Nekomimi_mode

I'm surprised no one has mentioned Gu Family Book yet. I found the pacing and story-line to be incredible. The end of every episode had a cliffhanger that just made you want to watch the next episode. A lot of times with Korean dramas the acting seems to flip flop. It's like one scene the actor really seems to be in love with the character and the next scene they're acting really cold. However I didn't experience this problem with Gu Family Book. The love was slow and budding but if really felt genuine, and the crying scenes were riveting. When they cried it wasn't a pretty pose for the camera one tear style cry. I could feel their pain, it made me cry. The plot was excellent. It's about a boy who is half kumiho who struggles to find out about his real family while trying to protect the one that raised him. The special effects were also semi-believable. Asian supernatural dramas tend to throw in special effects that are really cheesy super fake looking. But this drama kept the special effects to a minimum(using blue lights at the most). The ending is bittersweet but it's a must see in my book. Also seconding My Love From Another Star, the acting gets kinda annoying(it flip flops) but it's a solid drama with a nice plot. The ending could use some work though, you'll find out why when(if?) you watch it.

This site is awesome, I wish they would have everyone who speaks a different dialect sing the same song and the edit it all together. Sort of like how they did with the Frozen video sung in different languages. Though they'd probably have to choose a relatively long song since there are quite a few Chinese dialects. I'm sure it would sound awesome though. Do they have a place where you can email them suggestions?

I've been studying Chinese for three years and I completely understand how you feel about the tones. I still wonder how my Chinese teacher never got angry at me because my tones were TERRIBLE. That being said, everyone is bad at something when they first start it. The best way to learn the tones is to first picture them in your head. There are a lot of pictures online showing where the tones start and end. The one below is a good example of how the tones should sound. The second step is to trace the tones in the air with your finger. First tone is a high straight line, second tone is a crooked line going up and so on. Get a feel for how the tones should sound. Thirdly say each tone with a simple vowel sound( like a) while tracing the tone in the air with your finger. It will help reinforce how the tone should sound and help you picture the tone while you pronounce it. So when you say first tone's "ā" you should trace a straight horizontal line in the air and so on with the rest of the tones.This helped me a lot when I would mix third tone and fourth tone up. Lastly listen to educational videos for kids, they tend to water it down a bit and put in repetitive catchy songs that will make learning them easier for you. Once you have the tones down, you'll find learning the language much easier. The video's below are great helpers with distinguishing the tones. The first one covers phonetics too but if you only want the tones start the video at the 2:00 mark. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S4WeL7PvQCU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NFwF297Q4bA Hopefully with these you'll find Chinese to be a little less daunting and test it out again. 学中文很难可是你应该尝试它。可能你会喜欢它。 加油！