India or from Indonesia and the other islands?

and, ooo, you're learning japanese?

[ninhursag.livejournal.com]

Clearly tone deafness is not a life style choice approved of by some people's illustrious ancestors. :D

[permetaform]

::DIES::

bless you

[xsmoonshine.livejournal.com]

Tone non-deafness may be a childhood training thing - some study in a music school a while back found a lot of the students who speak chinese have perfect pitch .

[tehshiny.livejournal.com]

Heh. People used to tell me that English is the hardest language to learn due to all the exceptions and I'd tell them "Try learning Mandarin." >:D

[penm.livejournal.com]

Yes I did, actually. :) Wish I understood any of what they were saying. I insisted on watching it in its original mandarin. My sister folded when she heard the language. It was beauty, really.

[andtheafterglow.livejournal.com]

i've been studying chinese for about a year now.. it's brutal, but i really, really love it. :)