Hear Me

I know it's the same day, but I just wanted to write a bit about things other than my program's activities.

There's been an abundance of down time while we're traveling from place to place. It's a good time to chat with my classmates, get to know them. I'm really impressed with how nicely they can speak English. Even when there are discrepancies or misunderstandings, I can usually explain in detail what I mean and they'll catch on. It's amazing to think that they can hold conversations in two languages, when most people I know back in the states are only really fluent in one language and dabble in another.

Listening and comprehending Mandarin Chinese has been...I won't say a breeze, but I think it's my strongest aspect of this language. Then comes speaking, then reading, lastly writing. My goal when coming here was to practice speaking, but then I found out that the program is English oriented. So really the only time I practice is outside of class, while ordering things, or trying to bargain for a lower price in the night market. I'm happy that when people come up to ask a question I can usually answer them in Chinese. But other times the translation cogs in my brain get stuck and I usually just say, "我不說中文 (wo bu shou zhong wen)" Which means I don't speak Chinese, in Chinese. Even though it doesn't make sense to say that, it's just what comes out of my mouth.

So I can probably read about half of these characters

So it's nice to speak with my classmates in English and listen to them speak Chinese. They were practicing speaking English to each other when Randy and I found them in the game room tonight. Ji Ling had brought up the topic of Ken's love life...which turned into us having a fake television show called "Patient Family."

Patient because we'll listen to anything you say without question and Family because as Ken puts it, "We are Family! You can tell us everything." Basically everyone just shared about their previous or current loves. Like a girls night.

Here's a trailer for a movie recommended by my classmates. It's called Hear Me and is a romantic comedy, I'd say. About a boy who falls in love with a girl, of course. The twist is that he thinks she is deaf, but she really is just using sign language to communicate with her deaf sister. He learned sign language to be able to talk with her. So sweet, yet silly.