👩‍🦰 If you’re not ugly…in Chinese

Exploring the realm of online memes in Chinese serves as an enjoyable and highly effective means to acquaint oneself with the authentic and colloquial nuances of the language.

Just the other day, I stumbled upon this delightful online Chinese meme.

Can you decipher its meaning?

Step 1: Pre-test

Try to read the text above without any help.

This step is known as pre-testing and it’s proven to enhance memory by focusing your attention (even if you can’t read much).

Students who pre-test learn significantly more compared to those who don’t, even if they feel like they “bomb” the pre-test.

Step 2: Listen + Read

Next, listen to the audio file below and read along with the characters, pinyin, and translation (shadow). Learn more about how to shadow effectively in my speaking course.

Look up any words you don’t understand (vocabulary list below).

rú guǒ nǐ zhǎng de bù chǒu

如果你长得不丑

如果你長得不醜

If you're not ugly,

yīng gāi tǐng hǎo kàn de bā

应该挺好看的吧

應該挺好看的吧

you should be quite good-looking.

*This meme is a humorous and somewhat self-deprecating way of expressing that if someone is not unattractive or doesn't have a particularly unattractive appearance, then they should be considered good-looking or attractive. It's a playful way of boosting one's self-esteem or humorously complimenting someone's looks.

Chinese internet culture is known for its use of wordplay, sarcasm, and self-mockery, and and it's important to remember that it's not meant to be taken too seriously.

---

Vocabulary List

Organize all your vocabulary in one hub and learn Chinese faster here.

---

Step 3: Repetition + Retrieval

Most learners stop here, but they miss the most important step: repetition and active recall/retrieval (proven to enhance memory).

Read the characters out loud without audio. Focus on getting the correct tones/pronunciation.

Try not to look at the pinyin, but use it like training wheels if you forget.

Repeat until you don’t need to look at the pinyin.

rú guǒ nǐ zhǎng de bù chǒu

如果你长得不丑

如果你長得不醜

yīng gāi tǐng hǎo kàn de bā

应该挺好看的吧

應該挺好看的吧

Step 4: Final “Test”

Final stretch. Re-read the original text again.

How does it feel?

Congrats! You just read a piece of real Chinese material.

This is the exact system I used to learn authentic Chinese and build fluency fast.

See you next week for another breakdown!

PS If you’re looking for more help, here are some other ways I can help you:

1. Speaking Course: This is the step-by-step system I used to go from struggling to speak to knowing what to say, sounding more natural, having better conversations, and making new friends with native speakers.

2. The Language Learner OS: A multifunctional hub designed to assist in organizing notes, tracking progress, enhancing productivity, and accelerating Chinese language acquisition.

3. The Monthly Signs: Delve deeper into these lessons with interactive vocabulary lists, flashcards, study trackers, and more.

We’d love your input on how we could make The Mando Press even more useful for you! So please replay or leave a comment with:

• Topics you want to see in future posts

• Your biggest takeaway from this post

I read and reply to every single one of them!

---

Refer friends, get free training + resources!

If you’re enjoying The Mando Press, will you take 6 seconds and forward this edition to a friend? It goes a long way in helping me grow the newsletter (and help more Chinese learners around the world.)

1 Referral: Get the Top 50 Chinese Phrases Guide to help you learn the most important phrases that all learners should know.

3 Referrals: Get 1 free month of full lesson breakdowns with vocab lists, flashcards, example sentences, and more to help you learn Chinese faster.

5 Referrals: Get $30 off the Language Learner OS, the all-in-one system to help you organize + track your entire studies to keep you productive and learn languages faster.

Was this forwarded to you? Subscribe here.