Hi guys

Thought I'd let everyone here on Skritter know that I just got the results back from the HSK advanced I did back in October. (For anyone who doesn't know it, it's the official exam for Chinese proficiency. Advanced is the top level.)

And good news is - I passed! Yay! Got a grade C (level 9). Level 11 or A is the top mark, level 10 or B is the next down, C is the minimum grade to pass for advanced level. I was very happy just to pass.

For those who don't know the exam, it's pretty tough. There's a long listening section, long reading section with not much time to answer the questions, a grammar section that had questions that puzzled some of my teachers, an essay of 500 to 700 characters in 30 minutes, and a recorded spoken part where you have to read a passage out loud and answer two open-ended questions.

I was pretty much middling C on all of these apart from the grammar which I got a B on and the listening which I just missed the C grade for by one mark. Can still pass like that though.

Upshot is that I want to give a shout out to the whole Skritter team - I spent 200 hours plus grinding out characters in the year leading up to the exam. You guys rock. I think it's pretty unlikely I would have been able to fire off a 600 character essay in 30 minutes without Skritter.

I also spent a bunch of time on nciku.com (9000 words in my vocab lists now), YellowBridge.com and zhongwen.com (for etymology). I worked through about ten past papers. Did about 15 or so practice essays. I took over 200 hours of one-to-one classes on the internet and with teachers face-to-face in 2009, and about 160 hours total in 2007 and 2008. And got myself anxious by reading about how hard the HSK was at chinese-forums.com.

Sites I got my teachers from: chineseteachers.com, echineselearning.com, imandarinpod.com, chinesetutor.net. If the Skritter team don't mind I can also recommend a teacher I use (based in Spain) for anybody who's interested in taking classes online - just message them. (If they do mind they can edit that bit out :P)

Hope this encourages some learners out there - I've done most but not all of my study for this over the net.

Thanks again Skritter guys :P keep studying everybody else :P

Wow! Thats pretty awesome. Im planning on taking the advanced in April so at the moment my life is like a Rocky film, only with chinese characters and not boxing. Where in the world are you?? Did you do all this outside of china??(I ask because im having trouble finding test centres that do the advanced)

Also im curious why you decided to take the HSK? i am doing it because i intend to do my Phd in china.

Anyway, congratulations!!! Im discovering just how formidable this exam is (my particular fear is the spoken section as i dont think my pronounciation is all that), Im having nightmares already...

Congratulations, man! Great to hear how well you did. I've heard terrifying things about the HSK as well and am very impressed by anyone who can pass advanced level.

You can post your hero teacher's info, sure.

If we've helped you any, well, I'm sure you've helped us more--you've given so much feedback that I'm sure your total contribution across all Skritter users is more than 200 hours of study saved from efficiency. Awesome.

Now that you're locked and loaded to conduct any sort of business in Chinese, what will you do with your powers?

@jcraigie - I took it in SOAS, the School of Oriental and African Studies. It's part of the University of London. They were not 100% organised. At one point they said they might not be doing the HSK Advanced that year due to lack of demand, and there were not much updates in the run-up as to whether they were actually going to have it. At one point I thought I might have to go to Paris instead.

In the end there were about 10 people doing the advanced. A few more doing intermediate.

I spent a few months in China five years back. Did a fair bit of study there, but nothing too hardcore. Mostly self-study. Since then all my study has been in the UK. A few local teachers (I asked all the local Chinese restaurants if they could teach me mandarin), and a load of time on the internet with a lot of different teachers and on a load of websites.

I also went to big bookshops in London to get some Chinese textbooks. But didn't have too much time to get through these in the end, so Skritter, practise papers, one-to-one classes and imandarinpod was all I did.

Did the HSK Advanced to test myself really, I don't think practically it will be too useful for me. My Chinese would need to improve a lot more before I'd be comfortable working there, and I'm not planning to enrol in a Chinese university. I basically set myself a goal to pass at the beginning of January 2009, and then gradually started devoting more and more of my life to it as I realised how unprepared I was. At the end I pretty much dedicated all my waking hours to preparation (apart from my full-time job that is!). I also have a Chinese girlfriend, but other than the encouragement I don't think that helped much, her English is better than my Chinese so didn't do too much practice with her.

Where are you based? What PhD are you planning on if you don't mind sharing. I'd love to study formally in China, but don't think I'll be doing that any time soon. Good luck with the HSK, it's tough but doable.

@nick - thanks Nick, you guys helped keep me ~sane, it was good to have such enthusiastic guys fixing the site all the time and listening to the feedback. You guys deserve all the success you get.

Next stage for Chinese is to really get confident using the language. I can scrape by now, but want to get vocab up, fluency down, writing right. But it's going on the back burner for a bit. Last year was intense, time to relax a little.

If anybody wants info on the online schools I used (or to be put in touch with the one I know in Spain), either ask Nick to pass on an email to me and I'll get back to you, or follow @dximeng on twitter and I think I should then be able to direct message you. (I don't really know how twitter works, but that seems to be right.) Cheers.

@ximeng - Yep, im in London too, im a student of Physics at Imperial over in South Ken. Ive had the same issue with Soas, previously they wouldnt confirm that they were doing it, however it now looks like its on.

I ended up in Shanghai as a lost young teenager, and stayed there for a almost 2 years. I loved it so much that i want to go back and live there. So looking to do a Phd in physics, but not sure exactly where in China. The 'formal' requirement for a Phd in the sciences is a level 8 (im planning on takeing intermediate and advanced at the same time) though in the long run my personal goal is a 9 or 10.

I totally understand what you mean by dedicating all your waking hours to it, with me its got to the point where i actually spend more time on chinese than on my actual degree. Im planning on a month or two out in China over some, just gonna hide myself away and live/eat/sleep chinese.

Any particularly good bookshops you know of? Ive checked out all the big ones (Foyles, Waterstones....) but couldnt find much

Cheers, its enourmously reassuring to hear someone else whos done it!

Ximeng, nicely done sir. It's a healthy goal to want to become more comfortable, and given how successful you've been with the HSK accomplishment, I'm sure that you'll totally roxor at your next language goal. Where many have seen their resolve and motivation vaporize, you have laid roots.

@jcraigie - SOAS has a small bookshop. It's run by Arthur Probsthain, which is a bookshop near the British Museum (http://www.oriental-african-books.com/). I haven't been to the main bookshop, but did get some books from SOAS. The Waterstones nearby SOAS (on the way to Tottenham Court Road) has some Chinese books too. There's a specialised language bookshop near Regent Street, but I didn't have too much luck there with Chinese. Might be worth a go: http://www.grantandcutler.com/

For HSK I wouldn't worry too much about text books, instead I'd rock out with as many timed practise papers as you can. They're three hours each minimum, so you need to get practising early. For speaking practise I guess Chinese students are two a penny at Imperial. If you can afford it pay them rather than doing language exchange, teaching English is not a good use of your time. You could also go to the Chinese Language Meetup http://chinese.meetup.com/22/ , it's quite popular, about 50:50 Chinese / English origin. But it's not as efficient as grinding out characters at home and one-to-one lessons in my opinion. SOAS apparently has Chinese corners which sounded quite good, but I never made it to one - cranked out more essays instead. Good luck with PhD idea. That would be a great experience.

By the way when I did the exam the intermediate and advanced exams happened at the same time, not sure you could do them both in the same sitting. Definitely double-check that as many times as you can.

@george thanks for the poetic words of wisdom. Good luck to you and everyone else on Skritter with your own studies...

I'm both very impressed and envious, and scared witless. Well done! (And thanks for those links, especially the London Chinese meet up - think I'll go along to that).

Why you got to go and make me feel bad about my studies, ximeng?? :)

Just kidding, that is great man, congratulations... I have been living in China for 2.5 years now, studying part-time for at least half of that, and I am wondering if I can manage a 5 or 6 on the HSK Intermediate in a couple months...

As further encouragement for you, I am very sure you could get a job and work comfortably for a Chinese company here or a foreign company doing business in China. I work for a Chinese real estate investment company full time and I am the only foreigner there with a couple people who can speak some English, and it really isn't bad.

Definitely relax, watch some movies or tv shows in Chinese, maybe practice reading and writing some sentences just to learn some more grammar, but enjoy yourself! (then again why am I giving you advice, haha)

Congratulations again!

Congratulations!

I haven't taken the HSK test because ... I don't want to be disappointed with myself!

恭禧发财！

祝贺祝贺!!

That's really great!
I've been thinking about getting myself one of the HSK diplomas, but was always a bit unsure because (as you also mentioned) I'm not quite sure how useful it will be. I won't be studying in China although living there seems to be something that might happen sometime.
If I go for it, I would be aiming for intermediate...advanced is a bit more than I can offer....really great that you managed!

ximeng: Good motivational story glad you took the time to write it up! Congrats!

Ximeng

Congratulations, and many thanks for the links.

I too attended SOAS for a bit (not this semester
though). My teacher said I should aim for advanced but I'm not sure I have the time to put in the work that will be needed. If I try in May this year, it will certainly only be for Intermediate.

I needed a new source of inspiration (I got inspired for about 2 months when Thinkbuddha reached 3000, since then reality has intervened).

Where did you get test exam papers from? The SOAS bookstore?

I go to GuangHwa bookstore in Chinatown for my stuff, and they recommended I look through this catalogue:

http://www.cypressbooks.com/

but it's rather extensive...

阿福

PS: your comment about your girlfriend not being directly helpful in learning Chinese is spot on. When I tell people my wife is Chinese they assume I get hours of tuition every day :-)

Ximeng

Many congratulations, it is really impressive.

Right now I am just a beginner and in my personal opinion it is not easy to learn 3000–4000 hanzi. How do you manage to learn 9000 hanzi?

Congratulations! I'd say you definitely deserved it given the preparation you put in.

I took the HSK 基础 at SOAS a couple of years ago in my pre-Skritter days and was happy to get an A, even though it's only Level 3. I'm planning to take the 初中级 this May - maybe I'll meet some of the other UK Skritter users there?

"Like"! Congrats! As someone who's just begun, it's great to hear that it can be done on your own. Thanks for sharing your news. :)

@ximeng: Congratulations! You should be proud of all your hard work, especially because you did it for yourself rather than for some external reason like work or school.

@阿福: As someone who married his Spanish tutor, I can say that being involved/married to someone who speaks the language can be very helpful if you handle things right, but it comes with a whole set of potential problems.

I try to keep in mind that teaching someone a language is hard work and not particularly fun or romantic. I always try to remember to thank my wife when she spends time correcting me, and I try to spend an equal or greater amount of time helping her with English. I also try to keep in mind that I am neither an expert on English grammar nor a dictionary, so I shouldn't assume that she knows every answer to every question I have about the picayune details of Spanish.

If you're a man, you also have to be careful about learning feminine slang, and vice versa for women learning masculine slang:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0917/p19s01-hfes.html

This is also very true for Spanish; my wife has warned me against saying "porfis" in public but it has already slipped out (when talking to my father-in-law of all people). I don't know if it's the same for Chinese but would guess so.

James

西蒙，你是我们的好榜样，是我永远的偶像！

Congratz Ximeng!

Envious and happy at the same time, specially since it is the advanced HSK that you managed to pass! And yes, it is an awesome story of success, this thread goes to my bookmarks!

Wow, congratulations, 汉语水平考试高级! That is a pretty big accomplishment and one that is fairly far off for me.

I can certainly relate to the Chinese wife not being a tutor - she's a wife not a teacher of language. Language teaching is a skill that takes time to develop. Practicing what I already know works but getting much feedback is where my (excellent) tutor comes in. I find it more useful to talk to my wife's family, particularly my 7 year old niece, as we need to struggle to get meaning across and in that struggle there is learning. With my wife and I we just switch to English automatically.

My end goal is not HSK but fluency though HSK is a great motivational tool and very closely related. What I don't like is when teachers teach to a test though (thankfully I've not experienced too much of that, it is very common in Chinese high school which is basically a 4 year prep course for the college entry exam from what I gather). I have some of the HSK practice books as I think their questions are pretty good but I do try to read comic books or talk with my niece or watch Chinese TV to expand my comfort level in Chinese (one of my big challenges is rapid conversation as it takes my brain a bit of time to process the inevitable few new words leaving the person I'm talking to wondering in some cases, if I'm still thinking about the conversation, especially on the phone).

HSK9, that is awesome. You give us all hope and a great example of encouragement. Thanks!

Wow guys, thanks so much for all the really positive responses. I'm really pleased if my experiences can inspire people a little. It's cool to be able to tell people who understand the work that goes into something like this. Even though the HSK definitely doesn't equal fluency, pushing for this has helped my Chinese in a lot of ways. Most of all I think I know how to study now, and feel I can move forward with it given the time.

Some individual responses...

@byzanti - you wouldn't be envious of the 6am starts to have classes with teachers in China before work I guess... but seriously, fluency is totally possible, just keep working. Every bit helps.

@hobbes828 - hope the intermediate goes well. Good to hear you're well settled into living out there, I'd like to spend some time working in China or around there in the future, but don't really know where to start. If you don't mind me asking, how did you find your work and where are you based? And thanks for the advice... I did watch a bit of TV. Like 麦兜

http://bb.news.qq.com/a/20080320/000001.htm

And used to practise 卡拉ok as well. SHE 中国话 is particularly appropriate for Chinese students:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5IXO3vv4tvE&feature=PlayList&p=A9D92B7D1B2401E9&playnext=1&playnext_from=PL&index=3

But I should practise more... will try to follow your advice.

@faceleg, 百发没中, skritterjohan - thanks for the good wishes. Maybe HSK is not the most useful of things, but it's helpful to have something concrete to study towards when you're working on your own, and it's a pretty broad exam (with the inclusion of writing and speaking, more broad than the intermediate, although they seem to be changing that exam to include these sections).

@阿福 - I think the exam papers were from the Waterstones I mentioned, I got some books from SOAS but barely used them. Thanks for the tip about Gwanghwa, don't know how I missed it.

@jlm2jlm2 - 9000 words, not 9000 hanzi! nciku keeps track of the number of words you lookup. So 普通话 would be one word. 3000-4000 hanzi should be plenty for HSK. HSK advanced vocab list is around 7500 words I think. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanyu_Shuiping_Kaoshi for more (and a plug for Skritter at the bottom!)

@lyons - thanks for the kind words and good luck with the exam in May. Think working your way up is probably sensible, it's a lot less stressful that way.

@戴莉絲婷, @muer, @qingdaodragon - 谢谢你们，我很开心当一个好榜样。只是现在不太想用中文写，因为我恐怕你们就会知道我的汉语有多少的错误哈哈。 Thanks for the kind words guys and good luck with your studies all.

@jww1066 - thanks for the story and the link! I unfortunately recognised that "wa" at the end of sentences in the story and the talking about yourself in the third person thing hehe. Oh dear. Definitely got a long way to go still.

@2shanghai - you're right that having a good tutor is important, and in my experience it's not too easy to find one that you get on with 100%. That might have been my impatience on the runup to the exam tho! Agree with you on the TV, comic books etc. The more varied material the better for fluency I think. My tactic from the start was always (1) learn to read (2) read widely to build vocab (3) work on listening (4) work on speaking, which worked for me and for the exam, but maybe not if I actually use the Chinese a bit more. We will see. Skritter fits in pretty well with the tactics above incidentally.

最后要感谢所有在这里祝贺我的人。看起来skritter不仅仅是一个学习汉字的网站，而也是一个网络社区。在这里可以互相坚持，互相鼓励。祝大家学习快乐！

i'm thinking of getting