老外来了：外国人学汉语---老外哭诉：“我太难了！”

介绍： 主播：Win（美国） 翩翩（中国）
歌曲：One day

Foreigners learn Chinese
Learning Chinese is not easy!

1. Is Chinese hard? 外国人学汉语难吗？
It’s easier if you are Korean or Japanese. But if you are westerner, you have that fear. 
对于西方人来说，Chinese is really hard.

Why is it hard for westerners to learn Chinese? 为什么西方人学汉语难？
It doesn’t translate well. The grammar is very different from Romantic languages.
欧美国家的语言一般都是Latin拉丁语系，因此，欧美人学Spanish、 French、 Italian都是比较简单的，一般听一听大约就能understand。
但是汉语却是totally different！

It is easily one of the hardest languages in the world. 
汉语被公认为是世界上最难得语言之一。

English is great easily to pick up.
但英语却比较好上手, because of movies.
Hollywood has made English accessible and spread the culture all over the world.
Win觉得英语简单是因为好莱坞电影特别多，大家都在听、学。只要我们看好莱坞电影，我们就会have contact with English。

have contact with 和……有联系，接触到
mysterious 神秘的

外国人也会受“哑巴汉语”的折磨哦
Listening is better than oral（口语）. 听力要比口语好。

mental block 心理障碍
language block 语言障碍
block 被堵住

“哑巴英语”、“哑巴汉语”怎么说呢？
外国人喜欢用bottleneck（瓶颈）来形容听懂的多而能说的少。
They have bottleneck with their Chinese.

dumb/ mute English 哑巴英语
language bottleneck 语言瓶颈

2. Where is Chinese difficult? 汉语究竟难在哪里呢？
第一难：声调 the 5 tones 
在英语中，tones emphasis on different words，在不同的单词上重读可能会引起意思的不同。
在汉语中，tones are unlike anything in Western languages,在每一个character（字）上重读的意思都不一样。

characters 汉字
汉语的五种声调：
First/ high-level tone 阴平（一声） 
Second/ rising tone 阳平（二声）
Third/ low/ low-falling-raising tone 上声(三声)
Fourth/ falling tone 去声（四声）
Neutral/ Fifth/ zeroth tone 轻声 
Neutral tone is sometimes thought of incorrectly as a lack of tone.

eg： I feel sick. 我感觉不舒服。
That was sick! 太恶心了！

对Win来说，low tone（三声）和falling tone（四声）They are so close! 太像了！

Characters are exceptionally difficult to study and memorize. 汉字本身就格外的难学习和记住。

第二难：文化背景 cultural context
A meme: Fang bian (方便)
① Are you convenient tonight? 你今晚方便吗？
Fang bian: Are you available to meet? 有时间吗？
②I need to go to the bathroom. 我需要去方便一下。
Fang bian: use the bathroom 上厕所
③If he have enough money? 你方便付钱吗？
Fang bian: Do you have enough money? 你的钱够吗？
④Then they eat ‘fang bian mian’. 他们回家后又吃了方便面。
Fang bian: convenient food 速食品

这么多的“方便”让外国人很confused，也很头疼。

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