I currently live in China and have learned Chinese off and on for over two years. I think one of the biggest barriers of advancing in Chinese at a fast pace is all the text without any pinyin. My solution was to do the following: 1) Scan the text. 2) Convert the PDF to a text-editable document. 3) Translate the text. 4) Add pinyin to all of the characters. 5) Read the text with pinyin. You can also deconstruct Chinese grammar with this method. It is a lot of work, but it pays off eventually. Also, when I first got to China, I spent hundreds of hours on Memrise learning Chinese characters. This also eventually paid off.
One more thing: I just realized after receiving a text from the delivery man -- I do A LOT of shopping in China! With all my time shopping, I have picked up quite.a bit of Chinese due to the need to translate and respond to messages from shop owners.
That sounds like you worked hard while you were there! I've met soooo many people who study abroad and only talk to other foreigners so their language skills don't improve! You can easily build a bubble around yourself in a lot of situations abroad. Going abroad doesn't guarantee fluency. You still gotta work! (Maybe not 10 hours a day.... but you know! Still gotta do SOMETHING!)
Yeah, the non-Chinese speaking expats really annoy me. There's people I work with who get mad at Chinese people who can't speak English. WTF IS THAT? YOU'RE IN CHINA, FREAKING LEARN CHINESE - IT'S NOT THEIR RESPONSIBILITY!! Hahaha you do have to work - well put! Going abroad doesn't guarantee fluency
I was in France and I'd say half of the people there left without knowing more French! One person constantly tried to get me to translate for her! After the first month I'd help her formulate sentences but I stopped translating. I don't understand it! So many people think going there and being around it is enough. That's why when people say to study abroad and you'll become fluent I sort of cringe. They make it sound so easy! It's easiER, but still takes effort. I especially don't understand the people who get ANGRY about it. Who do you think you are?
That always irritated me too. I lived in an apartment complex with a store that had foreign foods. One day and American woman was in the store very angry at the store owner for selling foreign foods but could not speak English. WTF?? Another time she was complaining about all the laundry hanging above her apartment that would sometimes blow down on to her balcony. One day i finally said to her, "where are you living now? Don't you think you should adapt to being here? The whole nation is not going to adapt to you".
When I was a foreign exchange student in the US we had 5 exchange students at my school, even another one from my country... well the other 4 became friends and didn't really get a lot of the culture and it was way worse with the ones who spoke the same language... if they are in the US for a year and only speak their native language they shouldn't be surprised when their English doesn't improve. I sometimes heard from my friends that they feel a bit sorry for me, because I wasn't part of the exchange student friend group, but being friends with the locals was WAY WAY more fun and productive
I have an advice, that I want to stick to like forever. I tried learning some languages like Japanese and Chinese for many many years. What really demotivates are videos like "5 bad things you need to know about Japan" or "10 things that you will hate about China". Don't ever watch these videos, since you (could) loose all your momentum in learning and just get frustrated! I am not a dreamer to not know that other countries aren't the perfect world we foreigners imagine. But watching this is like being a child, looking forward to first days at school, but older students tell you all the time, how awful and bad school is. I guess then you aren't that happy about going to school soon, too. Oh, and I love your channel :) keep it up :)
You'll get there, my friend! Your Chinese is pretty good, actually - I've seen you in your street interviews! It seems you can definitely communicate and socialize without much of a problem, which is what really counts!
I never had any formal classes. I carried the Lonely Planet Mandarin Phrase Book with me in my back pocket. I would go walking every Saturday starting about 7 AM and walk all the back streets I could. If I wanted something, I just pulled out my pocket book, point at what I wanted, ask them to say it in Chinese and hopefully I remembered the word. I have a lot of respect for people like you that can read and write Chinese. I am only somewhat conversational with no reading skills. It always bothered me when someone said "I am fluent" in Chinese. I don't think anyone is "Fluent" in the real meaning of the word. Large vocabularies does not equate to being fluent in my opinion. Maybe you could do a video on the different levels of speaking and how it can help or hurt you in some given situation. Thanks for the videos Austin. Even though I am no longer in China, I still try to keep up what speaking skills I do have by going to the local Chinese owned restaurants.
Currently been using Memrise for an additional 45 minutes to an hour a day to gamify my Chinese to further keep it mobile and fun. Currently following a Udemy technique that directed me on how to make my own audiotapes for language learning paired with the transcripts. Thanks again for sharing Austin, I've had some friends that learned in a relatively short time as well but not as fast and as intensive as you have. Full on props! I gotta aim high!
Memrise is a solid program for building vocabulary! I'm not really good at learning via apps, but I definitely have heard some great success stories from Memrise!
Thanks Austin. That was interesting and helpful. I am going to China soon to live and Teach English, and I have been studying Mandarin for three years. I liked your examples and explanation.
Gavin, study Chinese with us if you need even more practice! We have 1-1 teachers that can help you advance your Chinese online. If you want a free trial lesson let me know.
I used to study chinese in Beijing language university for 12 weeks in 2001. It wasn't that hard compared to you but a period of 12 weeks was a bit too short to be able fluent in chinese language, one year would be an ideal but I hadn't got that much time. It's good that you have made it through, congratulation!
I have the highest respect for people who can learn a new language from scratch. I have trouble handling my own language. Somehow I had the impression that you were mostly fluent in Chinese before you moved there. I wish you Trevor (the Food Ranger) would do more videos together.
That's why I really like the website Lingq. I know it cost money, but it allows you to import text and save the words you don't know. It also allows you to look and see which words you do know in a text. All while you can import audio. I enjoy learning languages by reading so for me, the method you used by marking in the book would have been great. Thankfully now as you said, we have so much technology to help us along.
That’s impressive. I have only hsk 2 and work on hsk 3. I am 42 yo and physicist, phd. My goal is to quit my job after having hsk 6 and then study pre modern Chinese in Cambridge. So your Video is inspiring
Great video Austin! I was the opposite, I was already in China and found a taxi driver who could take me to work every day. We would talk and I would look up what he said and how to reply in one of those survival Chinese pocketbooks. After a month I put the book to the side and asked him that if I didn't understand a word could he try to explain it to me. a few months later I found I was holding 30 minute conversations without much trouble, so I bought mountains of text books and comic books and started teaching myself how to read and write.
Wow, very cool! That's super 厉害，getting lessons from a taxi driver. To this day, I find them the most annoying, language-wise haha so many don't speak Mandarin, and some of them aren't local, so they don't even speak the local dialect!! 哎呀妈呀！hahaha they're cool people, it seems, but man, nothing like a taxi driver to make you question all your years of study
Haha, I've had plenty of those drivers but mine was a 55 year old retiree shandong local who just drove to fill in his day. Super nice guy who I could always count on for anything :)
I had basic mandarin lessons then I stop for 40 years now I started again by watching Chinese drama , good for you , I am 58 years old intend to visit china again and hopefully can communicate well thanks for your video
That's a great way to push yourself by learning more vocabulary although speaking will be different. Also you studied 10 hours a day!!! No wonder why some of your friends said you stayed in your room for your 1st semester.
ten hours a day! Nice man, when its something we like doing, it doenst sound terrifying...I'm only three months on it, studying 2 to 3 hours a day (every day) You got me motivated thank you!
Studied Mandarin on a postgraduate diploma in 1991/92. All we had then was mainland's Practical Chinese Readers vol 1 and 2 and the Oxford Concise English-Chinese Chinese-English dictionary and the Xinhua dictionary. No Internet then. We then did selections of Chinese newspapers and then some readings in traditional Chinese characters and then it was exams and graduate. Afterwards I found myself in Taiwan at the Mandarin Training Centre. During my spare time I remember buying the textbooks for Chinese language and Chinese history used in Taiwan junior high schools and going through those. i also bought a textbook on news in English for Taiwanese students of English and going through the Chinese translation of the English news just so to learn more vocabulary. Around that time there was a controversial book published 醜陋的中國人which piqued my interest so I bought that and went through it. After that it was off to Hong Kong to work and reading the daily newspapers regularly. I recently went through again quickly Practical Chinese Readers vol 1 and 2 to brush up on grammar and decided to keep going on the remaining volumes 3 to 6 of the series. They are still selling old copies on Taobao in fact. The text is outdated for sure but the highlighted grammar points remain in use, such as how to use 既...又...I also recently bought Assimil Collection sans peine Le Chinois, which is for French learners and more up to date than the version for English learners, but which I bough mainly to listen to the MP3 recordings. Having learned Mandarin the old fashioned way 30 years ago, after going through the Assimil course, I would be sceptical about it claims to achieving B2 fluency just by that method alone. On Practical Chinese Readers we just ploughed through the many lesson exercises daily with a tutor.
I am happy to see your new staff every morning, Austin, you are doing a good job keep going. I have been watching your video to learn English, you are a optimistic person and a 吃货， when will come back to Tianjin
I use HelloTalk amongst other apps. This gives me the opportunity to communicate with a Chinese person. After somebody has sent me a sentence in Chinese characters, I push Translate, Translation and/or Speak (it pronounces the word). I can make a drawing, send links photos videos, free call. Definitely helps me a lot.
this vid is interesting !! i need ur suggestion for my case, about 4 months later i will go to chinese and take language & culture program, the way i learn chinese almost same with yours, now i can read vocab hsk 1-4 arround 1200 words has been memorized. but im pretty insecure when i land in china, i cant speak and sociallize with native 😣😣
it's time to go onto speaking, then! There's Tandem, DigiMandarin, and you can search around for Mandarin-dubbed TV shows and movies online (I suggest kids' shows, honestly) and repeat after them. Repeating listening dialogues is really good as well. A great piece of advice is that if your book came with a CD / mp3 downloads, USE THEM! They're native speakers, and you can copy them and use them as models! It feels weird, but it's far better than nothing! Practice is still practice, and UA-cam has a ton of listening/speaking practice videos
Great video Austin! Keep it up! I like seeing your real experience in learning chinese. Also I would love to hear about apps that are usedul for studying chinese, and specifically how to use them like the dictionary apps or how the easiest way to look up chinese words are today?
Hey, I'm a language learner myself. Your video was very interesting to me! This book looks really intimidating. XD You mentioned, that you looked up all unknown words and that you wrote notes in your book and such. But what EXACTLY expected your teacher from you? Did you discussed the theme of that particular chapter (to test your understanding and your ability to express yourself). Or simply a vocabulary/grammar test? Or did you have to write an essay or something like that? Did your teacher let you learn these texts by heart? I ask because I try to read as much as possible and also look up many words. But most of that don't stick. So I've got the impression, that this approach don't work so well. It's kind of demotivating. :/ That's why I would like to know how exactly your learning process looked like. Thank you in advance!
I'd have to read the chapter aloud, paragraph by paragraph, then after each paragraph, he'd mention a couple of key vocabulary/culture/grammatical points and then ask a couple of questions to check that I understood the content, not just memorized how to read it. If I didn't, he'd slow down and work through it with me. It was a 1-on-1 class, so it was like having a private tutor. It worked well for me because I didn't have a choice....if you're just studying by yourself at home for fun, yeah, this definitely doesn't work. I had that Chinese Culture class plus listening, writing, and comprehensive Chinese classes, all of which were 1-on-1 80% of the time. Add that to living in a place with no English speakers....you'll learn fast, I guarantee it! haha
Euleweis, study Chinese with us! We have fun lessons on our channel as well as 1-1 teachers that can help you learn Chinese online. If you want a free trial lesson let me know.
Your way of learning Chinese is kinda like how I learnt English. I just grabbed the book ‘The adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Initially，I was so freaked out. But after I have done ‘The hound of Baskervilles’ it started to get easier and easier. BTW you can try to learn 文言文 by that some day.lol
Hi Austin, Thanks for publishing this video! I like the way you're obsessed at learning Chinese language. I got some questions for you! How do you read Chinese books？Do you search for every word you don't know, or only when you don't understand the context? I have been in China for 4 years, and I passed HSK6, but I still get better at reading books and articles, and sound more like a native. Do you have any advice for me?
I use LingQ for anything I want to read. You can import any piece of text from any website or ebook or anything. It's great! I'd check that out if I were you
Great video man! I really like your channel and have enjoyed (binge) watching your videos and seeing how they have evolved over the years! They look great. I'm heading back to Guangxi Province in September, and will be filming for my channel as well. I was curious, what program do you use to upload your YT videos from there? A VPN I assume? I'd really appreciate any advice you may have! Keep up the great work, I'll be following it! -Jacoby
Austin Guidry Yeah thanks, I used one last time I lived there. My friend told me they have cracked down on them, making them harder to use.. was just curious if you knew a good one that seems reliable.
I'm starting university in a couple weeks, and I have to take a placement test for Chinese. After studying Chinese for several years, I would say I'm fairly proficient. BUT I just found out that my university uses TRADITIONAL characters, meaning I'll have to relearn thousands of simplified characters + new vocab ToT
Mikyle When you already studied chinese for a few years then you already must have known that when you go to Taiwan? Hongkong? or Macao? you will have to use traditional characters?
I'm well aware. For my situation, however, I plan to work out of mainland China, so while I do see the cultural importance of learning traditional characters, I do not have a practical use for them.
This is already almost a one year old video so I hope you are following the comments. Here is my question: Do you reccommend andy private school or university in Kunming for learning Chinese? I have read about a few private schools in Kunming but non of them is clear. Do you have any suggestion?
I don't know anything about schools in Kunming, sorry. I can't make any specific recommendations about cities I haven't spent a lot of time in.....but if I had to, I'd do university first and see how it goes. Get to know the city and then figure out if you think a private school would be better
a moment of silence for this man lolol I can use paper dictionaries but imagine how hard and time consuming it was especially while reading a book and looking up words huhuhu
I remember the first textbooks I used were called "A New Chinese Course," and of course, the 中国文化面面观, but the others, I really don't remember. Other than that semester studying in Lanzhou, I have never really used textbooks to learn. I learned through Internet comics, memes, Weibo and WeChat posts, and talking to people.
Small villages/towns....not really. You'll more likely learn dialect than Mandarin, particularly if you are somewhere down south. As far as martial arts is concerned.....I suppose it could be done, but I think you'd be making it unnecessarily difficult for yourself, not to mention your instructor. The instructor's a martial arts teacher, not a language teacher - it'd just slow the both of you down
Your story of learning Chinese especially with that history textbook is very impressive, but i want to point out that the reality of how Chinese universities teaching foreign students are far more better than what we Chinese students studying in north american universities have; in China, they will specially set up small scale classes for foreign students with qualified teacher and often do one-on-one teaching for you guys, and the speed of teaching is also slowed down to be easier and better comprehended. By contrast, we oversea Chinese students will never have any chance to get a such arrangement or treatment.
Yeah, that's true - but it's not just Chinese students. All international students in the USA are expected to be the best because the USA is such a competitive country, so they're just put in classes with ordinary students. It's possible that the situation in China is this way because China's not terribly competitive when it comes to overseas students - basically anyone can come here and get the Chinese government scholarship and get free language study because it's so encouraged by the government. It's really not that difficult to get into Qinghua or Beida if you're a foreigner with okay grades - not even great grades. The US government doesn't place such importance on trying to encourage more students like that because they're already coming. The UK and other parts of Europe are much more accommodating to Chinese, and I've heard the locals really don't like it because Chinese students get a really watered-down version of the curriculum that's much easier, but they graduate with the same degree. I imagine this is what China is doing with foreign students now. I dunno - it's an interesting topic, but as I have not been a student in China for six years, I'm not really sure what it's like now. Lenaaround or Keiradise would be better suited to talk about this than me
I would've failed the classes and would've had to do my semester all over again back home (it was my final semester of university - study abroad semester)
Hello, austin, did you come to China first as an exchange student? O did you just come here to study for a degree? What did you study then? Greetings to you ±
I wrote a comment under another one of your videos talking about what is going on. My Son first sent me a couple of Chinese text books about 3 months ago, BUT, the best thing he did? He got me onto WeChat, introduced me to some incredible kids who work with companies he’s going to be working with; and basically has ME doing some consulting (on products, marketing) as well as I started rewriting their copy on sites like Amazon, Ali Express and eBay-to make it more understandable for US customers. Understand, I was a physician before my accident 8 years ago, have science degrees, NO background really in business or marketing. (Although I’ve worked off and on in Financial Analysis-the markets; stocks, bonds, currency...AND I had my own business years ago as an undergrad and Med Student doing QA for life and health insurance companies). The kids I’m working with basically took over as my Chinese students and speak and write to me using mainly simplified Chinese. Lili, the grandmother I mentioned in my other comment, also started me doing calligraphy-and even some Chinese Brush Painting-to make it easier to learn the characters AND add some “fun” to it. 😁. I DO wish I had more structure-I signed up for a few online Chinese courses, but they don’t offer much structure either-unless you sign-up for the more expensive ones. But both my Son and my new Chinese friends have convinced me there’s no need to go that route-especially because I’m not in a big rush. IF I end up moving over there with my Son, it won’t be for at least another year. And just in the past 3 months, I’ve picked up more Chinese than I thought I would doing it this way. Lili feels that if I were to go take a University course, or something very structured; I would “lose the excitement” and miss all of the cultural nuances I’m getting doing it this way. And I have to admit, I AM having a blast! My personal physician, former colleague and friend says he hasn’t seen me this excited and motivated since I got a fellowship at the CDC years ago. The more I interact with these kids, the more excited I get! Two of “my kids” also plan on “introducing” me to their parents or grandparents over the next week-while they are home visiting. (Gotta love WeChat! 😂). I actually got another group of packages today, some more copy-books, a “Wind Horse” scroll...(that I’m supposed to hang in my bedroom ASAP...as soon as I figure out which direction it’s supposed to face 😂), a big beautiful red lantern, some red silky cording (she already sent a bunch of coins; I have to go find a video on how to tie them together to send to my (actual) kids. She sent the Red Envelopes last week. 🙄😂. I feel immersed in the culture whilst living here in the Poconos 😁); AND, speaking of learning Chinese, Weiwei, one of “my kids”, sent me a “Beginners Chinese” by Yong Ho-apparently a fairly well-known beginners book. Weiwei got it for me because of my confusion over some of the grammar and those additional words they stick in, like “le” after “completed actions-basically concepts foreign to English. As an English teacher over there, if you have any other suggestions, please let me know! As excited as I am about all this, I must admit that I’m still nervous about going over there with health problems. My Son insists it won’t be a problem and my kids and Lili keep saying they have some of the best medical care in the world. Unfortunately, that’s NOT what I’m hearing from some of my former colleagues. My Son heads over there in about a month; once he’s been there for a few months and has a chance to look into things himself; we’ll see.
Lol China does NOT have some of the best medical care in the world....some of it's good, sure...but to say it's some of the best in the world is just plain ignorant. Shenzhen should be alright, though - it's the laowai capital, so there should be some good medical facilities available
Come study Chinese with us! We have fun lessons on our channel as well as 1-1 teachers that can help you learn Chinese online. If you want a free trial lesson let me know.
Hi I love your video, I’m planning on moving to china to study Chinese, I got one question if you can kindly answer, how long it took you to be at the level of Chinese that you currently have?
only international student what that is bored. My college has a lot of international students and my teacher her account is very strong and she does not understand me a lot.
Looking up via physical book may better? Give your brain some time to take in the information. And for the same reasons why physical book is better than ebook. I don't think smartphones make things easier for learning.. it probably makes it worse
I believe the real reason you speck good Chinese now is you married a Chinese woman. Your way of learning Chinese is good for academic level not good for spoken Chinese.
It's just a turn of phrase hahaha calm down! Crazy doesn't actually mean crazy. It means complicated, sometimes frustrating, multi-faceted, and difficult......people use the word 'crazy' all the time like this
Austin ,man you are an inspiration on how to learn Mandarin the hard way. 10+ hours a day? Hats off🙏🙏
I currently live in China and have learned Chinese off and on for over two years. I think one of the biggest barriers of advancing in Chinese at a fast pace is all the text without any pinyin. My solution was to do the following:
1) Scan the text.
2) Convert the PDF to a text-editable document.
3) Translate the text.
4) Add pinyin to all of the characters.
5) Read the text with pinyin.
You can also deconstruct Chinese grammar with this method. It is a lot of work, but it pays off eventually.
Also, when I first got to China, I spent hundreds of hours on Memrise learning Chinese characters. This also eventually paid off.
One more thing: I just realized after receiving a text from the delivery man -- I do A LOT of shopping in China! With all my time shopping, I have picked up quite.a bit of Chinese due to the need to translate and respond to messages from shop owners.
Use LingQ
@@LogosTheos 谢谢🙏
That sounds like you worked hard while you were there! I've met soooo many people who study abroad and only talk to other foreigners so their language skills don't improve! You can easily build a bubble around yourself in a lot of situations abroad. Going abroad doesn't guarantee fluency. You still gotta work! (Maybe not 10 hours a day.... but you know! Still gotta do SOMETHING!)
Yeah, the non-Chinese speaking expats really annoy me. There's people I work with who get mad at Chinese people who can't speak English. WTF IS THAT? YOU'RE IN CHINA, FREAKING LEARN CHINESE - IT'S NOT THEIR RESPONSIBILITY!! Hahaha you do have to work - well put! Going abroad doesn't guarantee fluency
I was in France and I'd say half of the people there left without knowing more French! One person constantly tried to get me to translate for her! After the first month I'd help her formulate sentences but I stopped translating. I don't understand it!
So many people think going there and being around it is enough. That's why when people say to study abroad and you'll become fluent I sort of cringe. They make it sound so easy! It's easiER, but still takes effort.
I especially don't understand the people who get ANGRY about it. Who do you think you are?
That always irritated me too. I lived in an apartment complex with a store that had foreign foods. One day and American woman was in the store very angry at the store owner for selling foreign foods but could not speak English. WTF?? Another time she was complaining about all the laundry hanging above her apartment that would sometimes blow down on to her balcony. One day i finally said to her, "where are you living now? Don't you think you should adapt to being here? The whole nation is not going to adapt to you".
When I was a foreign exchange student in the US we had 5 exchange students at my school, even another one from my country... well the other 4 became friends and didn't really get a lot of the culture and it was way worse with the ones who spoke the same language... if they are in the US for a year and only speak their native language they shouldn't be surprised when their English doesn't improve. I sometimes heard from my friends that they feel a bit sorry for me, because I wasn't part of the exchange student friend group, but being friends with the locals was WAY WAY more fun and productive
I have an advice, that I want to stick to like forever. I tried learning some languages like Japanese and Chinese for many many years. What really demotivates are videos like "5 bad things you need to know about Japan" or "10 things that you will hate about China". Don't ever watch these videos, since you (could) loose all your momentum in learning and just get frustrated! I am not a dreamer to not know that other countries aren't the perfect world we foreigners imagine.
But watching this is like being a child, looking forward to first days at school, but older students tell you all the time, how awful and bad school is. I guess then you aren't that happy about going to school soon, too.
Oh, and I love your channel :) keep it up :)
Thanks for your support! :)
hows your Chinese learning now？ getting easier or getting harder？just being curious:)
Man, you deserve a ph D in Chinese learning. Love the 30 videos in 30 days so far. Keep up the good work!
I am learning Chinese in my spare time the only thing keeping me going is the 5 years I already invested, 我不要做一个半途而废的人！
I mean that in the sense that live in Australia and my profession virtually non existent in China.
Mr. Moriarty well said Chinese！well done :)
加油，帅哥！
wow that's was a great way you used to master the language
I still have a long way to go....................
You'll get there, my friend! Your Chinese is pretty good, actually - I've seen you in your street interviews! It seems you can definitely communicate and socialize without much of a problem, which is what really counts!
Oh My God
You inspired man :) thank you
I never had any formal classes. I carried the Lonely Planet Mandarin Phrase Book with me in my back pocket. I would go walking every Saturday starting about 7 AM and walk all the back streets I could. If I wanted something, I just pulled out my pocket book, point at what I wanted, ask them to say it in Chinese and hopefully I remembered the word. I have a lot of respect for people like you that can read and write Chinese. I am only somewhat conversational with no reading skills. It always bothered me when someone said "I am fluent" in Chinese. I don't think anyone is "Fluent" in the real meaning of the word. Large vocabularies does not equate to being fluent in my opinion. Maybe you could do a video on the different levels of speaking and how it can help or hurt you in some given situation. Thanks for the videos Austin. Even though I am no longer in China, I still try to keep up what speaking skills I do have by going to the local Chinese owned restaurants.
hostels in Pune
Currently been using Memrise for an additional 45 minutes to an hour a day to gamify my Chinese to further keep it mobile and fun. Currently following a Udemy technique that directed me on how to make my own audiotapes for language learning paired with the transcripts. Thanks again for sharing Austin, I've had some friends that learned in a relatively short time as well but not as fast and as intensive as you have. Full on props! I gotta aim high!
Memrise is a solid program for building vocabulary! I'm not really good at learning via apps, but I definitely have heard some great success stories from Memrise!
Austin In China Thanks for the recognition, it's helping me to retain more than I'd ever thought I could and I can't put it down!
wow, didnt know so many people are putting so much effort in learning Chinese, so excited to see it...lol...
Thanks Austin. That was interesting and helpful. I am going to China soon to live and Teach English, and I have been studying Mandarin for three years. I liked your examples and explanation.
Gavin, study Chinese with us if you need even more practice! We have 1-1 teachers that can help you advance your Chinese online. If you want a free trial lesson let me know.
I used to study chinese in Beijing language university for 12 weeks in 2001. It wasn't that hard compared to you but a period of 12 weeks was a bit too short to be able fluent in chinese language, one year would be an ideal but I hadn't got that much time.
It's good that you have made it through, congratulation!
WOW, that's the spirit! You can learn everything with it.
I have the highest respect for people who can learn a new language from scratch. I have trouble handling my own language. Somehow I had the impression that you were mostly fluent in Chinese before you moved there. I wish you Trevor (the Food Ranger) would do more videos together.
Haha I wish that, too! He's actually back in town for the first time in a loooong time, so we may actually do something!
That's why I really like the website Lingq. I know it cost money, but it allows you to import text and save the words you don't know. It also allows you to look and see which words you do know in a text. All while you can import audio. I enjoy learning languages by reading so for me, the method you used by marking in the book would have been great. Thankfully now as you said, we have so much technology to help us along.
That’s impressive. I have only hsk 2 and work on hsk 3. I am 42 yo and physicist, phd. My goal is to quit my job after having hsk 6 and then study pre modern Chinese in Cambridge. So your Video is inspiring
Great video Austin! I was the opposite, I was already in China and found a taxi driver who could take me to work every day. We would talk and I would look up what he said and how to reply in one of those survival Chinese pocketbooks. After a month I put the book to the side and asked him that if I didn't understand a word could he try to explain it to me. a few months later I found I was holding 30 minute conversations without much trouble, so I bought mountains of text books and comic books and started teaching myself how to read and write.
Wow, very cool! That's super 厉害，getting lessons from a taxi driver. To this day, I find them the most annoying, language-wise haha so many don't speak Mandarin, and some of them aren't local, so they don't even speak the local dialect!! 哎呀妈呀！hahaha they're cool people, it seems, but man, nothing like a taxi driver to make you question all your years of study
Haha, I've had plenty of those drivers but mine was a 55 year old retiree shandong local who just drove to fill in his day. Super nice guy who I could always count on for anything :)
You are a great language student and must love to study as ten hours a day is beyond most people I think! Well done
I had basic mandarin lessons then I stop for 40 years now I started again by watching Chinese drama , good for you , I am 58 years old intend to visit china again and hopefully can communicate well thanks for your video
That's a great way to push yourself by learning more vocabulary although speaking will be different. Also you studied 10 hours a day!!! No wonder why some of your friends said you stayed in your room for your 1st semester.
ten hours a day! Nice man, when its something we like doing, it doenst sound terrifying...I'm only three months on it, studying 2 to 3 hours a day (every day) You got me motivated thank you!
Studied Mandarin on a postgraduate diploma in 1991/92. All we had then was mainland's Practical Chinese Readers vol 1 and 2 and the Oxford Concise English-Chinese Chinese-English dictionary and the Xinhua dictionary. No Internet then. We then did selections of Chinese newspapers and then some readings in traditional Chinese characters and then it was exams and graduate. Afterwards I found myself in Taiwan at the Mandarin Training Centre. During my spare time I remember buying the textbooks for Chinese language and Chinese history used in Taiwan junior high schools and going through those. i also bought a textbook on news in English for Taiwanese students of English and going through the Chinese translation of the English news just so to learn more vocabulary. Around that time there was a controversial book published 醜陋的中國人which piqued my interest so I bought that and went through it. After that it was off to Hong Kong to work and reading the daily newspapers regularly.
I recently went through again quickly Practical Chinese Readers vol 1 and 2 to brush up on grammar and decided to keep going on the remaining volumes 3 to 6 of the series. They are still selling old copies on Taobao in fact. The text is outdated for sure but the highlighted grammar points remain in use, such as how to use 既...又...I also recently bought Assimil Collection sans peine Le Chinois, which is for French learners and more up to date than the version for English learners, but which I bough mainly to listen to the MP3 recordings. Having learned Mandarin the old fashioned way 30 years ago, after going through the Assimil course, I would be sceptical about it claims to achieving B2 fluency just by that method alone. On Practical Chinese Readers we just ploughed through the many lesson exercises daily with a tutor.
TQ Austin.I am a beginner in Mandarin.
u r wonderful, ur Chinese is already better than many Chinese's
I am happy to see your new staff every morning, Austin, you are doing a good job keep going. I have been watching your video to learn English, you are a optimistic person and a 吃货， when will come back to Tianjin
You sir are a legend...I couldn't imagine!
well i love the new and upgraded camera
It is recommended to start with the textbooks that native Chinese elementary school students would use for their Chinese course, which is called "语文"
Immersion is key! Great video!!
I use HelloTalk amongst other apps. This gives me the opportunity to communicate with a Chinese person. After somebody has sent me a sentence in Chinese characters, I push Translate, Translation and/or Speak (it pronounces the word). I can make a drawing, send links photos videos, free call. Definitely helps me a lot.
this vid is interesting !!
i need ur suggestion for my case, about 4 months later i will go to chinese and take language & culture program, the way i learn chinese almost same with yours, now i can read vocab hsk 1-4 arround 1200 words has been memorized. but im pretty insecure when i land in china, i cant speak and sociallize with native 😣😣
it's time to go onto speaking, then! There's Tandem, DigiMandarin, and you can search around for Mandarin-dubbed TV shows and movies online (I suggest kids' shows, honestly) and repeat after them. Repeating listening dialogues is really good as well. A great piece of advice is that if your book came with a CD / mp3 downloads, USE THEM! They're native speakers, and you can copy them and use them as models! It feels weird, but it's far better than nothing! Practice is still practice, and UA-cam has a ton of listening/speaking practice videos
@@austinguidry2 感谢您！！那建议对我心里越来越放心
Great video Austin! Keep it up! I like seeing your real experience in learning chinese. Also I would love to hear about apps that are usedul for studying chinese, and specifically how to use them like the dictionary apps or how the easiest way to look up chinese words are today?
Brent Cochran I am Chinese, we can do language exchange
There are many ways to learn Hanzi characters: by order of stroke, by radicals and if you have a computer or multifunctional phone you can draw it.
I am Sazeeb from Dhaka, Bangladesh. I want to learn Mandarin for fun! Hope that this series of lecture will help me to achieve my goal.
Hey, I'm a language learner myself. Your video was very interesting to me! This book looks really intimidating. XD
You mentioned, that you looked up all unknown words and that you wrote notes in your book and such. But what EXACTLY expected your teacher from you?
Did you discussed the theme of that particular chapter (to test your understanding and your ability to express yourself). Or simply a vocabulary/grammar test? Or did you have to write an essay or something like that? Did your teacher let you learn these texts by heart?
I ask because I try to read as much as possible and also look up many words. But most of that don't stick. So I've got the impression, that this approach don't work so well. It's kind of demotivating. :/ That's why I would like to know how exactly your learning process looked like.
Thank you in advance!
I'd have to read the chapter aloud, paragraph by paragraph, then after each paragraph, he'd mention a couple of key vocabulary/culture/grammatical points and then ask a couple of questions to check that I understood the content, not just memorized how to read it. If I didn't, he'd slow down and work through it with me. It was a 1-on-1 class, so it was like having a private tutor. It worked well for me because I didn't have a choice....if you're just studying by yourself at home for fun, yeah, this definitely doesn't work. I had that Chinese Culture class plus listening, writing, and comprehensive Chinese classes, all of which were 1-on-1 80% of the time. Add that to living in a place with no English speakers....you'll learn fast, I guarantee it! haha
@@austinguidry2 Wow, that's extremely intense!
Thank you very much for your answer!
Euleweis, study Chinese with us! We have fun lessons on our channel as well as 1-1 teachers that can help you learn Chinese online. If you want a free trial lesson let me know.
Your way of learning Chinese is kinda like how I learnt English. I just grabbed the book ‘The adventure of Sherlock Holmes’ Initially，I was so freaked out. But after I have done ‘The hound of Baskervilles’ it started to get easier and easier. BTW you can try to learn 文言文 by that some day.lol
Hi Austin, Thanks for publishing this video! I like the way you're obsessed at learning Chinese language.
I got some questions for you! How do you read Chinese books？Do you search for every word you don't know, or only when you don't understand the context?
I have been in China for 4 years, and I passed HSK6, but I still get better at reading books and articles, and sound more like a native. Do you have any advice for me?
I use LingQ for anything I want to read. You can import any piece of text from any website or ebook or anything. It's great! I'd check that out if I were you
Good for you buddy!
Anyone got a link to where I can get a pdf of that book? It sounds pretty interesting?
Great video man! I really like your channel and have enjoyed (binge) watching your videos and seeing how they have evolved over the years! They look great. I'm heading back to Guangxi Province in September, and will be filming for my channel as well. I was curious, what program do you use to upload your YT videos from there? A VPN I assume? I'd really appreciate any advice you may have! Keep up the great work, I'll be following it! -Jacoby
Yeah, gotta have a VPN! The best VPNs for China change all the time, so I'd recommend really doing your research beforehand!
Austin Guidry Yeah thanks, I used one last time I lived there. My friend told me they have cracked down on them, making them harder to use.. was just curious if you knew a good one that seems reliable.
I'm starting university in a couple weeks, and I have to take a placement test for Chinese. After studying Chinese for several years, I would say I'm fairly proficient. BUT I just found out that my university uses TRADITIONAL characters, meaning I'll have to relearn thousands of simplified characters + new vocab ToT
(insert price is right losing horn)
Mikyle When you already studied chinese for a few years then you already must have known that when you go to Taiwan? Hongkong? or Macao? you will have to use traditional characters?
I'm well aware. For my situation, however, I plan to work out of mainland China, so while I do see the cultural importance of learning traditional characters, I do not have a practical use for them.
Mikyle 其实，简体和繁体看起来大致是一样的， they basically look the same， Mainland Chinese have no difficult to identify traditional Chinese characters
Oh, crap!! That sucks....luckily, a number of them can be guessed.....but not enough to save you a crapton of work :( :(
Ah fantastic - I ordered that book! One day, one day! :-D
like I wanna practice my English listening , by watching your video😂
I can recommend the learn chinese videos on the CCTV website. There's a lot of content and it's for free
This is already almost a one year old video so I hope you are following the comments. Here is my question: Do you reccommend andy private school or university in Kunming for learning Chinese? I have read about a few private schools in Kunming but non of them is clear. Do you have any suggestion?
I don't know anything about schools in Kunming, sorry. I can't make any specific recommendations about cities I haven't spent a lot of time in.....but if I had to, I'd do university first and see how it goes. Get to know the city and then figure out if you think a private school would be better
Hi Austin, what book did you read after this one? Any other book recommendation? Thanks!
Chinese characters has been simplified, can't imagine if people still use your traditional chinese characters.
a moment of silence for this man lolol I can use paper dictionaries but imagine how hard and time consuming it was especially while reading a book and looking up words huhuhu
can you please talk about the chinese language textbooks you have used in China?
I use New Practical Chinese Reader and it works well for me...
I remember the first textbooks I used were called "A New Chinese Course," and of course, the 中国文化面面观, but the others, I really don't remember. Other than that semester studying in Lanzhou, I have never really used textbooks to learn. I learned through Internet comics, memes, Weibo and WeChat posts, and talking to people.
Wow you are very smart I have to say,seems like you set a goal and you accomplish it
Kudos on that Austin
I'm not giving up
That is me I can read them but don't understand them. I am in second year of Chinese. I am taking the HSK 1 and 2 now. I am studying for it.
Can mandarin be learnt at small villages and towns
Can mandarin be learnt if someone goes to learn marshal arts in china
Small villages/towns....not really. You'll more likely learn dialect than Mandarin, particularly if you are somewhere down south. As far as martial arts is concerned.....I suppose it could be done, but I think you'd be making it unnecessarily difficult for yourself, not to mention your instructor. The instructor's a martial arts teacher, not a language teacher - it'd just slow the both of you down
Chinese/Mandarin audio and transcripts are available at GLOSS. (click the blue floppy disk)
gloss.dliflc.edu/
Your story of learning Chinese especially with that history textbook is very impressive, but i want to point out that the reality of how Chinese universities teaching foreign students are far more better than what we Chinese students studying in north american universities have; in China, they will specially set up small scale classes for foreign students with qualified teacher and often do one-on-one teaching for you guys, and the speed of teaching is also slowed down to be easier and better comprehended. By contrast, we oversea Chinese students will never have any chance to get a such arrangement or treatment.
Yeah, that's true - but it's not just Chinese students. All international students in the USA are expected to be the best because the USA is such a competitive country, so they're just put in classes with ordinary students. It's possible that the situation in China is this way because China's not terribly competitive when it comes to overseas students - basically anyone can come here and get the Chinese government scholarship and get free language study because it's so encouraged by the government. It's really not that difficult to get into Qinghua or Beida if you're a foreigner with okay grades - not even great grades. The US government doesn't place such importance on trying to encourage more students like that because they're already coming.
The UK and other parts of Europe are much more accommodating to Chinese, and I've heard the locals really don't like it because Chinese students get a really watered-down version of the curriculum that's much easier, but they graduate with the same degree. I imagine this is what China is doing with foreign students now.
I dunno - it's an interesting topic, but as I have not been a student in China for six years, I'm not really sure what it's like now. Lenaaround or Keiradise would be better suited to talk about this than me
Austin Guidry yes, that really make sense! thanks your responds and enjoy your life in chengdu:)
Austin, you are explaining torture learning, this is the fastest method , however most people are very lazy to use this method.
Great video . . .
how did you put yourself up to such a daunting task? others might have just quit.
I didn't have a choice! Haha my grades depended on studying and studying well!
Austin Guidry what would've happened if you quit at that time?
I would've failed the classes and would've had to do my semester all over again back home (it was my final semester of university - study abroad semester)
Austin Guidry I see.... well, what doesn't kills you...
I read the news about the earthquake in Sichuan...please be safe!!!
Yeah, it's really sad news :( That will be my next video
how many words have u being memorizing every day?
2:43 Savage teacher
5:28 Was that in Lanzhou?
Yep, this was all in Lanzhou!
Hello, austin, did you come to China first as an exchange student? O did you just come here to study for a degree? What did you study then? Greetings to you ±
I first came as an exchange student
I love learning Mandarin, wish I could be thrown to the wolves like you did! 加油！
How did you get into a school without speaking Chinese?
Exchange semester --- just did one semester there as my last semester of university. Graduated, then came back to teach
I still have to look up words in a paper dictionary because our Chinese teacher won't let us use an online dictionary 😂
good lesson,i am familiar with chinese treatment.come from china
How old are you dude? You said you came to China in 2011.. that's 6-7 years ago and you look pretty young. Did you move there at the age of 18?
I came here in 2011 - I was 22 at that time
I wrote a comment under another one of your videos talking about what is going on. My Son first sent me a couple of Chinese text books about 3 months ago, BUT, the best thing he did? He got me onto WeChat, introduced me to some incredible kids who work with companies he’s going to be working with; and basically has ME doing some consulting (on products, marketing) as well as I started rewriting their copy on sites like Amazon, Ali Express and eBay-to make it more understandable for US customers. Understand, I was a physician before my accident 8 years ago, have science degrees, NO background really in business or marketing. (Although I’ve worked off and on in Financial Analysis-the markets; stocks, bonds, currency...AND I had my own business years ago as an undergrad and Med Student doing QA for life and health insurance companies). The kids I’m working with basically took over as my Chinese students and speak and write to me using mainly simplified Chinese. Lili, the grandmother I mentioned in my other comment, also started me doing calligraphy-and even some Chinese Brush Painting-to make it easier to learn the characters AND add some “fun” to it. 😁.
I DO wish I had more structure-I signed up for a few online Chinese courses, but they don’t offer much structure either-unless you sign-up for the more expensive ones. But both my Son and my new Chinese friends have convinced me there’s no need to go that route-especially because I’m not in a big rush. IF I end up moving over there with my Son, it won’t be for at least another year. And just in the past 3 months, I’ve picked up more Chinese than I thought I would doing it this way. Lili feels that if I were to go take a University course, or something very structured; I would “lose the excitement” and miss all of the cultural nuances I’m getting doing it this way. And I have to admit, I AM having a blast! My personal physician, former colleague and friend says he hasn’t seen me this excited and motivated since I got a fellowship at the CDC years ago. The more I interact with these kids, the more excited I get! Two of “my kids” also plan on “introducing” me to their parents or grandparents over the next week-while they are home visiting. (Gotta love WeChat! 😂). I actually got another group of packages today, some more copy-books, a “Wind Horse” scroll...(that I’m supposed to hang in my bedroom ASAP...as soon as I figure out which direction it’s supposed to face 😂), a big beautiful red lantern, some red silky cording (she already sent a bunch of coins; I have to go find a video on how to tie them together to send to my (actual) kids. She sent the Red Envelopes last week. 🙄😂. I feel immersed in the culture whilst living here in the Poconos 😁); AND, speaking of learning Chinese, Weiwei, one of “my kids”, sent me a “Beginners Chinese” by Yong Ho-apparently a fairly well-known beginners book. Weiwei got it for me because of my confusion over some of the grammar and those additional words they stick in, like “le” after “completed actions-basically concepts foreign to English.
As an English teacher over there, if you have any other suggestions, please let me know!
As excited as I am about all this, I must admit that I’m still nervous about going over there with health problems. My Son insists it won’t be a problem and my kids and Lili keep saying they have some of the best medical care in the world. Unfortunately, that’s NOT what I’m hearing from some of my former colleagues. My Son heads over there in about a month; once he’s been there for a few months and has a chance to look into things himself; we’ll see.
Lol China does NOT have some of the best medical care in the world....some of it's good, sure...but to say it's some of the best in the world is just plain ignorant. Shenzhen should be alright, though - it's the laowai capital, so there should be some good medical facilities available
u work so hard like a chinese.
I went and bought that book lol
Come study Chinese with us! We have fun lessons on our channel as well as 1-1 teachers that can help you learn Chinese online. If you want a free trial lesson let me know.
很厉害，我觉得你可以试试学学日语，你会中文汉字，会英语，学日语应该非常轻松
文言文 or traditional Chinese is like Latin for English speakers
man, I am a Chinese, the book you recommended is hard to Chinese beginner..
Right now i'm studying by translating books.
Hi I love your video, I’m planning on moving to china to study Chinese, I got one question if you can kindly answer, how long it took you to be at the level of Chinese that you currently have?
Probably....two years, I guess. It's hard to know, really
only international student what that is bored. My college has a lot of international students and my teacher her account is very strong and she does not understand me a lot.
图书馆有免费的各种书籍
When I lived in Taiwan, I found that the majority of people just spoke to me in English
Your Chinese will deteriorate if Taiwan people encourage you to speak English with them.lol
要学正统 中国文化，要买 中华书局 和 上海古籍出版社的书，其他出版社没有那么严谨
Looking up via physical book may better? Give your brain some time to take in the information. And for the same reasons why physical book is better than ebook. I don't think smartphones make things easier for learning.. it probably makes it worse
your chinese isgood
In a word; "impressive".
wow
Yeah, it was hard work before smart phones.......
"...xiangsheng, which is a thing they do in tianjin" oh dear people are gonna laugh
xiaojie is another thing they do in Tianjin lol
you are a.harder lerner👍🏻
that is very old book
hahaha yeah, it is!!
Do you want to stay in China forever?
溜溜溜 学习中文应该是比学习英文要难的
00:50
Awkwardness, if you haven't gone through that you haven't learned any language.
中国**文**化面面观 the subtitles say 丈 lol
You need to make a video on how to loose weight, it will be very convincing
I made a couple of those, yep!
🚫NO PROFANITY
I believe the real reason you speck good Chinese now is you married a Chinese woman. Your way of learning Chinese is good for academic level not good for spoken Chinese.
Jason John marrying a Chinese woman can have this effect as long as she can't speak English
Jason John haha😂
chinese is very difficult to learn
hahaha ancient poetry
Could of gone to the gym. Self studying Chinese. Have time for gym and dating.
I commend you for leaning, but, why are you classifying it as a crazy language? One can learn a lifetime & still not know it all! Bad choice of word!
It's just a turn of phrase hahaha calm down! Crazy doesn't actually mean crazy. It means complicated, sometimes frustrating, multi-faceted, and difficult......people use the word 'crazy' all the time like this
Hope earthquake was small there. Probably too far away
Zhu Bajie it's a small one doesn't bring any damage
Didn't feel anything in my part of the city, luckily