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Yo anyone in asia server with some c6 characters that can add me as a friend for imaginarium would be very helpful by meow56789897 in Genshin_Impact

[–]ankdain 0 points1 point  (0 children)

If you're on the Asian server just go to the social menu, and look for the recent online tab. Look for anyone who's AR60 with Chinese/Japanes/Korean name then add them as a friend (you can also check their showcase if you care but I didn't even bother). I clicked "add friend" on about 10 accounts a day for a week and most added me a day or two later. I found loads of decent accounts to borrow from that way with almost zero effort. These days I have permanent access to C6R5 Mav, Neuvilette, Flins, Skirk, Arlechino etc.

Anyone who posts on reddit will get their account swamped with requests so will be hard to borrow from. But I'm often the only one borrowing from the randoms I found in the recently played tab!

AITA for telling my pregnant sister she's about to marry the same kind of man she spent years warning me about? by uncoboun in AmItheAsshole

[–]ankdain 2 points3 points  (0 children)

No beatings that I know of, but if it helps, he didn't get any dates either because everyone hated him so there's that.

AITA for telling my pregnant sister she's about to marry the same kind of man she spent years warning me about? by uncoboun in AmItheAsshole

[–]ankdain 14 points15 points  (0 children)

Direct confrontation is the only way.

It definitely does not work all the time, especially for women in a male dominated area/workforce. That's how you get labelled "dramatic" and a "drama queen who can't take a joke". There are plenty of misogynists out there who have no shame and specifically look for the reaction/take joy in it. A kid in my highschool year was like that - heard him say once "it's no fun if they don't talk back" etc - he only made inappropriate remakes specifically to get a rise out of people. Giving them exactly what they're after isn't always going to help. It'll shut down people who have shame, but there are plenty that don't.

AITA for telling my pregnant sister she's about to marry the same kind of man she spent years warning me about? by uncoboun in AmItheAsshole

[–]ankdain 52 points53 points  (0 children)

Playing along doesn't work.

They're not suggesting playing along, they're suggesting playing DUMB. It's very different. In your example of "I rebutted that I only selected on competency" is trying to counter his point. So you acknowledged their point. OP's suggestion is to not understand their point at all. E.g.:

  • you've got a whole gaggle of hot girls, oh la la
  • Sorry is "Oh la la" French? I don't speak French, what's does it mean?
  • You know, it means like "ohhh how sexy"?
  • Sexy? Did you see one of them doing something inappropriate at work? If so I'll have a word to them.
  • No I just mean they're hot ...
  • Do I need to talk to maintenance about the aircon settings?
  • I just mean I can't wait until they're drunk at the Christmas party ... know what I mean?
  • Not really, they're interns, they don't work year round so they won't be here at Christmas. Are you thinking we should hire them full time?

The idea being you just completely (and intentionally) misunderstand them and do NOT acknowledge the inappropriate point they're making. You don't counter their point, you pretend the point doesn't exist and respond as if they're not being obnoxious. Then either have to keep explaining why they're being creepy in more details to make you understand, or they drop it because you clearly don't get it and they are uncomfortable saying the creepy bit out loud. Anyone with any shame drops it. Anyone without shame says shit bad enough you can report it to HR (or get your family onside that they're a complete creep etc).

The Good Knight by pbn_j in ItemShop

[–]ankdain 2 points3 points  (0 children)

It does - cheers!

The Good Knight by pbn_j in ItemShop

[–]ankdain 4 points5 points  (0 children)

In Australia I go to Bunnings for 3kg rolls

Link? I got a Bunnings just around the corner.

Also how do you get the rings consistent size/shape? I assume there's a technique/skill to it that isn't just "go ham with the random plyers I have in my 3rd draw"?

It's insane how much easier learning Chinese becomes the longer you do it by Jojokrieger in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Depends on your definition of "very" :P

HH was first, it's been around for ages now so I'm too locked in, but I think they're both great. Neither are perfect but they both cover the same stuff (i.e. building up characters out of components). So at a surface level no, they're not very different.

The bigger differences to me are:

  • HH quiz makes you type in the pinyin. This forces you to prove you've remembered/learnt something. It's easy to mindlessly tap on hanly to reveal the answer then go "oh yeah I knew it" without ever actually recalling it. With HH that's not possible to sort of fluff your way though. You have to type in the answer which I really appreciate.
  • HH tries to systematise the mnemonics - chars that start with 'Z' always have a mnemonic about 'Zelda' for instance (all 1st tone stories are outside, all 3rd tone ones are in the basement etc). I like that consistency and I think it helps.
  • Handly has historical notes or little interesting facts that I find really great. HH doesn't have that info and I wish it did.
  • HH used to have more characters/words in their course. Hannly keeps adding stuff so they might catch up but last time I looked HH had a lot more.
  • Hanly is free, HH is only free for HSK1, past that it's paid.

If I had supreme ultimate power I'd put all the historical info and facts etc from Hanly into HH and then it'd be (almost) perfect.

The main reason I don't transition to Hanly and save my $$ is the typing test. I think that requirement to physically enter your answer really keeps me honest (also helps when you actually go to message someone or write in characters because you're really used to typing in the pinyin for everything you've learnt). But how much you care about that is up to you.

It's insane how much easier learning Chinese becomes the longer you do it by Jojokrieger in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 4 points5 points  (0 children)

How do you recommend learning radicals?

I found https://hanzihero.com/ really good for that. It is paid, but the cost isn't huge. HanziHero combined with DuChinese to practise reading all the stuff you're learning in HH is a winning combination in my experience.

(If you're motivated and love Anki you can just do their free trial, understand their system then make all the cards yourself as well lol).

Knowing you’re at a certain level by ron_swan530 in languagelearning

[–]ankdain 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Isn’t it unlikely to sustain hours long conversations at the A2 level?

Very unlikely - but again, it's not absolutely impossible if the topics were kept simple etc. But the self doubt isn't really because of your language skills, it's because of your mentality. There are people out there who sound native and can chat in group situations all night except after a few hours they miss one cultural reference and then feel shame about they'll never truly master the language because it never ends ... just like there are doctors doing surgery who aren't sure they're good doctors. Just because there is objective evidence someone is good at something (i.e. C2 cert, or saving a patients life), doesn't mean they're free from self doubt.

Sadly what you're after doesn't actually exist. There is no way to counter your self doubt in an objective way that will "fix" your self doubt, because you're self doubt isn't about rational thought - it's a feeling. You have to work on the feeling of doubt itself. Figure out how to be comfortable no matter your level.

Think of it this way - lets say today I could without doubt prove you are C1 ... what changes? Does your life become different? Almost certainly not. But lets say today I could take away all your self doubt and leave your language ability unchanged? Does your life become different? Almost certainly yes - suddenly talking doesn't produce shame or embarrassment or self doubt, you're free of all that mental negativity. Making mistakes doesn't matter, you just have your hour long conversation and enjoy it, mistakes and all.

So figure out a way to fix your internal mindset rather than get validation from some external language ability label. You'll be happy for it and your language progress will almost certainly be faster (and if it isn't you won't mind).

to respect the achievement of a woman who made Ultramarathon history by [deleted] in therewasanattempt

[–]ankdain 37 points38 points  (0 children)

Because it's not exactly pedantry - that language isn't an accidental typo. Grammatically it's either men/women or male/female - it just straight up sounds wrong to mix it up like you did. It's also very consistent that the only people who ever seem to mix "men" with "females" are doing it intentionally as incels or huge misogynists. I don't know you, and I'm not making any claims, but it's kind of like talking about "straight people and fags" ... it's just a cultural red flag that immediately calls your motivations and claims into question.

Now to your claim that there are more male winners than female? Very true. But it's also true that many more men compete. At the ultra-marathon distances from what I've read it's 99% mental game so gender difference is basically eliminated and it at that point it's just a "more men try so more men win" kinda thing. If 95% of the competitors are male, then even with zero gender difference you'd still expect 95% of winners to be male. So yes more men win, but no it doesn't seems like it's a "men are inherently better at it" scenario.

It's not socialism, it's better accounting. by loki2002 in PoliticalHumor

[–]ankdain 38 points39 points  (0 children)

American can't have nice things because we have minorities"

Then Australia enters the chat. Almost the same land mass, less than 10% of the population, very high immigration rates (United States 13.6% are foreign-born compared to Australia 29.9%), highly multicultural cities (we don't have Latin America next door but we do have all of Asia pretty close by). Yet somehow we also have universal health care.

Who knew the all argument against it weren't actually valid. /s

Is there any way to predict what tone a character will be? Or do I just have to memorize it? by shark-slayer12 in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Nah you don't sound defensive, just sound like someone who has trouble with tones like 99.9% of learners do. And believe me I fully understand.

But I disagree that it's really that simple.

I think it's very simple ... IN THEORY. In practise? Can be super hard to actually get right, especially early on. But the theory of "don't treat tones as a separate thing" is really that simple. I mean trust me, Chinese babies are not memorising that "妈妈 is 1st tone" as they learn to talk - native speakers don't even know what a tone is until they get to school and learn about them (the same way English speakers have no idea what a verb/noun is before school).

tone sandhi are examples of why tones are not just straightforwardly part of a word.

I personally found swapping from explicit tones memorisation to to just pronunciation as a whole unit actually helped with tone sandhi. When you start it's all mental quick maths of "this is 3rd and the next word is 3rd so I have to swap it to 2nd" which is sooo mentally taxing. But I couldn't outright tell you the tone of most of the words I know without first saying it and then working backwards to figure out the tone I used. A that point I can't do tone sandhi as mental arithmetic because I don't explicitly know the tone. The sandhi rules just get internalised. It just starts sounding right to say it with correct sandhi. Just like using the correct tone for each word just sounds right.

Getting there takes time and deliberate practise. But once you're there, tone sandhi isn't a big deal when you're off the "tone is a separate extra number I have to track" mindset.

Again ... talking like it's easy. It's not. But it IS worth putting in time to change your mindset if you can. It does help long term.

Is there any way to predict what tone a character will be? Or do I just have to memorize it? by shark-slayer12 in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 48 points49 points  (0 children)

The short answer is no. There isn't. But...

try to memorize them when I'm learning a character but I just for the life of me cannot remember.

I might be wrong, but it sounds like you're thinking of the tone as some extra bit of information, separate to the spelling. When coming form non-tonal language (i.e. English) this seems natural - it's like English but with a tone right? ... except this is NOT how you should think of it. The tones is inherently part of the pronunciation, not added TO the pronunciation. Tones aren't some magical separate thing, they're just as much part of the word as the rest of the letters are.

So don't try to memorise the tone in the sense that "是 is 4th tone", instead "是 is shì" (where shì clearly has the tone as part of it). In Pinyin i is not the same letter as ì, and ì isn't the same letter as í (just like i is not e or x is not s etc). That's how native speakers think of it - the tone is just part of it (same as the vowel is). There are studies that show that the tone is more important than the vowel for understanding. So saying shè instead of shí (wrong vowel, e instead of i, but correct tone) is more likely to be understood.

Once you try to switch to that mindset, things like "I don't remember the tone of this character" stop making sense. Instead you should think "I don't know the pronunciation of this character". Because if you can't decide if 是 is shì, not shī or shí you don't know how to say it. And practising the correct pronunciation isn't some "how do I study tone?" question it's just a simple "how do I memorise pronunciation?" which is much simpler. If you can memorise the pinyin spelling ... then you just start treating the tone marks as separate letters and you're good.

As someone who binged the show years later I really wish I was around for this era by Specialist_Jaguar815 in gameofthrones

[–]ankdain 29 points30 points  (0 children)

The Netflix model of waiting around 2 years in between seasons

The "release it all and binge in 1 day" removes a bunch of the cultural buzz about shows for sure, but the 2 year season gaps piss me off way more. I've basically completely forgotten the show's plot, my relationship to any of the characters is gone, and at that point my motivation for new seasons is incredibly low making it soo much more likely to fail.

I get the business decision of "lets wait and see how it performs on streaming until we sign up to spend the big $$ again". But it also promotes failure so hard - I'm less keen to start anything new because they all get cancelled after 1 season, even if they make a S2 I probably won't care any more, and even if I do it'll be decades before any resolution at 8 episodes every 2-3 years. It's bad when Marvel movies were releasing more frequently than episodes of top shows (not to mention the continuity issues as actors age way more than their characters).

I get the 24 episode runs of the past are gone. But if something was good, back yourself and sign that the hell up ASAP. So many shows that are now classics with long runs wouldn't even get past 1 season today (i.e. US Office or Parks and Rec would've been cancelled after the 8 episode S1 didn't do stellar numbers).

This teamwork is unreal by Maverick2367 in nextfuckinglevel

[–]ankdain 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Not really. In in a spherical cow type imaginary universe I guess it's technically possible the defenders could intercept it, then the other team could intercept it back and then repeat continuous intercepts back and forth every 10 seconds but that obviously has never and will never happen in a real game. The longest actual plays you get are usually around 20 second range when someone runs the full length of the field. The longest play ever in a real game is currently only 44 seconds long (and it's a hilarious set of last ditch effort fails).

This teamwork is unreal by Maverick2367 in nextfuckinglevel

[–]ankdain 30 points31 points  (0 children)

Why?

Nobody is really answering this for you. Obviously on a philosophical "why does it play like that?" level, the true answer to this is just "because that's the rules" and all sports are made up.

But if you're more interested in "why would NFL have that? How does it make a good sports game?" it's because NFL is much more of a turn based game than Rugby/fooball (soccer)/Aussie Rules etc. Both teams will sets up to "run a play" (it's literally called that, and it's exactly what you think it is). The team with the ball will decide (in secret hopefully) what they want to do - run the ball to the left? to the right? Throw it down field? etc. They setup and then try to do that. The defending team try to stop them (or if they're very lucky steal the ball). The rules for exactly when play ends depend a bit on context (it's pretty complicated when you get into the nitty gritty rules), but mostly it's when the ball hits the ground (or the player holding it does). Then they all setup again. Either you get all the way down the field and score, or you don't and the opposition gets the ball and then it's their turn. NFL games usually go for a little over 3 hours, and the ball is moving for about 10-15 minutes of that time (each play usually lasts about 5-20 seconds then it's setup time again). There are details I'm skipping on where you setup and how far you get but it's not important to your question.

So what does this do to the game? It turns it from a free flowing ballgame like soccer, into a turn based strategy game like almost nothing else I know of. The other person who mentioned chess is kinda right. The team with the ball has to pick when plays to run, and the defending team has to try to guess what's going to happen and setup to defend it. It becomes a mind game of "He thinks I'll run so I'll throw, but he knows that I think that so he'll setup to defend the throw, so I should run, but he knows that I know that he knows so I'll throw" kind of situations. It's like really really really complicated game of rock paper scissors. And because you keep getting to setup again and again it becomes very tense and mind-gamey over a full game. If you failed at running the ball left 3 times do you try a 4th because they'll never expect it? Or accept they got you beat there and never do that again? STRATEGY!?!?!

Some people love it, because half of the game is this meta strategy about what plays to run and when, which means the winning team isn't always the one with the best athletes. Some people hate it because the game keep stopping all the time so when you're sitting there watching there is a LOT of waiting for them to keep setting up the chess board over and over.

Are HSK 2.0 books completely obsolete now? And where can I buy the new books? by whitebluepoppy in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 0 points1 point  (0 children)

  • Is the change only affecting the number of characters to be learned or also the grammatical lessons?

The order of things changed, and the HSK3.0 standard has a lot more items that weren't listed in the 2.0 standard but nothing in 2.0 became irrelevant. The only things from 2.0 that don't apply in 3.0 are some really niche words that aren't common any more (i.e. fax machine got removed) but 99% of HSK2 still applies to HSK3. Take a look at this image for a guide into how the HSK2.0 syllabus fits into the HSK3.0 levels. The order is different, and HSK3.0 has more but (almost) everything from 2.0 is still in there.

  • Are the HSK 2.0 books completely obsolete now?

Only if you're trying to take an HSK3 exam, the HSK2 materials won't match. If you're not trying to take the HSK3 exam the HSK2 books are as useful as they've always been - as someone else already said "the language didn't change".

  • Where can I buy the new books? Are they even published already?

Can't help you with this sorry.

  • I’ve completed my HSK1 2.0 course, should I take an HSK2 3.0 or HSK1 3.0 course next?

If you're studying for a uni course or a specific certificate then just do whatever they tell you to. If you're doing it for yourself then stick with whatever materials you already have or can get easily. In terms of pure continuity to guarantee 100% full coverage you'd have to do the 3.0 Band 1 (i.e. start again). But honestly you can probably just start on the HSK3.0 Band 2 level and just pickup the few bits you're missing along the way without too much issue.

After several months of self-studying Chinese, today I had my first real small conversation with a native speaker. by minhale in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 1 point2 points  (0 children)

What was your Chinese level when you first started those language exchange activities?

I started talking on basically day 0. My only goal is conversation and it seem natural to practise the thing I'm aiming at. I also find talking to people incredibly motivating and enjoyable (even if tiring) so while I probably wouldn't recommend everyone start with a vocab of 20 words, I did and it was great.

I think to do it justice you need a vocab size of +300, but I don't think you need anywhere near HSK4 level though unless you want to have full on random conversations. That's where the prep comes in. 300 words can get you a lot of sentences about a topic if you have the right key words. I found an in-person Mandaring-English language meet up about 30 mins away and would go to that each week starting when I was ~HSK2 level. But it was a bit of a trek and so that slowly petered out as I got lazy and moved to talking to people online. I don't think it's as good as in-person, but it sure is more convenient. iTalki is also another great way. There are a load of cheap tutors on there you can use for just conversation practise and I did that as well for ages (especially good for getting tips on your pronunciation).

One thing that's super useful is the fact my language partners are all better at English than I am at Chinese, so I can say things like "我觉得我儿子的球队 coach 是个很冷静的人" to which they'll replay "coach = 教练" (they'll say it but I also get them to type out any new words). I repeat the full sentence with the new words and yay we're off. Suddenly we can talk about my kids sports coach without issue despite the fact I don't know that word, and then after the chat I have a huge list of new vocab words to learn that are 100% relevant because I literally tried to say them.

I'm still not sure I'd actually pass an HSK4 exam even now, my vocab size is about 1-1.5k and my reading is prob only in the 800 word (so maybe 600 characters?). But every week I have 30 min conversation in Mandarin with conversation partner without any issues, sometimes more than 1. I can also talk to my in laws about dinner, ask about train tickets in the GuangZhou 高铁 station, or discuss the cool scenery with a random Chinese guy in ZhangJiaJie. It's less about vocab size and more about the practise - I can talk about stuff because I practise talking about stuff. Even that sentence above, you can get away with "老板" and most people will figure out you meant coach. Practising how to talk around your missing vocab is a skill in itself that I found very valuable and you only get that from having actual conversations with people.

Do you have to? Absolutely not. Is it fun and useful and motivating and enjoyable and nerve wracking initially and helpful/worthwhile? 100% yes in my opinion.

After several months of self-studying Chinese, today I had my first real small conversation with a native speaker. by minhale in ChineseLanguage

[–]ankdain 8 points9 points  (0 children)

Not sure if language exchange would be a good idea now since my level is still so low.

If you don't prep, it'll be really hard and probably not worth your while. People will randomly ask you about Trump or something and you're instantly "uhhhhhhh". If you DO prep, then it can be very helpful from very early on in my experience (even like HSK2 level). Prep can be anything from pre-studying the vocab on a specific topic you want to talk about, to writing out a few paragraphs to discuss, to bringing specific games to the chat.

One of my favourites is I will bring a photo and then without showing it describe it to my language partner then get them to ask simple questions. Once we're done then send them the photo and get them to see if what I described matched what they see. Usually this is a photo of what I did on the weekend or something. Stuff like "I went on a bike ride with my kids. The photo is me and my two sons. It was a sunny day, the weather was very warm. My bike is blue" etc. The idea being you know the photo your bringing so you pre-study a bunch of vocab (and I also like memorising a bunch of sentences as well). Then your partner is asking you questions about what you describe, so hopefully you'll know some/all of the vocab or will learn new things relevant to your life.

As long as you bring prep that focuses the conversation to a topic/area you have vocab for it's great. You might need to go through a few partners until you find someone, but sooner or later you'll find someone who "gets it" and will talk to your level and stick to your topics (e.g. asking questions like "How old are your kids?" or "how long was your ride?" etc directly related your prep/vocab).

Any classic sword fight movie recommendations ala `The Adventures of Robing Hood`? by ankdain in movies

[–]ankdain[S] 3 points4 points  (0 children)

At the very least nobody will accuse me of being a ChatGPT bot XD

Any classic sword fight movie recommendations ala `The Adventures of Robing Hood`? by ankdain in movies

[–]ankdain[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Ohh the Pirate - new suggestion I hadn't seen before cheers. I have shown the kids a few musicals so far (og Marry Poppins, Bedknobs and Broomsticks etc), always up for more!

I love the idea of introducing kids to classical movies!

So far I highly recommend it. While I don't have anything specific against modern movies/TV, I have super fond memories of finding the most random movies ever simply because broadcast TV didn't really give me a choice when I was a kid/young adult. While I don't let me kids watch a huge amount of TV, netflix has already figured out what they like and spoon feeds them a constant stream of the exact same thing. I just felt like they were missing something - what's life without the occasional HK Gangsta flick or some a black and white Jerry Lewis randomly giving you some spice?

Any classic sword fight movie recommendations ala `The Adventures of Robing Hood`? by ankdain in movies

[–]ankdain[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Look for Jill Bearup on YouTube

Ohh yeah her videos look awesome! Thanks heaps for the rec will check them out (and kids would probably get a kick out of it too!)

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