As mentioned earlier, one of my New Years Resolutions is to
9. Sit the HSK Chinese exam
which essentially means IMPROVE MY CHINESE!
This year I actually want to make an effort to improve my Chinese. There's no time as the present as they say, and if I don't start now, I'll never get better.
I found a Chinese class to attend, and so my dad and I attended. It turned out to be a conversational group, where there was a conversation/discussion led by a Chinese teacher. There were a few students there, and then my dad and I. Yeah, a bit odd for a 25-year-old to bring along his dad, but I thought my dad would be interested and in the end he helped me out quite a bit!
The other students were either Cantonese speakers or non-Chinese people who had lived in China for a few years and were wanting to keep their Chinese up. All of them had much better Chinese than me, so I was struggling to keep up and understand everything!
Fortunately the conversation wasn't as difficult as one between fluent speakers, but with my limited Chinese, I could still only understand a few things and would take too long to try figure out what something meant.
To be honest, it was a little soul-crushing! It's how I felt when I first started attending church. I'm used to it now, and people do help translate for me, but it is quite depressing when you feel left out because you can't understand and realise how bad your Chinese really is.
I know the only way to improve though is to practise, practise, practise, but I think I might need a more structured class with homework, tests, etc. to help push me!
The quest continues...
Showing posts with label Learning Chinese. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Learning Chinese. Show all posts
Tuesday, 11 February 2014
Wednesday, 18 September 2013
Working on That Asian Side of Me
Recently I've had a few people try to speak to me in Chinese, and after having tried to speak Chinese at the Mid-Autumn Festival and failed miserably, it's made me realise I've got to start working on my Chinese again!
I'm going to try start blogging on my Chinese blog to practise my Chinese, but beware: it's full of mistakes, so if you do actually understand it, feel free to have a read and correct me, or read and laugh if you prefer!
Thursday, 14 February 2013
Happy 14th of February
Happy Valentine's Day/Singles Appreciation Day everyone!
As usual it was just another sunny Thursday at home for me, enjoying the simple life of watching The Biggest Loser at home.
I did one surprise in the mail though. A week or two ago, I saw an ad on the side of my Facebook page, offering some free razor, so I thought I'd just fill out the form and see if they'd really give me something for free...
Sure enough, a delivery guy was at the door with a package for me!
It will definitely be a beardless Valentine's Day!
Saturday, 9 February 2013
Time to Testify!
Tomorrow morning Hamish and I will be giving my baptism testimony at church! Aonghas will be giving his next month, and then we'll hopefully be getting baptised in Easter.
We were originally meant to get baptised last Christmas, but because of exams and work, we decided to postpone it a bit so we could put some thought and effort into our testimonies.
Admittedly, Karvin, our youth pastor reminded us a couple Sundays ago to submit our testimonies to him by the following Wednesday, as we had had months to get it ready. However, Hamish and I hadn't finished them! We scrambled to finish them. I found it difficult to start, as with most essays and reports I write. However, once I got started, it just all came out.
I think the same thing happened with Hamish. He took a while to get started, but once he got started, HE GOT GOING.
We decided to walk to church that following Friday morning (our mum had already gone to church to help out with some kids playgroup, so we had no transport!) to work on our testimonies with Karvin. Hamish had a job interview on the telephone along the way which was extra cool.
We read our testimonies to Karvin, and he was fine with mine. Originally Hamish had four pages of writing, but managed to cut it down to two. Even with his abridged version though, it took 11 minutes! They worked on it a bit more and managed to halve it down to about five minutes.
For me, I've always wanted read my testimony in Chinese ever since I joined our church and witnessed others giving their testimonies in Chinese. To me, I just feel like it would be demonstrating how it has been a big influence in my faith (being a Chinese church), and that since the majority of the congregation is Chinese, I should put in the effort to speak their language! I'll have a translator anyway, right?
What I find funny is that up till this point people have been asking me if I will be presenting my testimony in Chinese, and have been encouraging me to do so. However, in the weeks leading up to it, I've been discouraged from doing so, for fear of no one understanding me! Maybe they will know how I feel when Chinese baptism testimonies don't get translated into English!
A few close friends of mine told me I should pray about it, so I did.
Anyway, with not wanting to let go of a long-held dream of mine, I was determined to give my testimony in Chinese, even though the pastor was thinking I was going to do it in English. The plan was I would practise in Chinese, then make a decision closer to the day and let the pastor know if I did decide to do it in Chinese.
However, it looks like I'll be doing it in English, seeing as the translation won't be ready in time for me to practise. There goes another dream of mine!
Maybe this was how it was meant to be in the end? I suppose it's not the end of the world, and at least I will be more comfortable with my delivery.
And as Jenny has tried pointing out to me, it's a declaration of my commitment to God in front of others and that's what is most important (or something like that!).
What will make tomorrow extra special is that we'll be having a Chinese New Year pot luck lunch after the combined service and Sunday school, so it'll be an interesting day! Oh...and I have to lead kid's worship!
I better practise more!
We were originally meant to get baptised last Christmas, but because of exams and work, we decided to postpone it a bit so we could put some thought and effort into our testimonies.
Admittedly, Karvin, our youth pastor reminded us a couple Sundays ago to submit our testimonies to him by the following Wednesday, as we had had months to get it ready. However, Hamish and I hadn't finished them! We scrambled to finish them. I found it difficult to start, as with most essays and reports I write. However, once I got started, it just all came out.
I think the same thing happened with Hamish. He took a while to get started, but once he got started, HE GOT GOING.
We decided to walk to church that following Friday morning (our mum had already gone to church to help out with some kids playgroup, so we had no transport!) to work on our testimonies with Karvin. Hamish had a job interview on the telephone along the way which was extra cool.
We read our testimonies to Karvin, and he was fine with mine. Originally Hamish had four pages of writing, but managed to cut it down to two. Even with his abridged version though, it took 11 minutes! They worked on it a bit more and managed to halve it down to about five minutes.
For me, I've always wanted read my testimony in Chinese ever since I joined our church and witnessed others giving their testimonies in Chinese. To me, I just feel like it would be demonstrating how it has been a big influence in my faith (being a Chinese church), and that since the majority of the congregation is Chinese, I should put in the effort to speak their language! I'll have a translator anyway, right?
What I find funny is that up till this point people have been asking me if I will be presenting my testimony in Chinese, and have been encouraging me to do so. However, in the weeks leading up to it, I've been discouraged from doing so, for fear of no one understanding me! Maybe they will know how I feel when Chinese baptism testimonies don't get translated into English!
A few close friends of mine told me I should pray about it, so I did.
Anyway, with not wanting to let go of a long-held dream of mine, I was determined to give my testimony in Chinese, even though the pastor was thinking I was going to do it in English. The plan was I would practise in Chinese, then make a decision closer to the day and let the pastor know if I did decide to do it in Chinese.
However, it looks like I'll be doing it in English, seeing as the translation won't be ready in time for me to practise. There goes another dream of mine!
Maybe this was how it was meant to be in the end? I suppose it's not the end of the world, and at least I will be more comfortable with my delivery.
And as Jenny has tried pointing out to me, it's a declaration of my commitment to God in front of others and that's what is most important (or something like that!).
What will make tomorrow extra special is that we'll be having a Chinese New Year pot luck lunch after the combined service and Sunday school, so it'll be an interesting day! Oh...and I have to lead kid's worship!
I better practise more!
Tuesday, 25 January 2011
Re-prioritising My Goals
I think I've finally decided what my study goals will be alongside doing my pharmacy internship and becoming a registered pharmacist!
For a while I've been set on trying to either do some online distance learning course or taking evening classes to get a Graduate Diploma/Certificate in something like Arts (Chinese), or maybe something relating to the health field. However, it would require me to take university papers which cost almost $1000 each, and I would have to study part time which means I wouldn't complete it within a year. Because I plan on doing post-grad studies next year anyway, I don't want to waste my money on a half-completed qualification! It also costs so much that if I end up not being able to study properly for these papers because of work or the assignments/tests I have to focus on for pharmacy and end up giving up on those papers, I'll have wasted a whole lot of money!
Therefore, I've decided instead to aim for two exams that are a lot cheaper to sit and I can study for on my own...more or less:
- HSK Test: This is a test on a non-native Chinese speaker's ability to read, write, listen and speak Mandarin Chinese. I've been meaning to learn Chinese for a while, so this will give me motivation to keep on going and recover all of the Chinese I've lost over the past four years since high school. I should really get my Chinese blog going again!
- Trinity Grade 6-7 Music Theory Exam: I bought several music theory books late last year, so I might as well make use of them and fulfill my dream of passing grade 8 music theory!
At least by working towards these two tests/exams, I will also be trying to fulfill my New Years' Resolutions:
For a while I've been set on trying to either do some online distance learning course or taking evening classes to get a Graduate Diploma/Certificate in something like Arts (Chinese), or maybe something relating to the health field. However, it would require me to take university papers which cost almost $1000 each, and I would have to study part time which means I wouldn't complete it within a year. Because I plan on doing post-grad studies next year anyway, I don't want to waste my money on a half-completed qualification! It also costs so much that if I end up not being able to study properly for these papers because of work or the assignments/tests I have to focus on for pharmacy and end up giving up on those papers, I'll have wasted a whole lot of money!
Therefore, I've decided instead to aim for two exams that are a lot cheaper to sit and I can study for on my own...more or less:
- HSK Test: This is a test on a non-native Chinese speaker's ability to read, write, listen and speak Mandarin Chinese. I've been meaning to learn Chinese for a while, so this will give me motivation to keep on going and recover all of the Chinese I've lost over the past four years since high school. I should really get my Chinese blog going again!
- Trinity Grade 6-7 Music Theory Exam: I bought several music theory books late last year, so I might as well make use of them and fulfill my dream of passing grade 8 music theory!
At least by working towards these two tests/exams, I will also be trying to fulfill my New Years' Resolutions:
12. Sit a music theory/Chinese exam
20. This should've come earlier but study Chinese and return to at least NCEA Level 3 Chinese level..and be more Chinese (throw that in as well)Once I finish my internship, I may even consider going to China for a few weeks or maybe a semester to study...if it's feasible. If not, I'll just do post-graduate study while working part-time! I think I'm starting to get somewhere with my life planning! Any further advice or suggestions welcome!
14. Decide what I want to do with my life after I (hopefully) complete my pharmacy internship
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)