• MoeDict/萌
• Source code:javascript:(function(){var%20w=window,d=w.document,s="";;if(d.selection){s=d.selection.createRange().text}else%20if(d.getSelection){s=d.getSelection()}else%20if(w.getSelection){s=window.getSelection()}window.open("https://www.moedict.tw/#"+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");})()

Update: 2012/11/7: OK, so it’s broken again…I suspect due to a Chrome upgrade….the links to them dictionaries down there are still useful though!

[Update 2012/3/10: K, it totally works now. I’d…yeah…I goofed up. The source code was fine, but…yeah…I copied the wrong…Anyway, it works now! ]

Hey there, you Lazy Hanzi aficionados!

Here is a little bookmarklet that looks up multiple kanji dictionaries (Wiktionary, MDBG, Richard Sears’ Chinese Etymology, CantoDict, Goo and YellowBridge) for you with a single click.

1. Drag and drop the following link onto your browser’s toolbar: 華匙漢MHLB
2. Highlight a single hanzi (e.g.: 感) and then click on the link.

• Read more on bookmarklets:
  • What is a bookmarklet j.mp/qjlQb8
  • Bookmarklets – About Bookmarklets j.mp/o5Fic3
  • How to use a bookmarklet: A Service of Wytheville Community College j.mp/vaW5Ws
  • how to use bookmarklets – YouTube j.mp/rS5wEs
  • The Digital Marketer : How to Use Bookmarklets :: Quick and Dirty Tips j.mp/vwSwD0
• Source code for this bookmarklet:
  • javascript:(function(){var w=window,d=w.document,s="";;if(d.selection){s=d.selection.createRange().text}else if(d.getSelection){s=d.getSelection()}else if(w.getSelection){s=window.getSelection()}window.open('http://www.surusu.com/addqaui.php?front='+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://www.mdbg.net/chindict/chindict.php?page=worddict&wdrst=1&wdqb="+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/"+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://www.chineseetymology.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput="+encodeURIComponent(s)+"&submitButton1=Etymology","_blank");window.open("http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/dictionary/search/?searchtype=3&text="+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/wordsearch.php?searchMode=C&dialect=M&word="+encodeURIComponent(s)+"&search=Search","_blank");window.open("http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/srch/je/"+encodeURIComponent(s)+"/m0u/","_blank");})()

“Cantonese is a difficult language to learn — not because of its sounds or syntax, but because it’s hard to find good learning resources”
— Eldon

Well, let’s remedy that one mini-transcript at a time, as has been the custom established by Edwin and CanteHK!

Situation: Ahsoka Tano appears for the first time, delivering critical news to Obi-Wan and Anakin to the effect that they are both to return to the Jedi Temple ASAP.

亞蘇卡・塔諾：尤達大師叫我嚟嘅。佢指派咗個任務俾我，就係叫你哋即刻趕快去絕地神廟！
Ahsoka Tano: Yoda Daai Si giu ngo lei ga。Keui ji paai jo go yam mou bei ngo，jau hai giu nei dei jik hak gon faai heui Jedi san miu！
Ahsoka: Master Yoda sent me to inform you that you are to return to the Jedi Temple ASAP, motherlovers. Also, I’m sick of these motherloving droids on this motherloving plane!

• Audio file: clonewars-ahsokaappears

Note: I’ve never seen Star Wars: Clone Wars in English, so…I don’t know what the original lines were. These are my re-translation back into English from Cantonese.

超能先生(帕波)：咪話咗遲啲返嚟囉？！
chiu nang sin saang(paak bo)：mai wa jo chi di faan lei lo？！
Bob: I said I’d be back later.

彈弓女俠(柏海倫)：我知你話會遲返 但我係冇諗過咁遲囉！
ngo ji nei wa wui chi faan daan ngo hai mou nam(=lam) gwo(=go) gam chi lo！
Helen: I assumed you’d be back later. lf you came back at all…you’d be ”back later”.
Lit: I know you said you’d be back later, but I didn’t think you’d be THIS late, innit’?

Audio: incredibles-backlater

Here is a little bookmarklet that looks up multiple kanji dictionaries (Wiktionary, MDBG, Richard Sears’ Chinese Etymology, CantoDict and Goo) for you with a single click:

• Multiple Kanji Lookup Bookmarklet
• Source code: javascript:(function(){var w=window,d=w.document,s="";;if(d.selection){s=d.selection.createRange().text}else if(d.getSelection){s=d.getSelection()}else if(w.getSelection){s=window.getSelection()}window.open('http://www.surusu.com/addqaui.php?front='+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://www.mdbg.net/chindict/chindict.php?page=worddict&wdrst=1&wdqb="+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/"+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://www.chineseetymology.org/CharacterASP/CharacterEtymology.aspx?characterInput="+encodeURIComponent(s)+"&submitButton1=Etymology","_blank");window.open("http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/dictionary/search/?searchtype=3&text="+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank");window.open("http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/srch/je/"+encodeURIComponent(s)+"/m0u/","_blank");window.open("http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/srch/all/"+encodeURIComponent(s)+"/m0u/","_blank");window.open("http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/srch/all/"+encodeURIComponent(s)+"/m1u/","_blank");})()

Audio:Monsters vs Aliens: Look, what is it you want from me?

蘇珊墨菲：你呀，你究竟想我點呀？

sou saan mak fei：nei a，nei gau ging seung ngo dim a？

Susan Murphy: Look, what is it you want from me?

銀河煞星：妳偷咗一啲本應該屬於我嘅嘢！

ngan ho saat sing：nei tau jo yat go bun ying goi suk yu ngo ge ye

Gallaxhar: You have stolen what is rightfully mine.

蘇珊墨菲：我從來冇偷過你任何嘢！

sou saan mak fei：ngo chung loi mou tau gwo nei yam ho ye！

Susan Murphy: I didn’t steal anything from you.

銀河煞星：妳呢個龐大怪異嘅身體充滿咗量子素。佢係全宇宙最有力量嘅物質。妳真係以爲可以唔俾返我咩？

ngan ho saat sing：nei ni go pong daai gwaai yi ge san tai chung mun jo leung ji sou。keui hai chyun yu jau jeui yau lik leung ge mat jat。nei jan hai yi wai ho yi m bei faan ngo me？

Gallaxhar: Your enormous, grotesque body contains quantonium, the most powerful substance in the Universe. Did you really think you could keep it from me?

This clip is from The Incredibles/超人特工隊. Helen Parr (Elastigirl) and the kids have made it onto Syndrome’s island base. Helen is about to leave the kids alone in a cave overnight while she goes to heroically rescue husband Bob. But before she parts with her offspring, she does the momly thing to do and lays down some ground rules .

彈弓女俠(柏海倫)：佢哋絕對唔會因爲你係小朋友就留手。一有機會嘅話，佢哋就會殺你。唔好俾機會佢哋。
daan gung neui haap (paak hoi leun)：keui dei jyut deui m wui yan wai nei hai siu pang yau jau lau sau。yat yau gei wui ge wa，keui dei jau wui saat nei。m hou bei gei wui keui dei。
Helen: They won’t exercise restraint because you’re children. They will kill you if they get the chance. Do not give them that chance.

柏小麗：媽咪？
paak siu lai：ma mi？
Violet: Mom?

彈弓女俠(柏海倫)：小麗，我靠晒你㗎喇。
daan gung neui haap (paak hoi leun)：siu lai，ngo kaau saai nei ga la。
Helen: Vi, I’m counting on you.

柏小麗：啲嘢喇・・・
di ye la
Violet: There’s something I…

彈弓女俠(柏海倫)：我靠晒你呀。堅強啲。小衝，如果有啲咩嘢唔妥嘅話，媽咪要你有咁快就咁快。
ngo kaau saai nei a。gin keung di。siu chung，yu gwo[yau]di me ye m to ge wa，ma mi yiu nei yau gam faai jau gam faai。
Helen: I’m counting on you. Be strong. Dash, if anything goes wrong, I want you to run as fast as you can.
Note: Helen all but swallows the 有, but it does belong there, AFAIK.

柏小麗：有咁快就咁快？！
yau gam faai jau gam faai
Dash (excited): As fast as I can?!

彈弓女俠(柏海倫)：有咁快就咁快。跟住匿埋。睇住大家。媽咪聽朝就返。
yau gam faai jau gam faai。gan jyu nei maai。tai jyu daai ga。ma mi teng jiu jau faan。
Helen: As fast as you can. Stay hidden. Keep each other safe. I’ll be back by morning.
Note: When people say 就/jau really fast or…lazily…it can come out sounding a bit like “yau”…

• MDBG Bookmarklet
• Bookmarklet source code: javascript:(function(){var w=window,d=w.document,s="";;if(d.selection){s=d.selection.createRange().text}else if(d.getSelection){s=d.getSelection()}else if(w.getSelection){s=window.getSelection()}window.open("http://www.mdbg.net/chindict/chindict.php?page=worddict&wdrst=1&wdqb="+encodeURIComponent(s),"_blank")})()

Despite feeling a little bit like Jar Jar Binks addressing the Galactic Senate — mesa day startin pretty okee-day with a brisky morning munchy, then BOOM! Writin on AJATT! Mesa gettin’ very very scared! — I’m thrilled to have this opportunity to lay out some fundamentally good resources for all of the All Chinese All The Time folks in the audience.

Please don’t take this as an exhaustive list. It’s not. It’s just some stuff I’ve collected over the years. For one, it is very mainland China / simplified Chinese specific, because that’s where I’ve lived for the better part of the last decade. It’s also very biased toward the sort of lame stuff that I enjoy. That’s OK, though, because it’s only a spawn point. Show your stuff in the comments and help us fill this bugger out, why dontcha?

Streaming media and downloads

Most if not all of these should work worldwide, though obviously they will stream faster in China. Some of the bigger video sites have region locks for some of their content, but those locks tend to affect pirated Western media (to reduce complaints from overseas copyright holders, apparently) rather than Chinese media.

• Tudou and Youku are the two biggest Youtube clones in China. Thanks to liberal copyright law enforcement, they’re chock full of Chinese movies and TV shows.
• Ku6 and 56.com are also streaming video sites, and they sometimes have things that you can’t find on Youku and Tudou.
• Let’s not forget Youtube, the granddaddy of them all. Because Chinese copyright holders tend not to have as many bees up their bonnet as their Western counterparts, there is plenty of good Chinese language material there as well.
• Baidu Video Search is great for finding things that aren’t on any of the above sites. There are a ton of small-time video sharing sites out there, and Baidu Video gives you a search interface into all of them.
• Mogo is a Chinese music video portal, and is filled with music videos and musician interviews. They cover a lot of underground music (especially hip hop) and constantly have new material, making Mogo a great way to find new music and artists.
• Google.cn Music is an awesome resource for Chinese music, full of free (and legal) MP3 downloads. However, all of the good stuff is only available to people in mainland China (or who can finagle a mainland Chinese IP address). If you’re suffering behind the GFW, though, it is a shining mountain of goodness.
• I don’t listen to many podcasts, but I listen to the radio all day. Seriously, from 8:30am to 6:30pm, at least. Baidu Radio has streaming radio from all over the country, and for more Shanghai-specific fare there’s SMG’s 上海網絡廣播電臺. There are a lot of music stations, but for Chinese learners I’d recommend listening to the various 交通廣播 stations — they’re primarily meant for taxi drivers and anyone else stuck in traffic, and are invariably entertaining (and full of good ol’ fashioned 口語).
• I do, however, listen to the BBC’s Mandarin podcasts, which are fantastic, as should be expected from the BBC.
• SMG also has a streaming TV site that airs their entire lineup of channels. I’ll be honest in saying I don’t have a lot of experience with online Chinese TV (I just have Chinese TV, on a real TV, in my living room, all the time), and I’m not sure how well this streams outside of China, but it’s an option.
• VeryCD is a directory of eMule links for media and software of all kinds, including pretty much all popular Chinese movies and music. It’s not quite as convenient as BitTorrent, but its pretty comprehensive, and has avoided recent crackdowns on BT download sites on the mainland.
• HipHop.cn is a portal site for Chinese hiphop and rap (which you won’t hear on the radio, or find on many mainstream entertainment portals). They have a lot of tracks available for play on their website, and with a little ingenuity you can download full MP3s, too.

Media purchasing

As fun as getting stuff for free can be, sometimes you have to fork over some hard-earned RMB. You should be able to buy things from all of these with a Visa or Mastercard (or Chinese bank card, obviously), and they should be able to ship overseas.

• Amazon.cn… it’s Amazon… in Chinese…. Books, DVDs, CDs. They have pretty much everything, and will most certainly ship overseas (buy a bunch at once and send it all together to save on shipping costs, though).
• Dangdang is a more general-purpose online shopping site, but it also has a wide selection of books and other media. I personally find Dangdang to ship faster than Amazon.cn within China, but I don’t have experience ordering from it outside of China.
• You can find everything on Taobao, China’s eBay. Seriously, everything. Probably even child brides, if you search hard enough. 淘寶 has even become a verb (meaning, natch, to buy stuff on Taobao). However, because its a collection of thousands upon thousands of individual retailers, you need to be a bit more cautious about what you buy, and make sure to ask the vendor beforehand if they ship internationally, and if so what the shipping costs are.

Online book sites

Another great part about learning Chinese is that loads of books are available in electronic form online. Some of the sites are legitimate and some are totally breaking the law, but in either case the learner of Chinese wins.

• Sina, (one of?) China’s largest portals, has a massive book portal filled with content. A lot of it is free, though there is some content only available to VIP members (I don’t remember how much VIP membership costs, but it isn’t much).
• Dangdang, mentioned above, also maintains a book portal, read.dangdang.com. Again, tons of content, mostly free.
• Readnovel.com is another option, though it tends to be filled with the Chinese equivalent of teenybopper lit. Not my cup of tea, but if it’s yours, then there’s plenty available.
• If you can’t find what you’re looking for (and what you’re looking for is relatively popular), go to Google (or Baidu) and search for “在線 閱讀 (the book title)” and you’re likely to find a … less than totally legal … copy of it available somewhere. Help comes to those who help themselves.

Newspapers and magazines

There are countless thousands of newspapers and magazines in China. A lot of them (like a lot of newspapers and magazines everywhere) are utter crap, but there are a few gems.

• Southern Daily is known for being one of the ballsier newspapers in China, writing about stories that push the edge of the censorship regime (and occasionally getting smacked around for it). Based in Shenzhen.
• Metro Express is a free paper handed out every morning on the Shanghai subway system, and is a pretty lightweight overview of mostly national news and local Shanghai issues.
• Xinmin Evening News is also a Shanghai-based newspaper, and is my favorite evening commute read. Often full of wacky stories about local issues, it tends to be a pretty fun read, while also having decent reporting on larger stories.
• While not a Chinese newspaper itself, Danwei.org‘s Front Page of the Day gives brief translations (in English) of the front page of a random newspaper bought each morning near Danwei’s Beijing office, and is a good place to find new sources of reading material.
• Sanlian Life (三聯生活) is like China’s Newsweek, and covers a wide variety of topics (with major stories following a weekly theme). I purchase a hardcopy every week, and read through it religiously
• 第一財經周刊 is BusinessWeek to 三聯’s Newsweek. Business-oriented, but relatively readable. For more hardcore business and financial reporting, 財經網 is where it’s at.
• BBC Chinese is also an excellent source of Chinese news, and is a good choice for non-local views on Chinese and Asian news, not to mention coverage of the rest of the world.
• Both Google News and Baidu News aggregate Chinese news stories. They also happen to be terrific sources of formal usage examples — just search for the vocabulary word you’re interested in.

Reference sites

There are only two major players in the space, so no bulleted lists. Wikipedia and Baidu Encyclopedia are both fantastic resources (the former being available in traditional as well as simplified Chinese). For very Chinese-specific things Baidu Encyclopedia tends to be a little more complete, I’ve found, but both let you while away hours upon hours once you start following links. Baidu also runs a question-answer service, Baidu Zhidao that is full of interesting material.

Monodics

It seems that most of the Chinese dictionary sites are Chinese-English dictionaries (which makes sense seeing as Chinese kids are forced to learn English in school), but there are a few monodics worth noting.

• ZDic is my favorite. It has a proper character dictionary, word dictionary, and chengyu dictionary.
• httpcn.com has both a Kangxi Dictionary and a 說文解字 search interface, as well as a really cool 書法 search that lets you see characters written by various masters of Chinese calligraphy.
• If you own an Apple iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad, then do yourself a favor and download the Pleco Chinese Dictionary. The app is free and comes bundled with an OKish Chinese-English dictionary, but serious learners should purchase the 現代漢語規范詞典 (it’s around $35, if memory serves) monodic for it. The dictionary itself is fantastic, and the Pleco app is the best dictionary app I’ve ever used. You can also buy Pleco for Palm and Windows Mobile devices direct from their website.

I feel like I’m forgetting a million things, but this list should help get you started. Please, please add your favorite Chinese sites in the comments. I’d love to get more material for the Chinese-munching machine that sits in my brain.

There ya go. That’s all for now, kids. May you be sinodeficient no more. Remember to say “thank you” to Uncle John!

PS: To get the most value out of all the links John has provided, I would recommend using a service like the Surusu URL Shuffler (free!) to keep the links flowing through your life. Because you and I both know that “bookmark” is just the English word for “a place to keep links to websites you should visit but never will”.

尼奥：你是想告訴我，我能躲避子彈？
Neo: What are you trying to tell me? That I can dodge bullets?

莫菲斯：不，尼奥。我想告訴你，到了一定的時候，你不必躲。
Morpheus: No, Neo. I’m trying to tell you that when you’re ready, you won’t have to.

Note: while the official “spelling” of “Neo” is 「尼奥」,  Morpheus pronounces it more like 「尼爾」.

Audio: dodgebullets

“You know the difference between you and me? I make this look good.”
知道你和我之間的區別嗎？我穿這更帥！

Audio: 我穿這更帥

“Use it or lose it.”
~ Originator Unknown To Me

“If I do not practice for a day, I know it. If I do not practice for two days, my wife knows it. If I do not practice for three days, my audience knows it.”
~ Vladimir Horowitz

I have a hunch. I don’t have proof yet. That’s why I’m going to try it out first. Here it is:

Hunchpothesis: The frequency of contact with your L2 matters more than the quantity.
Corollary: if you just focus on the frequency you can relax on quantity.
Caution: which is not to say that the quantity doesn’t matter at all…it just matters less

Example: back in late 2007, I spent an entire week here in Japan (Thanksgiving Break, essentially) hanging out only with Americans. We ate, walked, talked and slept together the whole time. No, not in that way.

These were eikaiwa types who seemed to make it their solemn duty to avoid Japanese as if it were an infectious disease. They wouldn’t try to speak it, read it, or even watch TV in it. They went out of their way to watch English-language TV, eat American food, and watch Hollywood movies in English with no Japanese subs or dubs. I know. One of them (a chick) totally freaked out when I switched the bilingual news to Japanese (even though no one but me was watching)!

Having said that, they were nice people and it was fun to be with them. Also, despite their English bubble, they did experience varying degrees of decay in their English skills (they constantly found themselves forgetting words…you know…more than usual), perhaps because of the truncated, “ESL English” lexicon they used so much of the time at work.

So Thanksgiving Break ends and I get back to my Japanese life. At the train station on the platform, I call my friend Emstar, who happens to be Japanese and monolingual. He says: “dude…you sound weird”. And I know I do. A week of galavanting about with the American crew was enough to harm my Japanese severely. It didn’t matter that we were in Japan. It didn’t matter how much — what quantity of — Japanese I had been exposed to before. The frequency had gone down to 0. And that was enough to cause damage.

The Japanese students I knew in college in the US also reported significant drops in their Japanese ability, particularly when it came to reading and writing.

Ishinosuke UWANO had the same thing happen to him, but on steroids. His Japanese contact frequency dropped to 0 and stayed there for 60 odd years. Result? Despite 20 years of pure, unadulterated AJATT (21 years if you count his time in the womb), 21 years of uninterrupted Japanese exposure, folks…184,086 hours (that’s 11 million minutes or 663 million seconds…half a billion seconds, people)…he basically lost it all. If you think about it, he’s not even Japanese any more — he’s a Ukrainian guy who knows a couple of Japanese words.

I’ve still only had 5 figures’ worth of Japanese exposure — about one tenth of the exposure volume that Uwano has had. But obviously, I’m all over him when it comes to Japanese. Methinks that can be said quite safely. Nevertheless, I have seen the damage that neglect can do. I saw it over Thanksgiving 2007. I saw it when I decided to make myself a little China in Japan — great for my Chinese…disastrous for my Japanese. And I’ve met my fair share of Chinese (college) kids struggling with their Japanese here.

I want to be a polyglot…kinda. No, I don’t want to be a polyglot. I want Chinese and Japanese and maybe a bit of English on the side. Maybe I want to mack on chicks in Spanish as well. I don’t know. But I do know that I’m not prepared to sacrifice the old for the new. I’m especially not prepared to sacrifice Japanese.

Most of the great Internet polyglots I’ve talked to accept decay and just practice back from it. I don’t want to accept decay. I hate having to make a “comeback”; that just feels like unnecessary repetition to me. I hate that “I used to know this” feeling; it’s not wistful, it’s just painful. As long as I’m alive, I want to be moving onward and upward, not regaining lost ground and glory. His name is Sisyphus and I have no interest in emulating him.

OK, so now what? Now that you’ve seen the shallow contents of my soul. Now what?

Here’s what it comes down to.

I used to subscribe to what you might call an absolute volume (critical mass) model of language acquistion. Basically, it goes like this:

Contact Volume → Critical Mass → Ownage.

And I still think that’s more or less true. But simply trying to log as many Japanese hours as possible is painful. And it’s not something I actually did. I was ultimately trying to log the J-hours. But the way I did it was to take any and every opportunity to touch Japanese. I never let dead time pass un-Japanized; I never let myself be apart from Japanese for any significant length of time. In other words, I maintained a very high (occasionally infinite) Japanese frequency.

You’ll recall that I once said that AJATT has two principal aims. (1) To tell you what I did, so you can do it as well, and (2) to give you stuff I wish I had had, so you can do better.  To that, we might do well to add a silent third aim: (0) To figure out what the heck it actually was that I did (and, as far as practicality and curiosity allow, why it worked) — in other words, to figure out some underlying principles.

“All Japanese All the Time” is a misnomer. I rarely hit 100% Japanese quantity (infinite frequency) for the day. Having said that, I did have the occasional 100% day, and I am watching a Chinese variety show as I type this, so…I like to think that I don’t mess around . Once, during the legendary “hardcore” AJATT phase, I went with a Japanese friend to watch an English movie;  she talked to me in Japanese the whole time, and when she wasn’t talking I was doing my reps. I like to think that I don’ t mess around.

“Always trying to to get some Japanese in there”. “Some Japanese all the Time”. “Always working to reduce the time between the last time I touched Japanese and the next time I touch Japanese”. These names are perhaps more accurate.

Absolute volume of contact with a language does matter, but not in the way I thought. In fact, I think we can basically ignore it. Iff, we can guarantee frequency. Uwano-san’s case shows us that even 180k hours of absolute exposure can amount to naught if the frequency drops to 0. Conversely, hourly or half-hourly exposure to Japanese…even just 2 minutes at a time…something tells me…could not only (of course) maintain ownage, but also produce it. For at least two reasons. (1) Frequency itself, and (2) run-on — people turn on the Japanese and accidentally leave it on.

So here is the new model I have in mind:

Critical Frequency → Ownage  Maintenance.

Sorry if the arrows don’t make much sense. I’ll need to draw a real diagram. One of these days. Hehe.

Executive summary: if you just come in contact with Japanese often enough, you will not only get good at it, but you will stay that way. And you don’t have to worry much what you do “in-between”…as long as “in-between” is very, very short. I’m thinking on the order of 30~60 minutes. Example: 2 minutes of Japanese within every 1 hour block of the day…I think this may just be enough. I think this may just do it. But I’m not sure. I may be wrong.

It almost seems too easy, doesn’t it? But if life has taught me anything it’s that…people try too hard to do hard things. Indeed, it is people’s puritanical desire to do hard things that leads to failure and procrastination. The winners are those that choose “strategic laziness“. It’s sort of like the difference between religious fundamentalists who proclaim abstinence…right before they get pregnant and catch an STD all on the same day…versus people who plan out that part of their lives more…strategically: they may lack moral purity, but they also lack teenage pregnancy. Sorry for the racy example.

A language is like a cross between food, air and a pet. You can’t just binge on it once and call it a day. You need it there constantly, no, not constantly — very frequently — and when it does go, it needs to come back soon. Otherwise the skill dies.

Here are my serving suggestions for frequencies. These are all just guesstimates. My favorite one, the one I am using, is #2, the highlighted one:

1. 1~2 minutes per half hour
2. 2 minutes per hour
3. 4~5 minutes per 90 minutes
4. 10~15 minutes per 2 hours
5. 15~30 minutes per 3 hours
6. 30~60 minutes per 4 hours
7. 60~90 minutes per 6 hours
8. 90~180 minutes per 12 hours

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been using what I call a “contact calendar” (AJATT+ users get a free sample) to help me keep track of my exposure frequency in this way. I only track Cantonese and Mandarin. I opted for the highest manageable (to me) frequency: 2 minutes per hour (or, more accurately, 2 minutes within each 1-hour block or “frame”, of which there are 24 in every day).

Keeping to this frequency is a lot easier than it sounds. Usually, I handle the exposure every hour on the hour. Often, even though I only mean to do 2 minutes, I get so sucked in that I stay well over 2 minutes (run-on); simple inertia also plays a role — I’ll just forget to turn it off. Nevertheless, I keep to the same frequency — 2 minutes/hour or 2 minutes within each 1 hour block — because quantity is not the goal here: frequency is.

If I want or need a large block of time to do something else, I might listen to Cantonese at the top of one frame (say, from 21:00 to 21:02), then do the something else, and then catch more Cantonese at the bottom of the next frame (say from 22:55 to 22:57). So there’s a lot of flexibility here. In case you’re wondering, at night, when I’m asleep, I just leave a talk podcast playing, through all 8 frames or so.

The weird thing is…it works. I can’t quite explain it, and I know my explanations suck anyway, but somehow it works. I think what may be happening is that Cantonese and Mandarin are never allowed to “go cold” in my mind; they’re never allowed to fade; they always stay in working memory(?); there’s always a Chinese echo in my head. It’s sort of like the Song Stuck In My Head Phenomenon (SSIMHP), but in a more general way.

So even though I could be exposed to only 48 minutes of Cantonese per day, in theory, the effect is the same as listening to it all day because of the frequency, just like how a movie looks like it’s always moving because the frames, which are nothing but still images, move frequently enough. If it helps at all, remember that atoms, even of solids, are more than 99% empty space. But, apparently, the distances between and within atoms are close enough to where they can interact with light and each other, electrically and otherwise, in such a way that we experience opacity and solidity. Or so I’m told…someone hit me if this is wrong.

The secret to losing at Japanese: giving up. Why? Because frequency drops to 0.

The secret to winning at Japanese: reduce the gap between the last time you touched Japanese and the next time you touch it.  Tip: for best results, make “next” = now. But if “next” can’t always be “now”, then make it darn soon. Like, less than an hour or so. Never let that water go cold. Never let the echo fade into silence. Never let the din in the head die.

I don’t know what I’m doing; I never do . But I’m excited about this new game. And I’m excited at the possibility of growing new skills while keeping old ones. In a way, not much has changed. But at the same time, I feel like everything has. There’s no more guilt about not being at 100% volume. Because the meaning and value of 100% has changed.

Infinite frequency is unnecessary provided the frequency is high enough. That is the hunchpothesis. It’s like math versus engineering. Old AJATT immersion was math — infinity, perfection, analog, continuous, smooth, unbroken. New AJATT immersion is engineering — discrete, digital, pixel-based, good enough for all practical intents and purposes.

Use it or lose it. And it’s not how much you use it, but how often.

Maybe…Maybe…again, I don’t know for sure…but maybe. Maybe if the Japanese input frequency is high enough…if enough frames go by each day — one per hour — then the image might as well be moving. If the red dots are close enough together, they make a red line — as far as we humans are concerned. I am basically certain that the underlying idea is sound. The only question, then, is: how close is close enough? What is the critical frequency? We’ll just have to try and see what the results tell us…

Update: A Japanese website covers this post: 【コラム】必要以上!?のビジネス英語マスター術 (48) 英語学習で重要なのは時間ではなく頻度!? 信じてみたくなる”2分間学習” | 経営 | マイコミジャーナル

“Cantonese is a difficult language to learn — not because of its sounds or syntax, but because it’s hard to find good learning resources”

— Eldon

Well, let’s remedy that one mini-transcript at a time, as has been the custom established by Edwin and CanteHK!

The movie is Triple Tap.

Situation: At the investment bank where Gu Tin Lok‘s character works, Boss Lady (who also happens to be Gu’s girlfriend…in the movie, that is) — played by Lei Bing Bing — chews out an underling.

Boss Lady: 明我意思㗎嘞？
ming ngo yi si ga la？
Have I made myself clear? / Is that clear?

Underling Dude: 明。
ming
Yes, Ma’am.

Boss Lady: 明都仲（＝重）唔走？！
ming dou jung m jau？！
Then what are you waiting for? / So why the heck are you still standing [t]here? / Then why are you still here?

• Audio: ming

“Cantonese is a difficult language to learn — not because of its sounds or syntax, but because it’s hard to find good learning resources”

— Eldon

Well, let’s remedy that one mini-transcript at a time, as has been the custom established by Edwin and CanteHK!

Situation: Anakin finishes briefing/debriefing his clone soldiers and tells them to get to it. Rex more or less duplicates the order, except a little more gruffly.

「好啦，各位，我哋仲有嘢做嘅」
「hou la，gok wai，ngo dei jung yau ye jou ge」
“Alright, everybody，we still have work to do! Let’s get to it!”

「知道！聽到將軍講乜嘢啦！？行啦！」
「ji dou！teng dou jeung gwan gong mat ye la！？hang la！」
“Yes, Sir! — You heard the General! Move! Move!”

• Audio: You Heard The General!

Notes:

1. I’ve never seen Star Wars: Clone Wars in English, so…I don’t know what the original lines were. These are my re-translation back into English from Cantonese.
2. Some people argue that the “仲” up there should be spelt “重”.

“Cantonese is a difficult language to learn — not because of its sounds or syntax, but because it’s hard to find good learning resources”

— Eldon

Well, let’s remedy that one mini-transcript at a time, as has been the custom established by Edwin and CanteHK!

Situation: Obi-Wan “surrenders” to the Clone Army as part of a ploy to buy time.

歐比王·肯諾比 大師：我投降哩！
{ngau bei wong·hang nok bei daai si} ngo tau hong le
Obi-Wan: I surrender!

• Audio: StarWarsCloneWars- 200

Note: I’ve never seen Star Wars: Clone Wars in English, so…I don’t know what the original lines were. These are my re-translation back into English from Cantonese.

“Cantonese is a difficult language to learn — not because of its sounds or syntax, but because it’s hard to find good learning resources”

— Eldon

Well, let’s remedy that one mini-transcript at a time, as has been the custom established by Edwin and CanteHK!

The situation this time around is a high-ranking clone soldier (Rex?) speaking to Anakin and Ahsoka after the first battle of the movie.

做得好呀，Skywalker將軍！你都係呀，小妹妹
jou dak hou a，Skywalker jeung gwan！nei dou hai a，siu mui mui
[To Anakin] Well done, General Skywalker! [To Asoka] And you too, little Miss Thang — you weren’t so bad either .

• Audio: StarWarsCloneWars- 260

Note: I’ve never seen Star Wars: Clone Wars in English, so…I don’t know what the original lines were. These are my re-translation back into English from Cantonese.

“Cantonese is a difficult language to learn — not because of its sounds or syntax, but because it’s hard to find good learning resources”

— Eldon

Well, let’s remedy that one mini-transcript at a time, as has been the custom established by Edwin and CanteHK!

白卜庭議長: 要派Jedi{絕地}去救Jabba{賈霸}個仔
baak buk ting yi jeung: yiu paai Jedi {jyut dei} heui gau Jabba {ga ba} go jai
[We] need to send Jedi Knights to rescue Jabba’s son

魅使·雲度: 嗯 其實我真係 好唔想同呢個壞蛋打交道
mei si wan dou: ng kei sat ngo jan hai hou m seung tung ni go waai daan da gaau dou
Hmmm…I’d really rather not deal with that ruffian.

• Audio

Note: I’ve never seen Star Wars: Clone Wars in English, so…I don’t know what the original lines were. These are my re-translation back into English from Cantonese.

Keep in mind that this is just what I do right now. Yes, I am the Great Khatzumoto, but you know what? Really I’m just a 27-year-old boy who drinks peppermint tea and plays with his cats. I don’t know jack about jack. This is just what was most fun and least annoying for me. You’re bound to have a better idea and I’d love to hear about it if you’d like to share .

Put another way: a lot of AJATT strategic principles are universal, I think. But the tactical stuff is totally a matter of “what works for you”. I mean, we might not even be running the same OS, so…you know. Anyway, here we go!

The Steps

1. Have a song that you love, love, love and wish you could sing along to
2. If at any point in this process you get bored…stop. The worst thing you could do for your Chinese/Japanese/any language is start to associate it with boredom. That there is the gateway to failure. Having fun with and in the language is the name of the game.
3. Get an mp3 file of the song.
4. Split the file into 10~30-second clips with ~5 seconds of backward overlap
   • I add a 5-second backward overlap because a split on strict time boundaries is bound to be imperfect in that it’ll cut right in the middle of something good.
     • Adding the overlap provides a way to automatically compensate for this without going through the psychological and computational heck of attempting to split on something like silence-points.
   • I use EZSoftMagic’s MP3 Splitter & Joiner for this automated splitting
     • They’re not paying me for this endorsement, but they should
     • If you know of any other software that does a good job at this, feel free to share in comments.
   • The reason we split the file and not just throw the whole thing into the SRS is because we are trying to do what the SRS does best – optimize the management and memorization of discrete chunks of information. Throwing the entire song in there is (1) boring and (2) defeats the purpose of even having an SRS.
5. Get the lyrics of the song
6. Put the audio clip into the SRS on the back of the card
7. Put one line or less of the lyrics on the front of the card
   • i.e. the lyrics of a segment of the 10~30-second clip, not of the whole clip
8. Put the lyrics of the whole 10~30-second clip, or of the entire song, on the back of the card.
   • I prefer putting the lyrics of just the whole clip because it’s easier to read
   • But sticking the lyrics of the entire song on the back could save you a lot of fiddling
9. Do your reps.
   • The task is to read aloud or sing the line/segment of the line of the song
   • Check your “answer” against the actual song clip
10. Final note: if any of this feels like too much work, then stop. Abort. Delete. Whatever. Because you obviously don’t like the song enough. You may like the song, just not enough, not that much. And that’s fine. Remember, the idea is to be like Soviet Russia: let the media motivate you — that’s its job.  All you have to do is put yourself in the path of the media.

Sample Card

FRONT

男兒當自強

[Youtube]

BACK

[media: naam yi dong ji keung- 007.mp3]

廣闊浩氣揚　既是男兒當自強 昂步挺胸

jìshì【既是】
…であるからには．…である以上．

gei si naam yi dong ji keung

Benefits of this method

• Over time, with very little effort, you learn the entire song
• As per SRS principles, the parts of the song that give you the most trouble – and that therefore need the most practice – will get seen the most
  • Ever notice how almost everyone knows the chorus of a song no matter how complex the vocabulary? (I remember being about 6 years old and singing Bobby Brown’s “it’s my prerogative!”). That’s because the chorus gets repeated so much. SRSing the song turns the entire song into a “chorus”, in that all the parts of the song will get repeated to the degree necessary to ensure their memorization.
• No need to fiddle with carrying lyric sheets in your bag or on your computer – it’s not like you can ever get them out on time anyway.
• Even after the song stops getting playtime on your mp3 player, the SRS will ensure that you keep getting practice with it. This is a microcosm of how the SRS is a powerful partner to an immersion environment – even after you stop immersing in, say, technical documents from a certain field, the SRS will guarantee you keep getting the practice in that field that you need to retain your proficiency in it.

『宇宙，人類的終極邊疆。這就是星艦「企業」號的旅程。
它的任務是探索全新的世界，挖掘新的物種和文明，勇敢地前往沒有人去過的地方。』
[Audio file]

Shortest AJATT post ever…

Audio here.

借我用一下。

（是，）長官。

早上好。
再過一小時，
這裡的飛機將與世界各地的盟友並肩戰鬥。
你們將參與人類歷史上最大的空戰。

人類。這個詞今天對於我們所有人將有新的意義。
我們不能再為小小的分歧而內耗。
我們將為共同的利益團結起來。

也許是上帝的安排，今天是獨立日。
你們將再一次為自由而戰。
不是為了反抗暴政、壓迫和迫害。
而是免遭毀滅。
是為生存的權力而戰鬥。

如果我們今天能夠勝利，
七月四日將不僅只是美國人民的假日，
而且將使全世界人民發出同樣的吶喊：

“我們不會默默地走向黑暗！”
“我們不會就這樣坐以待斃！”
“我們要生活下去！”
“我們一定要生存！”

今天我們要慶祝自己的獨立日！