Extracurricular Chinese TV

A lot of our Chinese friends tell us that we should watch Chinese soap operas to help improve our Chinese. I don't doubt that - conversational dialogue is one of the best things to learn. But I haven't really spent too much time researching on what actually is a good soap opera series to watch. So... that one is on hold.

In the meantime, I have found a different show for my extracurricular Chinese TV (er, watched on our computer, that is, since we don't have a TV). It is...

托马斯和朋友 (tuō mǎ sī hé péng yǒu).

For the English speaking 3-year-olds out there... that would be "Thomas & Friends." Yes yes... Thomas the train.

Thomas & Friends launched in Chinese in April of this year, airing on CCTV-1. I've been able to find about 30+ episodes online.



It is all in Chinese, along with Chinese subtitles. It has been a great way to hear some basic language, basic conversation, and cover some fun topics. So far, I have learned about bravery, pride, sacrifice, asking for help, and forgiveness.

So, can you guess the trains below based on the Chinese transliteration of their names?

托马斯 - tuōmǎsī
邓肯 - dèngkěn
艾蜜莉 - àimìlì
高登 - gāodēng
培西 - péixī

And as a bonus, who is this character (not based on transliteration)?

胖总管 - pàngzǒngguǎn

Potpourri

Back in the day, Potpourri was used as a Jeopardy category whenever they wanted to find a place for a bunch of questions which had no running theme. Today, Potpourri will be the title of this blog post on multiple random things.

First, regarding some cool things I've recently discovered...

A Chinese tv station, called 东方电影 (dōng fāng diàn yǐng = Eastern Movie) streams online - it often plays American movies with Chinese translations. Movies like... A Few Good Men, The Wedding Singer, and others. But also, on weekday afternoons, it plays 2 episodes of Smallville. This has been great for language practice - simple dialogues, easy to follow, and somewhat entertaining.

The Twitter Website has been inaccessible here all this week. But, thanks to The Captain, I have just learned that Twitter Gadget is accessible. This will be useful until the Twitter website comes back online.

Next, regarding candy...

Saw this in the store the other day:


If the green packaging doesn't give it away, then perhaps you remember our little Chinese lesson from a previous post that the very first character in the top left of the packaging: 酸 (suān) means sour. That's right... sour skittles. Wonderful. (By the way, I have grown to really like the sour milk that I bought last week. It's already all gone. Will probably buy more.)

Lastly, regarding fruit...

We've been pleased that there is a large variety of different fruits available. Fruit is somewhat expensive here, at least relative to other food; but, nonetheless, we have many options. I was very pleased to find mangoes here. Mangoes are possibly my favorite fruit. Just by looking at this picture, can't you tell right away that this mango is sweet and juicy? Well, it was.



Also, regarding fruit... I went out today to buy a lime. For salsa. It was part of our Mexican food dinner tonight (which was delicious... but Bethany will blog about it tomorrow... with pictures - something to look forward to for sure!). I bought the greenest lime I could find:



And then I cut it open. This... was not a lime.



I felt deceived. Is this a lime? Is this an orange? What. Is. This. Thing?