Peace Through Compassion
In the remotest parts of Tibet, the American Himalayan Foundation has been working quietly as a lifeline for people who have no one else.
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UC Berkeley Webcast Access Link to lectures and open courses.
On Saturday, April 25, AHF was honored to host His Holiness the Dalai Lama for a public talk entitled “Peace through Compassion.”
More than 7,000 people joined AHF on a beautiful sunny day in Berkeley to hear the funny, charming, and inspiring words of His Holiness as he discussed compassion in people and in nature, including delightful anecdotes on former presidents, his childhood fear of caterpillars, and advice for this year’s crop of college grads.
Thanks to actor Sharon Stone, UC Berkeley Chancellor Robert Birgeneau and AHF Chairman Richard Blum for warming up the crowd and to the thousands of AHF members, friends, and UC Berkeley students who made the day so special.
Your site has been a great inspiration and the knowledge gained has gotten me past the obstacle blocking my way.
These cards have been a great purchase. Originally I had not planned to learn characters, wanting instead to focus only on the spoken language. But eventually I realized that knowning characters could be extremely helpful in learning new vocabulary. So many Chinese words are composed of multiple characters, and therefore each single character will usually appear in a number of different words. Learning new words is so much easier when you can make this connection: namely, when you can look at a new word’s characters and associate them with words you’ve learned already. But you cannot make those associations unless you commit to memorizing characters and their meanings. These flash cards have been invaluable in this regard. High quality, durable, with concise but informative content.
The only compliment I can think of that I did not see in any other review is the fact that each character is written in two different typefaces: while the front of each card provides a more “stylized” character, almost like calligraphy, the back shows a somewhat simpler one that seems to be what you’d find in a typical textbook. These two forms can sometimes appear a bit different, and I’ve found it very useful to make sure I can recognize both of them.
Finally, I’ll provide one criticism. It would be so helpful to have a little more information about the various components of each character. The flashcards currently provide the main radical of each character and a list of its components. It would be great if the name and meaning of each component could be provided along with its drawing. I think this would help with remembering the pronunciation and/or meaning of the character. This is not a major issue, but simply a suggestion in case Tuttle decides on a “version 2″ release in the future.
As mentioned in other reviews, these cards are not alone sufficient for learning the Chinese language: for that you’ll need a textbook or formal course. But for memorizing characters they fit the bill perfectly. All in all, I highly recommend this great product!
Super-Duper site! haha. I am loving it!! Will come back again – taking your rss feeds also, thanks.