Getting Deeper Into Mandarin Podcasts
Apr. 20th, 2026 10:48 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
disappointed_lesbianI finished creating flashcards for my second full-length episode from the Mandarin podcast Learn Chinese, the Taiwanese Way this evening. I was going to say that this is only my second full-length mandarin podcast episode ever, having completely forgotten about the podcasts I studied despite the hosts' less-than-pleasant voices. I no longer bother studying those now and will probably have to relearn the vocab I got from them, so, in a way, they don't count.
Finishing this episode a milestone because getting through podcast episodes takes forever because of all the unfamiliar vocab. Of course, getting through them will just get easier and easier (unless I come across an episode that's super advanced/complicated), and this second episode was already significantly easier than the first. It took me longer than necessary because I got tired of it and took a break, so to speak, to study other podcasts.
Also this evening I restarted studying the podcast 隨口說美國, which is hosted by someone speaking mainland Mandarin. I had given up on this podcast before, and I think understanding it was difficult because I picked an episode with difficult vocab (the topic was chatgpt). This time, I'm studying an episode about the glass ceiling. I dislike having to be careful about non-Taiwanese mandarin vocab, but I'm studying this podcast anyways because I like the host's voice and intonation, and his accent is bearable, not so difficult to understand.
Other mainland mandarin accents I've heard are frustratingly non-committal, as if spoken with sloppy enunciation, as if the speakers don't really want to speak or care about speaking, compared to Taiwanese Mandarin, which is meatier, more substantial, easier to wrap my ear around, so to speak.
Today I tried to contact my health insurance company to find out why my information was given out without my consent, but the company has no email address and I refuse to burn myself out on phone calls, plural, because holding large businesses accountable generally takes more than one call. So I emailed the state healthcare department's civil rights office with a disability discrimination complaint.
It's ten-thirty pm, I've had two windows open all evening, and I'm not freezing to death even though I'm not terribly bundled up. I'm enjoying my menopause. I've been able to have a bit more coffee without hot flashes too.
I scrubbed some or most? of the mold off my bedroom walls, so I guess I'm going back to sleeping there even though that's probably not the best idea.
I skipped snacktime today. Well, I had hot chocolate instead of food. Getting engrossed in things is great for weightloss diets because it makes it easy to ignore and even not notice hunger.
I'm having too much low-calorie sweetener. I just bought the bottle two or three days ago and it's nearly half gone. It isn't low-calorie if I consume a ton of it in a short period of time. I'm going to have to cut back on tea and hot chocolate so that I don't use so much of it, have some of my coffee black.
Finishing this episode a milestone because getting through podcast episodes takes forever because of all the unfamiliar vocab. Of course, getting through them will just get easier and easier (unless I come across an episode that's super advanced/complicated), and this second episode was already significantly easier than the first. It took me longer than necessary because I got tired of it and took a break, so to speak, to study other podcasts.
Also this evening I restarted studying the podcast 隨口說美國, which is hosted by someone speaking mainland Mandarin. I had given up on this podcast before, and I think understanding it was difficult because I picked an episode with difficult vocab (the topic was chatgpt). This time, I'm studying an episode about the glass ceiling. I dislike having to be careful about non-Taiwanese mandarin vocab, but I'm studying this podcast anyways because I like the host's voice and intonation, and his accent is bearable, not so difficult to understand.
Other mainland mandarin accents I've heard are frustratingly non-committal, as if spoken with sloppy enunciation, as if the speakers don't really want to speak or care about speaking, compared to Taiwanese Mandarin, which is meatier, more substantial, easier to wrap my ear around, so to speak.
Today I tried to contact my health insurance company to find out why my information was given out without my consent, but the company has no email address and I refuse to burn myself out on phone calls, plural, because holding large businesses accountable generally takes more than one call. So I emailed the state healthcare department's civil rights office with a disability discrimination complaint.
It's ten-thirty pm, I've had two windows open all evening, and I'm not freezing to death even though I'm not terribly bundled up. I'm enjoying my menopause. I've been able to have a bit more coffee without hot flashes too.
I scrubbed some or most? of the mold off my bedroom walls, so I guess I'm going back to sleeping there even though that's probably not the best idea.
I skipped snacktime today. Well, I had hot chocolate instead of food. Getting engrossed in things is great for weightloss diets because it makes it easy to ignore and even not notice hunger.
I'm having too much low-calorie sweetener. I just bought the bottle two or three days ago and it's nearly half gone. It isn't low-calorie if I consume a ton of it in a short period of time. I'm going to have to cut back on tea and hot chocolate so that I don't use so much of it, have some of my coffee black.
