First off - the Japanese restaur
Next came Zhongwen Zhiye, the end of term talent s
I also have a video of my final oral exam: a talk show where we discuss what factors are most important when considering who to marry.
It's really remarkable how much I changed while I was away in China. Firstly, I became fluent in Chinese. I knew it would happen (I even mentioned it in my first blog post), but it still amazes me. Back when I was a first year student, I used to search for videos on Youtube of foreigners speaking Chinese... seeing a non-heritage speaker speak fluent Chinese gave me something to strive for. One girl in particular really impressed me. I understood almost none of what she said in her videos, but she spoke so confidently and fluidly that I didn't question her language skills. Now I watch her videos and catch her tonal and grammar mistakes as well as her sometimes awkward word choices.
I used to memorize Chinese characters by forming pictures and inventing characters in my head. For example: the word "humorous" (yōumò). The first character became a set of bleachers filled with cheering fans. The second character is composed of, on the left, an alien baby sitting on coals, and me on the right smoking a pipe. I don't think I'll ever forget how to write "humorous" in Chinese.


As the semester went on, I relied less and less on silly pictures. As I learned more characters and the meanings of different radicals, I began to "feel" inside me whether I had written a character correctly. Instead of just learning by rote, for example, that 火 means "fire," I now look at that character and can't help but to associate it with heat, machinery, industry... fire. It might still take me a while to read a paragraph in Chinese. But the characters make a lot more sense now. I just wish my English were a little bitter so that I could express this all clearly haha.
With that, I say good bye to Beijing, my home for the past half a year. I think I did a lot of growing up over in China. I cannot thank the Light Fellowship donors and staff enough for the amazing opportunities they have given me. I'm excited to see what life has in store for me next.
Happy Holidays and a very Happy New Year.
Tairyo Teppanyaki. Got it, thanks.
ReplyDeleteGreat final post! It never ceases to amaze me what is possible within the span of a few months, and congratulations to you for getting so much out of this opportunity!