339 days to go (tofu's not bad, i just prefer buns)
Visiting a local temple in Qingdao today, I befriend Wang Xiaojie (Miss Wang) who invites me to join the buddhist monks as they take their lunch. Great! A chance to practice Mandarin ...
Slight problem: I have this (weird, I know) dislike of Tofu, and the hot steaming bowl of it in front of me is going to prove something of a challenge if I want to avoid that compulsive gagging sensation I normally get when I eat it.
Befitting lunch at a temple, a heaven-sent solution arrives when Wang Xioajie returns with more food - two enormous buns (manto) for us to eat with our tofu and sprouts. Never have plain, doughy buns tasted sooo good!
"bu hao chi?" (not good food?) she asks ... pointing directly at the tofu I have been trying to avoid.
The Challenge: Using 50 words of Chinese or less, find a face saving way to avoid having to say that you don't like the tofu.
The Solution: Wo xihuan tofu yidiar, keshi wo xihuan manto hen duo!! (I like tofu a little, but i like buns a lot!!)
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Thanks to all for the comments, it is a great feeling to know that good friends are cheering from the sidelines.
Nga - my goal is to able to read and write the 2,200 simplified characters that are used in everyday Chinese script (plus many more of the combinations), so that I can indeed pick up a Chinese newspaper and read it by Jan 12, 2006. The conditions of the bet are more to do with conversation - I have to be able to hold an in-depth discussion of life, love, work and relationships with my colleague from Shanghai, for an hour, without any obvious difficulty. And CONGRATULATIONS on the news of the baby on the way!
6 Comments:
Hey Paulie, gd decision to go china or qingdao to learn mandarin, always am very impressed when i see a foreigner speak fluent mandarin, and i heard its already a common sight in Shanghai itself. Jia you ba!
Gday Paulie.
Mandarin chllenge is great - I'm tempted to do the same with Arabic...
Nomrally adverb should be put before the verb instead of the end of the sentence. So it would be better if you say: "Wo hen xihuan manto". (I very much like manto.)
:)
Paulie - tai hao le! It's like a language-learning mini series where you interact w/ people from different occupations and all walks of life.
I believe an alternative is to use "bijiao ~~", a comparison phrase, such as:
- Wo juede manto bijiao tofu hao chi. (I think manto tastes better than tofu)
- Wo xihuan manto bijiao hao. (I like manto more)
But I think Paulie's ", keshi..." phrase is more polite in context? Any thoughts from the native Chinese speakers?
Not sure if Paulie has learnt the word "bijiao", but here comes some reference:
* bijiao + Noun + agjective
Wo bi ni gao (I am taller than you.)
* bijiao + Verb
Wo bijiao bu xihuan tofu (I more dislike tofu)
So, to answer Saki's questions, it would be...
* Wo juede manto bi tofu hao chi. => bijiao + N. + adj(hao chi = delicious)
* Wo bijiao xihuan chi manto. => bijiao + V. (chi = eat)
If I were Paulie, I would say to Miss Wang, "Wo xihuan (chi) tofu, danshi gen xihuan (chi) manto. It means, I like (to eat) tofu, but more like (to eat) manto.
:)
Hey dude
Thanks... you gave me the kick in the butt i needed to learn french.
loving you for that.
Hugs Maz xx
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