Interview with American YouTuber AUSTIN IN CHINA - Intermediate Chinese | Chinese Conversation 

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Thanks so much for having me on! It was a great time!

We hope most of you don't misunderstood our reason for interviewing Austin. We never meant to represent him as the epitome of a foreigner who has mastered Mandarin. Instead, we wanted to give students a glimpse of the type of interesting life that is possible in China if you learn the basics of the language. Austin mentioned several times in the video that he only seriously studied Chinese for six months and suggested he did not care about studying Chinese continuously. He realized that he knows enough Chinese to enjoy his life in China and prefers doing that than spending countless hours trying to sound like a native. We felt maybe some Mandarin students could learn from his attitude. We feel Chinese is just a tool to fully experience, gain benefits and enjoy life in China, *not an end in itself.* Only some Chinese teachers would want you to think that attaining high fluency in Chinese is *THAT* important or necessary.

Regarding: "Why a long interview with a FOREIGNER?!" I felt this was one of your best videos so far. My Chinese study partner and I BOTH agreed it was great hearing a fluent but NON-NATIVE speaker - he’s easier to understand - the vocabulary is less advanced and so it motivates us and gives us "hope" when we are able to understand more of the conversation. Although I respect this person’s “opinion” who suggested otherwise, I do not consider it to be at all as he or she suggests, “constructive”. And as a side note, I am also immediately wary of anyone using the word, “counter-intuitive” - that says a lot to me right there. Don’t let one person change your mind. It’s great to have variation. I have seen and enjoyed Austin’s videos so it was great seeing him be interviewed. I would encourage you to continue to do selected non-native interviews. Best wishes for continued success, Daniel Léo Simpson Composer San Francisco

Eileen, the pace at which you release great content is truly impressive. I'm not even halfway through the last video and I've been watching it every day (I set 50% speed and pause a lot to look things up, so I get through a couple minutes a day). I hope you have at least some idea of how useful your videos are to Chinese learners all over the world.

To me, a new student at Mandarin Corner, THIS video AND the video of Tyler (American Talks About His Life In China) are both VERY VERY IMPORTANT because if they can do it so can I and I want to find out exactly how they did it!!! Already I have been studying the video about Tyler and when I saw this one about Austin I was THRILLED to say the least. Keep putting out more and and more similar content. I have been studying Mandarin for 4 years now and STILL CANNOT hold a conversation with my own shadow so I want to see what these people are doing that makes them so successful

Eileen: I was truly surprised to find out that some people did not like this video. I think it is wonderful! I have been studying Chinese for over 2 years and to hear Chinese being spoken by a native English speaker is very informative. I love watching your videos, you truly are a professional.🥰

*Timestamps:* 01:42 Self introduction 02:35 Why he came to China 04:03 How he felt when he first came to China 07:56 First impressions of Lanzhou, Gansu 09:58 His first experiences studying Chinese 17:05 Lanzhou cuisine 17:58 Lanzhou weather 18:46 Lanzhou accommodation 19:23 Lanzhou people and foreigners 23:53 Return to the USA 25:47 Why he return to China 27:16 First job in China 30:54 The most surprising thing about Lanzhou 31:42 Lanzhou job and accommodation impressions 34:24 Move to Tianjin 35:39 First impressions of Tianjin 38:46 Impression of Tianjin people 39:42 Tianjin weather 40:21 Move to Chengdu 41:28 First impressions of Chengdu 46:17 His favorite city 48:16 Why he started making RU-vid videos 55:37 Appearing on Chinese television for the first time 58:00 Appearing on Chinese television for the second time 58:31 Thoughts on the effect of social media on people 1:00:15 Opinion on comments about his videos 1:04:35 Doing video for Hainan Tourism Bureau 1:08:55 Doing videos on Chinese food 1:10:10 Favorite Chinese food and snacks 1:11:49 Weirdest Chinese food he has eaten 1:16:48 Most memorable places he has visited in China 1:22:51 Eight month old English student 1:26:22 Advice on learning Chinese 1:35:09 Are foreigners too comfortable in China? 1:39:31 Favorite China RU-vid Vloggers

People do not like the fact that this man was not a fluent Chinese speaker and they said that it was not good to have someone representing your lessons who could not speak fluent Mandarin. I would say that it was very nice to hear someone speak Chinese in a way that was very simple and easy to understand. This was a very good lesson and a very good interview.

Eileen, Awesome work again. Your effort in bringing the Chinese language to students around the world is really appreciated. There is nothing like living in the country itself to truly learn the language, but your videos and the content is a close second for Chinese language students who want to have native speakers as well as foreigners living in China talk about their experiences. Keep up the Great Work.

Very happy to see you upload videos again. Been telling everyone how great you channel is to improve ones chinese but also get a better understanding for China :D

Felt it was finally time to comment on a Mandarin Corner video after coming across the channel about a month ago - I've been learning Japanese all my life- yet watching Austin who by self admission only studied for 6months and isn't really aiming for fluency, I find that incredible. Pair that with Eileen's amazing interview skills and kindness in listening (yet also politely correcting him when needed), super wholesome. Great video!!

Thank you again Eileen !! This one is not that difficult, this encourage me. You again did a lot of effort ! Xiexie ni:) Always so happy to get a new video from you!!

Thank you so much Eileen, I love your videos! This and the other video you made with an American are my favourites, I watch all your intermediate videos but most of them are a little too difficult for me, however when you speak with a foreigner the vocabulary and speed is so much more suitable for me. Perfect!

After having recently begun attending Chinese lessons once a week and, now, watching Austin being interviewed, it's finally dawned on me just what a hugely difficult undertaking learning Chinese is. The number of places where one can put a foot wrong is astounding. Last week, while my teacher and I were going through a written assignment of mine that she had corrected, she realised that she'd written a character incorrectly, after I pointed it out and told her that I didn't recognise it. Seeing that even educated Chinese, who are strict in terms of learning style and expectations, can make trivial mistakes in their own language made me realise that we non-Chinese seem to be attempting the impossible. Of course, there will always be a number of linguistic equivalents of Mozart out there who mastered everything Chinese with ease, but for the rest of us, with our varying degrees of average ability and different strengths and weaknesses, achieving anything resembling spoken fluency, solid listening comprehension or written proficiency really is a taxing task. Two of my classmates don't seem to be able to accurately reproduce any tones (even with pinyin available), despite having studied for years, which leads me to wonder if they are literally tone deaf (no pun intended) or whether at some point they made a conscious decision to just pronounce Chinese without regard to the tones, assuming they'd be understood anyway. While they excel at writing and grammar, they are still unable to understand basic spoken sentences. As for myself, I've noticed that there is often a shockingly wide gap between how much I'm able to understand and how much I'm able to actually use, whether listening and speaking or reading and writing. Here I'm not just talking about having a rough idea what someone might be saying to me, but clearly understanding a series of individual words. Ask me to repeat back what was said though, and I often fall flat. Words I was sure I knew suddenly disappear into the ether, fairly complicated constructions I was certain I'd mastered are missing in action. I've no idea what it is that stops me accessing my vocabulary. I'm sure that nervousness plays a part, but something tells me it's not the whole story. It's so frustrating.

老师，您教的中文方法非常好，我非常喜欢了，我现在住在北京，我非常喜欢说中文，学习中文。I really appreciate your efforts by making such type of videos. In fact to make a video with a foreigner like this gives me and other learners more motivation to like, love Chinese language and Culture. I have been very passionate learning Chinese and has lot of affection for Chinese Culture. Hope to watch more videos on your RU-vid channel. 加油

好極了的視頻。 是鼓勵著我去中國為努力學習漢語。我的普通話還有很大的進步空間。我剛剛贊👍和關注你們的頻道。謝謝你。

This video is so encouraging. Please make more videos like this. Austin's journey is so inspiring to us who are learning the Mandarin language. He is so easy to understand. I like his sentences, and this is one of the inspiring interviews for me. Thank you so much for your hard work! And this is one of the best channels on RU-vid for learning the Mandarin language with interesting and relevant content!

As always, useful content and material for analysis with encouragement that attaining functional mandarin is possible. I hope to see an interview with a foreigner who has mastered the language but outside of China.

This is a great video. One of the toughest things I find to do is to remember and use new vocabulary. Austin learned almost from scratch how to speak Chinese - in China. I value his choice of words because he is telling me that these are the most common, practical words. Natives can enhance their descriptions and reach into literary prose sometimes in trying to describe something. So, this conversation is much more than listening practice. It helps us to gain practical vocabulary at an easier pace, especially in countries like the U.S. where we don't have Chinese speakers on every corner!

I have been in china 4 years. Think his mandarin is pretty good. Great he's put the effort in to learn it. I'm currently HSK 4. Found your channel recently it's great !

I taught English as a Chinese American in Shenzhen for 5 years. Really loved this interview. I went there to learn Chinese.

Awesome video, it brings to life the new vocabulary i am currently studying. I will listen to this over and over and hope to be as good as Austin someday. Thanks Eileen.

Fei chang fei Chang tai hao la! I watched the whole video and really enjoyed it! I absolutely love that Austin doesn’t try to sound like a native and it gives me hope to learn Chinese. I’m fine with speaking Chinese with my California accent. He speaks fluently and hits all the tones and I understood him just fine. He is a very likeable guy and he reminds me of my other friend who can speak Vietnamese fluently. I also subscribed and liked this video. Xie xie ah! Women dou Shi pengyou men! 😀

Very useful content, as always!! I am very happy everytime you upload a new video :) Thank you Eileen and Austin!!

I started watching this video a bit worried about how long it was and that I couldn’t sit through it, but it’s actually quite interesting and easy to follow. Very nice interview!

Hi Eileen, hope you are staying safe in China! I have been following your videos and studying Mandarin through it for a while now and benefited tremendously.

Thank you so much for this interview. I really enjoyed it and also, it was easier for me to undrstand

I am new at this channel. I learned a lot just by listening to the conversation.

Hi Eileen, I always follow Mandarin Corners and what more like me es precisely that fresh air that have your videos. in my case I am trying to learn a language for communication if my pretention were more academic I should go to university. for sure my English is not good enough because my native language is Spanish, but for sure I can make me to understand. Nowadays I'm trying to learn Chinese and all of you help me a lot, besides this kind of stories teach to us with foreigners, that it's possible if we work hard. thank you very much.

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Nem vi o video ainda, mas ja sei que é bom. Toma o meu like!

Good conversation, natural and relevant. xie xie nimen ! Wo xianzai zai Montreal.

Eileen, I must compliment you on your preparation ! I may be one of only a few people who have watched EVERY one of Austin's videos. Plus, I know his experience in China from talking with him weekly. You didn't have that advantage, so it's obvious that you spent a LOT of time getting ready for this interview by watching his videos.

Thank you very much Miss Eileen . I'm becoming a Chinese translator because of you because you are struggling very much to helping me and others. My first teacher is Mr . Wang in level 1 and second I'm watching you videos. Love from Pakistan Lahore ( Changa Manga forest Waan Khara)

Austin can obviously be understood by Chinese people.This video was a good source of encouragement because I don't feel I have to be perfect in mandarin to be understood

I used to watch Austin’s videos and I barely recognize him here, congratulations on the weight loss my brother you look great.

I don’t know if I’ll ever go to China but there is something fascinating about these intrepid adventurous souls who throw caution to the wind and move there to study or work independent of a host company.

Awesome, inspiring and informative!!! Thank you so much for sharing your experience!!!! Your Chinese is amazing !!! And it’s much harder on camera bc it’s more pressure!

Thanks, grate interview

This channel is helpful, I'm slowly improving my listening because of this channel

Thanks for uploading, stay healthy.

Very inspiring. This makes me want to learn Chinese even more

我很喜欢这样的视频，时间又长，水平又不太难，还可以学到很多新的词和习用语。谢谢！很期待你下一个上传的视频！

He has lost a lot of weight! I have watched a lot of his videos! Very cool!!!!! Don’t mind people’s criticism! 加油！

Thank you so much to you both for this interview. It is really helpful.

thank you very much for this video

Thank you Eileen

To the people who think that interviewing foreigners is a bad or less useful technique: I think when interviewing 外国人, the conversation is a lot easier to understand (I understand about 70-80% of what you’re saying here, compared to when you’re speaking to locals where I only understand about 40-50%). Something important to note is the role of comprehensible input in language learning. There is not much use in, when your language ability is low, listening to extremely complicated material. They say it is better to learn with material that is only slightly above your current language ability, so that way it stretches your brain but it doesn’t overwhelm you. In this sense, Eileen, I think it is useful to mention that these videos with foreigners are actually very useful for the majority of people who follow your videos, whether they admit it or recognize that or not, in filling that gap. It doesn’t matter whether or not the guy speaking is using perfect Chinese or not; what’s important is that we understand and we are learning. When your a baby, do your parents speak with perfect grammar or not? As your chinese improves, you will start to recognize the mistakes he is making and will omit them from your use of the language.

THANKS For All you do

Eileen, I also have a suggestion about video to come: there's a lot of disinformation and misconceptions about people in Hubei now. I would love to see in depth 30-60 minutes interview with local people from there. My italki teacher is from Wuhan, so I keep in touch with her and I know she's doing great out there. There was a video of skype interview on AsianBoss channel with a girl from Wuhan, but it was kinda 马马虎虎, the questions were very general. So if there is a chance to interview a person from isolated city about their plans, feelings and hopes, how the situation changed the life of one certain human being, that would be GREAT!

The video is great. I don’t know what people are complaining about .

Thank you!!!

Subscribe to *Austin in China* for some of the best videos on RU-vid about learning Chinese as well as working and living in China: ru-vid.com

can I give it two likes? one for amazing work done and another for mentioning @serpentza

I loved this interview! I felt identified with many of his experiences in China. I would like to be as fluent as he is in the future. 加油！

我是印尼人，您的录音很有意思，我喜欢。因为我的听力不太好哈哈哈，我多学习从你 Austin, 有一天我来到中国联系说话 👍

Thank you for these videos! They are really helpful!

Now all our videos have transcripts with *TRADITIONAL CHARACTERS!* Available to *Mandarin Corner Supporters* only at: mandarincorner.org/listen-to-audio-with-transcript/

Bring more foreigners! Thank you for the great content!

哇，他从2011年一直在中国。我也第一次是2011年去的中国，也是到兰州，到兰州大学学了一学期的中文，感觉一个学期不够，我的中文口语听力都快要冲的时候要回国。我在自己国家本科毕业后2012年再到兰州大学又带了一个学期。后来2014年拿到了孔子学院奖学金，考上了兰大的文学院读硕士研究，专业是对外汉语教师。我记得为了考hsk六级我们去了理工大学。想念兰州😍 但是我没完成这个学历，又考上了合肥的中科大，也是读硕士研究，不过所有的课是英文的，老师都会非常好的英语。在合肥带了三年。也想念我的科大 😍

HOLY SHIT, I used to watch Austin youtube channel before. But seems he reduced lot of weight now, When his old clip came in between video i realized he is same person. Austin, thanks a lot for sharing your experience. It's funny & Meaningful. Remind me of my days in china (Suzhou, Jiangsu)

Thanks Eileen for another great video.... 我很想出中國跟你聊天👍

I Love your channel and appreciate all your content. I would like to offer my opinion/constructive criticism. In terms of learning Chinese, I find it counterintuitive to listen to a foreigner (regardless of their level) speak chinese. Why would I want to spend time getting chinese input from a non-native chinese? I always look forward to your content, but can't see myself getting any actual valuable listening practice if half of the conversation is not from a native chinese speaker. I hope you can understand my perspective. In terms of engaging content, perhaps many subscribers will enjoy it, but in terms of learning I find it less useful than the majority of your videos. Please keep continuing the excellent work you do! Thanks for helping me improve my Chinese!

我很享受这样的视频。非常感谢你们做这样面试的视频。请做更多呵呵 》。《

好期待著Austin減肥的過程喔

谢谢老师，你的视频非常好

Thank you for the video tip at the start not a lot of people know this I usually just do it myself to study

Thanks Eileen for this great video it is a great motivation to me

thought I watched this interview lately but to be honest me and this amazing boy we have some same feelings about when we arrived china for e.g I did not know how to take taxi , I felt I lost, I felt I'm in new new world my first in university I was like absent minded. here is one unforgettable story I encountered my Chinese teacher gave me Chinese name but unfortunate second day I forgot my name when she called me during attendance. @Mandarin Corner like my comment if you read my story thanks

我最喜欢你的视频。 太谢谢啊。

太棒了，谢谢Eileen

Very IMPORTANT one Thank

We love your videos!!!

Great content! Thanks!

Great job!

your channel is the best

Eileen的视频是最有用的 !那是毫无疑问的 !我希望你总是做这种的视频 .

这 视频 太爽了。 谢谢

This content you share with us is really helpful. Thank you Laoshi ;)

Thank you

Great video. I literally feel my hanyu is improving considerably. Thanks a million! I was wondering if anyone could recommend a Mandarin movie to watch, something about everyday life, not related to history or fantasy...

This video is making a bit homesick, Lanzhou is my hometown

艾琳。 我喜欢你的频道。 邀请你这么有趣的人。

So proud of you,😘

video quality improved. have you changed a camera?.. which province you live?

Austin has HSK 5. Now my goal is to get HSK 6.

These subtitles must have taken a whole day haha! Great job.

Wonderful

good guy austin

If you liked this video, you will also like - *American Talks About His Life in China:* ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-l6kBSvtuc_8.html

Truthfully not to put a damper on the party but there have been many foreigners who have done this in China way before this gentleman came on. I wish him well and I’m glad he’s enjoying China but if you were to look up Marc Salzman He is the author of iron and silk he studied Mandarin Chinese and traditional will show in China back in the 1980s. In 1991 I started my own studies of Chinese in mainland China and study traditional Kung Fu as well it is unfortunate that there was no RU-vid or Internet back in 1980s and 1990s . Austin 說的普通話還可以的， 他看起來有一點緊張 😓

It's very interesting interview,just keep going !加油 !!!

非常感谢你的视频！ 我一直期待新的视频 我也是非常跟减肥的视频感兴趣

More interviews with foreigners, please.Already each interview watched more then ten times, need new stories 😂

我最喜欢你的视频。 太谢谢啊。 I been lazy for to long . Time to get back to serious 自学。i been watching alot of Chinese tv basically retaining what I already know and learning passively and practicing with random people I run into. I did have a conversation with a lady and her kid in a motel in middle of nowhere oregon. She spoke no english . Was cool she was super surprised as was I. I dont have the biggest vocabulary but I think I speak with a better accent then most white people. I just mimic alot from tv shows.

That bullshit line was awesome. I feel like the girl needed a bit to recover from that lol.

Hey Eileen, what happened to the latest video with Austin about his keto diet? I watched some of it a few days ago but now it's disappeared.

多亏您的视频，我的汉语就提高了！！！