[Talk] Learning Chinese is hard =(

[huggie (huggie)]

Yes I'm learning Chinese. Except that I am a native Taiwanese and I'm learning
Hakka. I've just got started, but I can't even get the tones right.
We know that Mandarine has four tones. Hakka I am learning (四縣 dialect)
has six tones. Two of those are the so called "Entering sounds" 入聲.
They're the "stops" if you know a little phonetics. Technically they not
tones in themselves, but classified as tones traditionally, perhaps because
they do have the accompanying tones, which may fall, or not fall, in the
range of other non-stop tones.

OK the entering sounds, they're difficult, I can sometimes pronounce them,
sometimes not. But at least their actual "tones" is not a problem for me.
For the rest of the four tones, the first three tones sound pretty much
the same as in Marndarin. It's the fourth tones that's really giving me a
headache. Sometimes it sounds like the fourth tone in Mandarine, sometimes
it doesn't! I can't see why both are all lumped to the same tone. Or maybe
the real tone of it depends on the tone immediately prior to or after it.
I certainly haven't discovered a rule yet.

In phonetic class back in college, I know that sometimes a phoneme may
appear to be the same to a native speaker, when to a foreign speaker
they're two. (Well, because they're really two!) Perhaps same thing occur
for the Hakka tone also. It makes me wonder if the four tones for
Mandarin area different depending on context. Any foreigner learning
Chinese here to have a say?

--
※ 發信站: 批踢踢實業坊(ptt.cc)
◆ From: 61.64.139.164
推 XiJun:I think the entering sound just like -k, -p, -t in Eng.
→ XiJun:like kick, keep, kit, but the don't pronounce the k,p,t
→ huggie:Yup, you're right.
→ huggie:It's hard for me to distinguish with ear though.
→ huggie:And I know a little Taiwanese. I have to "think" in
→ huggie:Taiwanese to get the sound right. (at least some of the
→ huggie:times)
※ 編輯: huggie          來自: 140.129.160.62       (05/21 11:04)
※ 編輯: huggie          來自: 140.129.160.62       (05/21 11:05)
→ outofdejavu:Hakka as I am, I can't sometimes tell what the
→ outofdejavu:woman in the ICRT Hakka teaching time is saying
→ outofdejavu:but I won't say she's wrong
→ outofdejavu:I'm not that into Hakka linguistics...I can not
→ outofdejavu:help you      囧>
→ huggie:Taiwan Hakka can be roughly classified into five kinds
→ huggie:It could be that ICRT one is diff. from yours.
→ huggie:The tone I'm having trouble getting is not diff. enough
→ huggie:to be incomprehensible.
→ huggie:Anyway, it is fun learning it. I'm still trying. ︿︿
推 amerinese:Is there tone sandhi going on?  I know there is for
→ amerinese:Taiwanese
→ amerinese:As for your question on Mandarin, a lot of
→ amerinese:foreigners have trouble distinguishing 2 + 3 tones