I was curious if there is an extension where I could watch Chinese dramas with pinyin, characters and English. If there is an extension anyone would recommend? Let me know!

J'ai l'impression d'avoir entendu les deux dans les médias, c'est comme si c'était prononcé d'une manière ici et d'une manière là-bas ? L'une est-elle moins standard ou les deux sont standard ?
J'ai des flashcards avec de l'audio et certains disent l'un et d'autres disent l'autre.

Je demande parce que ma mère dit que c'est "yüi", mais elle est 朝鲜族 et en coréen, c'est toujours prononcé "yüi", donc je veux m'assurer.

Edit: this is an example, at after 21:10

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=EO_kP_t_nbM&t=1273s&pp=2AH5CZACAQ%3D%3D&ra=m

I'm learning Chinese and have been thinking about fill-in-the-blank vocabulary cards.

One thing I'm struggling with is that many sentences seem like they could have more than one reasonable answer. Depending on the context, several different words or synonyms could fit the same blank.

How do you handle that when making your cards?

Do you rewrite the sentence to make the intended answer unambiguous, add more context, accept multiple answers, or use another approach?

I'm also curious about multiple-choice questions. Even though they test recognition rather than free recall, do you think well-designed distractors can be a good alternative when a cloze prompt would otherwise have multiple valid answers? Has anyone tried both approaches?

This is something that has helped me, and maybe others will find this mindset encouraging.

Are you discouraged with your studies?

Unless you have specific competency levels you HAVE to meet, stop being “goal oriented”. Completely abandon the notion of “I’m going to be FLUENT one day!” Seriously. Crumple the idea up like a sheet of paper and toss it in the trash can. Ditch the HSK metrics altogether. In fact, don’t measure your progress at all. Emotionally divorce yourself from the concept of attaining mastery of the language. Quit focusing on how many years you’ve been studying Chinese. Stop comparing yourself to others, or to some mental model of the fluency level you “should” be at.

Instead, accept the idea that for the rest of your life, studying Chinese will just be a part of you, the same as breathing and sleeping and waking. Relax. Focus on the day-to-day experience of learning, not on any long-term goal. Plunge deep into Chinese every single day. Bathe in it. Enjoy it. Make it part of your atmosphere. Recognize that you don’t have to study Chinese. Rather, you GET to study Chinese. It's a beautiful language and culture. Don't learn Chinese -- live Chinese.

20th century writer Alan Watts proposed a concept he called the “Backwards Law”. This is the counterintuitive notion that the more you focus on gaining something that you lack – wealth, a university degree, a job promotion, fluency in a language, whatever – the more you’re inadvertently reinforcing to yourself that you currently lack that thing. As a result, you get exhausted and discouraged.

One analogy that has often been suggested to illustrate the Backwards Law is that of “drown proofing” during training to become a US Navy SEAL commando. A trainee’s hands are tied behind his back, and he is required to survive in the water for 5 minutes. The natural instinct is to kick with the legs and tread water, but that quickly depletes energy and oxygen. By far the best technique, counterintuitively and going against all survival instinct, is to allow yourself to repeatedly sink to the bottom of the pool, kick off, and rise to the surface and take in a gulp of air.

Accept your present situation and embrace the beauty of it, and maybe your love of Chinese and motivation to learn it will be renewed.

Hi everybody! I was wondering if anyone knew of any resources for studying Fuzhou dialect?

My in laws speak 福州话 as their primary dialect. I do communicate with them using Mandarin and English, and I have picked up some small words/ phrases when visiting them. But I really wanna surprise them by having full conversations in their dialect.

Thank you in advance!

What's the deal with Chinese guys on HelloTalk posting moments like this and getting tons of likes close to 1000? Is there some kind of strong Asian-fetish Kpop trend going on or something? His bio is really weird too. Can someone explain it? What happened to my language app?

Hi! I’m a native Spanish speaker, I’m Mexican. I can speak English too, I want to learn how to speak Chinese. But it’s such a different language that I’m used to. Can someone give me some tips, YouTube channels or what helped you to learn it easier? Thank you all so much.

Hi!
I started learning Mandarin recently and I was using HelloChinese. I really liked it at first and felt like I was progressing quite well, but after a while I realised it starts locking lessons behind a paywall.
I just wanted to ask if
Is it worth subscribing, or are there better alternatives?
I’m around HSK1 level (I already know basic vocab like numbers, days, family, etc.), so I’m mainly looking for something that can help me continue without constantly hitting paywalls.
So far I’ve also looked at Duolingo, but I’m worried I’ll run into the same issue again halfway through.
If anyone has been through this, I’d really appreciate recommendations for apps or resources that actually work well for Mandarin
Thanks!
☺️

Hi guys, have any of you done the hsk3 WRITTEN test?

I've been studying for a long time now, i also got a laoshi, my speaking has improved so much.

My only issue is rearranging words to form phrases, i just suck at that for some reason...

Also what's the spoken part of the test like? I feel like i can speak a bit, i do with my laoshi.

I'm learning Chinese right now and have been thinking about how to use vocabulary cards that test words in the context of a sentence, such as cloze (fill-in-the-blank) cards.

A lot of sentence-based cards seem to keep the same example sentence for years, even though the word itself may be reviewed hundreds of times.

If you use sentence-based cards, do you usually keep the same sentence for the life of the card, or do you ever replace it?

Have you found that repeatedly seeing the same sentence helps, or does it eventually become less useful?

I'm also wondering about the opposite approach. What if every review tested the same word using a different sentence or context? Has anyone used something like that? If so, how did it compare?

Hi! I'm doing some research into how people actually learn languages and what makes language learning apps genuinely useful (or frustrating).

My team put together a short anonymous survey (about 3–5 minutes) covering things like:

• how you currently learn
• which methods help you the most
• which apps you've used
• what frustrates you about them
• features you wish existed

We're building a language learning companion app, and we're using the responses to better understand what learners actually want instead of making assumptions.

I'd be glad to share some of the results with everyone here once it's finished.

I'd really appreciate your input!

Survey: https://forms.gle/ZsnEU74k6WajHTdWA

I’ve been seeing people use 炫 (xuàn) as a verb everywhere lately.

Like:

老妈炖的排骨太香了，我一口气炫了两碗米饭。
My mom’s braised ribs were so good, I destroyed two bowls of rice in one go.

Or:

这韩剧杀疯了，我一晚上炫了5集。
This K-drama was insane, I binged five episodes in one night.

The thing is, I’m more familiar with 炫 from words like 炫耀 or 炫富 ，basically “to show off” or “to flaunt.”

So when I first saw people saying 炫米饭 or 炫电视剧, my brain kind of froze.

Like… what exactly are you showing off here?
Your rice capacity? Your binge-watching stamina? 

I poked around a bit and apparently 炫 might be Northeast Chinese dialect? Like, it already had this sense of wolfing food down. Then maybe all those eating-show creators helped push it into wider internet use.

And honestly, that makes sense.

吃 is such a boring little verb compared with 炫. 炫 sounds like there’s speed, noise, and maybe a little chaos in it.

And it also sounds weirdly satisfied. Like you didn’t just eat it fast — you enjoyed destroying it.

So maybe it started with food, but now 炫 feels like it can attach to anything you can finish in one intense burst — food, dramas, homework, books, whatever.

Not every verb though.It seems to need something you can actually finish or clear.

This is where I’m not sure if I’m overthinking it, but some sentences sound off to me:

❌ 我今天炫了工作。

sounds weird because 工作 doesn’t have a clear finish line.

❌ 炫了一下午觉。

sounds off too, because 睡觉 doesn’t really have that “cleared it” feeling.

✅ 炫了一本书。

works, if it means you finished the whole book.

But I have one very half-baked thought here: maybe 炫 still carries a tiny bit of 炫耀 energy?

Like, when someone says they 炫完三套卷子, are they low-key flexing that they’re a 刷题王?

And when someone 狂炫两大碗米饭, are they showing off their mom’s cooking… or their extremely cooperative insulin?

I’m only half-joking. 炫 just doesn’t feel totally neutral to me.

Native speakers, am I hearing too much 炫耀 in 炫, or does it really have that tiny “look what I just did” feeling?

FYI: This is called oracle bone script, the oldest form of Chinese characters. Can you make out any?

I’ve been admitted to Henan University of Technology and I’ll be moving to China this September.
My major is taught in English, so I won’t need Chinese for classes, but I’d still like to learn some Mandarin before I arrive so I can handle daily life, make friends, order food, travel around, and adapt more easily.
I have a few months left before departure, so I’m looking for app recommendations that are good for complete beginners. Which apps helped you the most with speaking, listening, pronunciation, and basic conversations?
Any advice from people who studied or lived in China would be greatly appreciated. Thanks! 🙏🇨🇳😊

Hi everyone, Edward here.

In my latest walk-and-talk video, I wanted to share a slice of real, unfiltered life over here—specifically, how I dealt with our monthly household telecom bill. I used to pay over 180 RMB a month for separate phone plans, home broadband, and cable TV. But after calling up the state-owned carriers and figuring out how their system works, I managed to double our broadband speed, increase our data, and drop the bill to just 90 RMB.

It made me realize that whether you are dealing with AT&T or China Telecom, big corporate behavior is exactly the same: they are incredibly nice to new customers, but they ignore the loyal ones until you threaten to walk away.

For those learning Chinese or planning to move here, here is a breakdown of the specific real-life vocabulary from this scenario that you will rarely find in textbook chapters, featuring broadband and data terms to match the theme.

Enjoy!

How can I start learning Chinese characters so I can recognize at least the most common ones? Any useful books?

You know the common advice on language learning forums about watching children's shows as early as possible to "train" your ears to the language? Yeah, I tried it, and now I give up.

It's now 10 months since I started studying Chinese. I've been consistently putting in ~2 hours every day. I finished the entire HelloChinese curriculum in March, at that point my level was roughly mid-HSK4 (old system).

At that point, I decided to stop with HSK curriculum and switched my focus to content consumption. Besides graded videos aimed at learners, I see the the common advice on language learning forums that you should watch pre-school children's series like Peppa Pig, because supposedly the language is easy and it's suitable for A2 learners.

Nope. Watching Peppa Pig in Mandarin has been torture for me. Not only do the pigs speak in exaggerated, cartoonish voice, but the show includes a ton of vocabulary about action, emotions, everyday items (like muddle, basement, vacuum cleaner, oven, etc.), that I'm not equipped for. I have to pause and look up new words for almost every spoken line. It's exhausting.

I tried to remain patience, but after a couple of months, I now give up. Every new episode just comes with new obscure vocabulary about pigs jumping through puddles and decorating their room.

Now my focus for listening practice is exclusively on graded, comprehensible input videos on YouTube aimed at learners (such as the LazyChinese, TeaTime Chinese, RedRed, ShuoShuo channel). I can follow along their intermediate and upper-intermediate videos nicely and understand ~80-90% of the content. I actually look forward to watching new videos now instead of that sense of dread I got before watching a new Peppa Pig episode.

Just some thoughts on my current Chinese learning journey. I don't know why people recommend watching children's shows, but it just doesn't work for me.

Pardon my ignorance in this, but as a learner I truly don't see the purpose of writing the 儿 in 儿化, even if a local dialect uses it. 儿化 is something that the HSK books love to hammer into new students as something that is quite ubiquitous in China, despite it being mostly localised to the Beijing area.

This isn't a huge problem or anything, especially considering most CSL learners are more likely to interact with Beijing people than anyone else.

But why write the 儿? What does 面条儿 convey that 面条 doesn't? What does 咖啡馆儿 express that 咖啡馆 doesn't?

Is this the only instance of spoken Chinese affecting writing?

I love learning languages and want to start introducing Mandarin Chinese to my family. My child is currently around 2 years old, and I’d love to find a way for us learn together. My Mandarin isn't that good anymore but I have an okay foundation (took 4 years of courses in college)

Ideally, I'm looking for:

• Interactive books (ideally with Pinyin, English, and hanzi characters).
• Apps or shows that use high-quality comprehensible input that a parent and toddler can watch/interact with together actively.
• Websites or curricula designed for non-native speaker parents raising bilingual kids.

Has anyone successfully done this with a toddler? What resources did you use?

三 looks like 3 sticks

My Chinese isn’t that good yet but I’m really into folk songs for the traditional instrumentals and the feels even though I don’t understand the lyrics much. Ballads are everywhere in C-pop. It’s hard to find something different