Always question zero and ten – A Day for Numbers

Started the day getting drilled on number words. The words for zero and ten are rising tone words. Someday, someday, I’ll even remember the word for 10. Anyway, at this writing I can say all the single digit words without too much trouble. But will forget 4 and 10 by tomorrow. Funny how certain words are so hard to remember and others are so easy. 5 and 8 are in the mind at one learning.

Actually, I went to the end of the Danshui MRT line and caught a bus to a beach. Wanted to see some water. Beach was empty and under construction. But had a good walk. Usual beach stuff. Like the NW with warm air. Felt the water. Not hot, but certainly not NorthWest Pacific cold. Probably swimmable without thinking much. Couple windsurfers way out in the bay. Real good wind.

Waylaid several people to practice my “homework” on. Went well. Again, people here are friendly and nice. A kid on the bus back practiced his English on me, before I returned the favor with my sheet of “homework”.

When I got back to Danshiu (or Tanshui – spelling is rather flexible for a lot of words), it was a thriving Sunday street fair with stores and such. Lots of people doing the usual street fair stuff with all the usual street fair stuff to do. Saw one thing I’d not seen before. You stick your hand in a couple of pans of liquid. One of them is wax or something. Eventually, a form is made around the hand. I didn’t wait to see what happens, but presume that the form is used to build a heavy plastic hand matching yours.

Anyway, back to having a real hard time with tones (and all the fricatives).

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