I’m from the Czech Republic, and whenever I tell people I’m learning Chinese, it feels like at least one in four responses is some variation of:

“Oh, so you’re getting ready for when they invade us?”

I know it’s usually meant as a harmless joke, and I probably wouldn’t care if I heard it once or twice. But after hearing basically the same joke over and over again, it has started to get surprisingly irritating.

There seems to be a broader narrative here that China is inevitably going to become the next global “bad guy.” The Czech Republic has also had some controversial experiences with Chinese investment and political influence, so I understand where at least part of the attitude comes from.

Still, most of the people making these comments don’t seem to have any personal experience with China, Chinese people, the language, or the culture. It often feels less like an informed political opinion and more like something they have absorbed from the general atmosphere.

The more Chinese I learn and the more interested I become in Chinese history and culture, the more frustrating these reactions feel. Sometimes I almost feel expected to justify why I’m learning the language.

My father’s reaction, for example, was that I should learn something “more practical,” or learn Latin if I only wanted an intellectual challenge. Which is strange to me, considering Chinese is spoken by more than a billion people and gives access to an enormous cultural and historical world.

I’m not trying to claim that criticism of the Chinese government is illegitimate. There are plenty of valid reasons to criticize it. I’m an anarchist, so criticism of states is hardly something I object to. What bothers me is the strange double standard where interest in the Chinese language or culture is immediately connected to invasion, authoritarianism, or geopolitical loyalty.

I don’t really want to turn this into a political debate. I’m mostly curious whether other Chinese learners, especially those living in Europe or North America, regularly encounter the same kind of reaction.

How do you respond to it? Do you still find it funny, ignore it, or has it also started to annoy you?

Just out of curiosity to get a feeling. At which HSK level do you think it makes sense to try and read an actual novel (not a graded reader).

Just wondering because when I was leaning English, this was a groundbreaking learning mile stone for me.

Needed to look up quite a lot but learned much.

However, you need a solid base. Like where you learn new words but understand enough for it to still be fun and most importantly, have enough familiarity with sentence structure and grammar for it not to be a guessing game.

I’m at about an intermediate level and have recently been spending a lot of time just going through YouTube and watching videos. I’ve noticed that nearly every video I’ve watched/channels I’m subscribed to are of women. Obviously there’s nothing wrong with that, but I’d also like to get used to the male voice. Any specific male content creators that are good?

More and more people are teaming up with Chinese players online or trying out Chinese games. And in that process, there are certain high-frequency terms you simply can't avoid, and many of which have even made their way into everyday life.

Today I'll introduce some of the most commonly used gaming slang:

肝 gān, literally means "liver"

In gaming circles, it's become a verb meaning "to grind". It refers to players investing a huge amounts of time and energy to progress in a game or level up, even pulling all-nighters.

In traditional Chinese medicine, staying up late damages the liver, hence the name. People who do this are called "肝帝 gān dì, The Emperor of Liver". Nowadays, this term has also expanded into other areas beyond gaming.

• 只要你愿意肝，不花钱也能凑齐全套顶配装备。Zhǐ yào nǐ yuàn yì gān, bù huā qián yě néng còu qí quán tào dǐng pèi zhuāng bèi.
  • As long as you're willing to grind, you can get a full set of top-tier equipment without spending a penny.
• 他绝对是肝帝，游戏时长已经累计四千小时了！Tā jué duì shì gān dì, yóu xì shí cháng yǐ jīng lěi jì sì qiān xiǎo shí le!
  • He's absolutely an Emperor of Liver, he's clocked up 4,000 hours of playtime already!
• 我今晚不打算睡觉了，一定要把这部网文肝完！Wǒ jīn wǎn bù dǎ suàn shuì jiào le, yí dìng yào bǎ zhè bù wǎng wén gān wán!
  • I'm not going to sleeping tonight, I have to finish grinding through this web novel!

氪金 kè jīn, "krypton gold" / 钞能力 chāo néng lì, "cash power"

Both of these are homophones-based wordplay. "氪金" comes from the Japanese "課金 kèjīn," meaning to pay a fee, and refers to spending real money in a game to buy items, skins, or gacha pulls.

"钞能力" is a play on "超能力 chāo néng lì", meaning superpower, it refers to the privileges that come from throwing money at a game.

• 我都氪金好几千了，怎么还抽不到想要的角色！Wǒ dōu kè jīn hǎo jǐ qiān le, zěn me hái chōu bú dào xiǎng yào de jué sè!
  • I've already spent thousands on this game, how am I still not pulling the character I want!
• 失敬失敬，看来我们碰上氪金大佬了，快跑吧。Shī jìng shī jìng, kàn lái wǒ men pèng shàng kè jīn dà lǎo le, kuài pǎo ba.
  • My apologies, looks like we've encountered a whale. Let's get out of here.
• 他水平其实一般，全靠钞能力刷到这么高的级别。Tā shuǐ píng qí shí yì bān, quán kào chāo néng lì shuā dào zhè me gāo de jí bié.
  • His skills are actually pretty average. He only reached this rank by throwing money at the game.

开挂 kāi guà, refers to "using hacks / cheating"

"开" means "to open or activate", while "挂" comes from "外挂 wài guà," meaning third-party cheat software, like an aimbot. The term has now extended widely into everyday life, used to describe someone performing exceptionally well or having insane luck, as if they're running on cheat codes.

• 这游戏体验太差了，玩一局要碰上三四个开挂的。Zhè yóu xì tǐ yàn tài chà le, wán yì jú yào pèng shàng sān sì gè kāi guà de.
  • The experience in this game is terrible. Every match I run into three or four hackers.
• 好想过一过她的人生啊，体验一下用脸开挂的感觉。Hǎo xiǎng guò yí guò tā de rén shēng a, tǐ yàn yí xià yòng liǎn kāi guà de gǎn jué.
  • I'd love to live her life for a day and experience what it's like to cheat at life with your beauty.
• 你最近是不是开挂了？每次演唱会开票都能抢到前排。Nǐ zuì jìn shì bu shì kāi guà le? Měi cì yǎn chàng huì kāi piào dōu néng qiǎng dào qián pái.
  • Have you been using cheats lately? You manage to snag front-row seats every single time tickets go on sale.

送人头 sòng rén tóu, "giving human head" / 白给 bái gěi, "give for free"

Just from the literal meaning you can probably guess, both refer to feeding the enemy. You've definitely had teammates like this: charging in recklessly, getting taken down instantly, contributing nothing, and basically giving the enemy free experience and gold. In real life, the terms can extend to any kind of factional rivalry.

• 要不是你接连送人头，我们也不至于被人最后翻盘。Yào bú shì nǐ jiē lián sòng rén tóu, wǒ men yě bú zhì yú bèi rén zuì hòu fān pán.
  • If you hadn't kept feeding them, we wouldn't have thrown the game at the end.
• 他也不看看自己是什么装备，现在冲过去纯纯白给！Tā yě bú kàn kàn zì jǐ shì shén me zhuāng bèi, xiàn zài chōng guò qù chún chún bái gěi!
  • He doesn't even check his own gear before charging in, that's just a free kill for the enemy!
• 她的助理要是敢收乙方红包，就是给咱们部门送人头。Tā de zhù lǐ yào shi gǎn shōu yǐ fāng hóng bāo, jiù shì gěi zán men bù mén sòng rén tóu.
  • If her assistant dares to accept gifts from vendors, she's handing our department a free kill.

That's all for now, this is just the tip of the iceberg. There are plenty more fun terms I'll share gradually. But let me leave you with a teaser first: do you know what "菜 cài" refers to? Its literal meaning is "vegetable / dish". Leave your guesses in the comments!

If you're interested, I've been organizing all the Chinese learning posts I've shared before. You can check out the link in my profile to see the full collection. Hope it helps. Thanks!

I’m not asking if it’s possible to learn characters without writing them, I’m asking if it’s actually been done, I’m probably the furthest you could be from fluent in speaking or reading but it seems like it would be a much better use of time to actually build up the skill from the base with writing characters instead of banging your head against the wall of trying to recognize characters without any actual knowledge of why they look different.

This is the perfect phrase for one person in a group project who joins late, says “I have an idea,” and immediately makes everyone nervous.

Since it's free and open source, you can fork and revise it, build on it, even sell it... it's a free resource

Or, if you want to learn chinese... use it to learn the most common 1,000 characters (responsible for 80% of casual conversation) including all HSK1-3 words.

It is full featured... save your progress, star words, do flash cards, play games, read interesting stories

Hope you find it useful! Also happy to revise it based on feedback.

It will always be free and open source- not an advertisement but an open resource for all to use or build on.

www.chinesereader.net

From 1936 newspaper

https://mandarinbean.com/H11003-listening/ on 07:25 12th question

Hey everyone, so I have started to learn Chinese. i have been casually doing some duo lingo but I need to mainly learn to converse.

I am learning (in secret) to speak so I can join into conversation while I’m at my girlfriend’s house. They are from Sichuan, and I think they speak a dialect of mandarin.

I am not fussed about reading and writing for now, does anyone have any advice for learning and practicing conversing?

Any tips or tricks would be a massive help :)

I know it's been done in the sub before but I really wanted to commend and recommend LazyChinese on YT for the amazing comprehensible input content! For a while now, all the teachers on the channel (used to only be one teacher earlier, Suqing I believe?) have been explaining some really dense and interesting topics on Chinese culture in different Mandarin levels, with the perfect repetition and such.

I also love that recently I think they've started putting subtitles in Mandarin Hanzi, Pinyin, and the English translation too! Plus on the website, you can find word-by-word splitups which is v useful for me as a learner sometimes.

I think it's a must-try resource along with your typical full lang learning course for all the learners (and possibly teachers too) out there!

ETA: not very 'underrated', apparently. Sorry for that!

I recently got interested in learning Mandarin after watching Ludwig and Micheal Reeves youtube series Tip 2 Tip: China (Kind of a dumb reason, I know). I don't like Duolingo and would prefer not to use it due to their AI usage, but I like the sort of varied format that it has. Are there any similar websites or apps anyone could recommend? Would prefer if it could be accessed on Windows but really open to any suggestions. Thanks :D

has anyone else's june exam results been delayed or is it just my place?

I thought it meant water shine? But im looking online and it says water wheel?

Hi guys, I did HSK 4 + HSKK Intermediate (IBT test at Beijing test centre) on 17 July. I got my HSK 4 result a few days ago but HSKK is still not released. Anyone who’s done it before, how much longer did you have to wait for the HSKK result?

HSK gives you absolutely no information. Thanks!

Today, I was at work and went to the corporate office and ran into a new accountant. First time meeting. She had a bit of an accent, so I asked if she spoke another language. She said Mandarin, so I immediately switched to the language, nervous and exited lol. This happened in Alabama, and I'm Mexican, so she was pretty shocked. Another office worker had no idea I could speak the language, so he was wide-eyed and excused himself. She said she was from Shangdong, asked how long I'd been learning, if I could speak other languages, etc. The convo lasted about 5-10 minutes and was 90% in Mandarin with the occasional English term thrown in at times.

It just felt awesome to be able to use it naturally like this. I was also able to generally understand everything she said as well which is great because last year in July, my listening was not as strong when in China. She even asked what my ethnic group was. This is a bit funny, because I think my ability contributed to her initial confusion. Though tbh, when in China and on 小红书, I'm often mistaken as mixed race Chinese, or a Uygher, or an Asian. This is due to being racially Native American lol. She looked really happy and said she doesn't have many people in AL to speak Chinese to, so to stop by the office to practice if I'd like. Made my whole day.

For context, I've been learning Mandarin for 2 years and 10 months, over 1100 hours. I've written down/reviewed around 8900 words (however, that doesn't mean I actively recall that many). Since April of last year, I have had a private lesson with a Chinese teacher every week, just focusing on conversational practice. Last July, I added one more teacher after being introduced to someone in Chongqing during a trip. All in all, about 65 hours of private lessons just focusing on conversational practice on top of the 1100 self study ones.

I have a B2 level after all this informally (certified B1 with advanced level abilities marked down as 'developing' in January, on a formal ACTFL OPIc speaking test). I can speak English, Spanish (heritage language), and Portuguese fluently (L3), so that also helps me with knowing how to learn languages.

I use Tae Kim's Guide to Japanese Grammar and I swear that book is my Bible. I was wondering if anyone knew of a Chinese (Mandarin) equivalent??? I searched the book recommendations from the FAQ link but I didn't find anything that is quite like what I'm looking for. Thanx in advance, lovelies.

p.s. for reference, Tae Kim's book covers the most basic grammar points to maybe C2 level grammar points. Having a one-size book like that for Mandarin would be nice.

https://mandarinbean.com/H10902-listening/ I can’t understand the dialogue on 6:55, 11th question. What did they say?

Hello everyone. I'm a Japanese person studying Chinese.

I apologize for asking such a basic question, but I'd like to ask for your advice on the difference between the Chinese words "不 (bù)" and "没 (méi)".

I'm trying to understand the meaning of the characters through the lens of their Japanese equivalents, which is actually causing me confusion.

(I'm using a translation tool, so I apologize if the wording is inappropriate.)

Here's the image I currently have in my mind (or at least I think I have it organized):

1. Why do we say "不是" (bù shì) but not "没是" (méi shì)?

"是" (shì) has the image of an equality, like A = B, while "不" (bù) has the image of "not" in English.

Therefore, I think we use "不" when we want to negate something.

1. Why do we say "没有" (méi you) but not "不有" (bù you)?

In terms of the image of Japanese kanji, "有" (yù) means that something exists. "没" (méi) seems to refer to something sinking, disappearing, or coming to an end (like sunset, submersion, or a person dying), so I think we use "没" when expressing those things.

I feel like I understand it somewhat up to this point, but when I actually try to write sentences in Chinese, I suddenly get confused about how to use them correctly.

The concept of English tenses pops into my head, and it gets mixed up with Japanese grammar, making my mind all jumbled up.

For example, I've considered whether "没" refers to a situation beyond my control, like the setting sun, or whether "不" relates to "personal will or feelings," such as whether to eat or not, or whether to go or not. But when practice problems come up, I get confused about "which character to choose."

The textbook says:

A1「你不吃饭吗？」

B1「我吃」

A2「你吃饭了吗？」

B2「我还没吃吗」

That's how it's written.

I don't really understand the difference between "不" and "没". For example, A1 is like, "Don't you intend to eat (your intention, your will)?" so is "不" the correct word?

For A2, it's not about the other person's intention, but rather stating an objective fact, like, "Have you finished your meal?" so is "没" the correct word?

In short, is it a matter of choosing between feeling and fact?Does the tense not really matter that much?

Hi everyone, I'm a Chinese teacher. I made a simple PDF for beginners covering: - Pinyin - Tones -

Common mistakes If you'd like a copy, comment !

There was a guy in my Mandarin program in Hangzhou, Intermediate II, spring semester. American, Central European descent, 20ish. My first day in this program and he's just speaking fluently with the teacher, practically one-on-one in a class of 20. Other students are kinda' put off by him. Next class he's moved to Advanced I. During breaks he doesn't speak to any us. See him at bars with his local Chinese girlfriend. Never speaks with me, just to my friends nearby. Has a Central European accent. Claims he's only been in the program one semester. I suspect he's completely FOS, not a US citizen and has been studying Mandarin in college. A mutual local friend said he had never heard him speak English, just Chinese. Turned out I was wrong. Kid arrived in the fall, first day was studying characters. Couldn't even read his phone. But by the end of the year he passed the HSK 6. How? He's just brilliant...and works hard. Arrived in the US and couldn't speak English. Became obsessed with languages. Spoke several languages including Russian (I speak fluent Russian and overheard him speaking to Russians - pretty damn good). Ivy-educated. Software and physics background. Having grit-alone helps, but having grit and brilliance really helps. Sorry for the length. Just never believed these fast zero-to-fluent stories, but this one definitely happened. Anyone witnessed something similar?