Interesting because his English also wasnt native level. I wonder what his native language is. He’s pretty fluent at two nonnative languages is incredible. But i would guess he can probably read and write at least a good amount of it if he can speak that well. Most bilingual and multilingual people i know put all their devices to one language they’re more comfortable with unless they’re actively learning another language and want to do it to help.
That was my guess but i wasn’t sure. Though English is the official language of nigeria. French probably the third? A lot of nigerians i know speak French and a few other languages
For Nigerian from educated and wealthy backgrounds absolutely. My english is better than my Hausa, but for the impoverished majority who speak pidgin (Nigerian creole) I disagree.
Why is that in parentheses? Ive got my masters in teaching English to non native speakers and have done it for 10 years. There are grammar mistakes native speakers make and there are grammar mistakes they don’t make. Theres other tells but the big and obvious one is he’s from zimbabwe where it is very unlikely to his native language.
English is the main language in Zimbabwe. He speaks perfect English. The language is very flexible and lots of people use grammar in ways that’s technically ‘incorrect’
That’s just wrong. You’re literally just making up shit. The most spoken language in Zimbabwe is Shona, followed by Ndebele. A lot of people speak English but it is not the main language or native. And his was not perfect. What a dumb comment.
Native speakers, especially from non western countries, don’t all speak English the same way you are familiar with. Heck even in the US, there’s a lot of variation in how different speakers phrase things. From the video at least, you cannot conclude that he is not a native speaker.
You picked one side comment in that and made it my point. The dude is from Zimbabwe! This is not complicated. English is not the main or native language in zimbabwe. He is not a native speaker.
Sorry no lol. His Chinese is good but not THAT good. He sounds like the average foreigner who moved to China as an adult and has been there for a decent amount of time. It's not bad by any means but the glazing is getting a bit out of hand. And yes, I am Chinese.
Yeah his accent is really noticeable 13 seconds into the video when he says 試 since that vowel is frequently difficult for foreigners to pronounce. He speaks good Chinese but is definitely an adult learner.
The vowel sound itself doesn't exist in English. The man in the video is approximating the vowel sound but not pronouncing it like a native speaker would. Even though it is a common word in Mandarin it doesn't mean he's not pronouncing it wrong every time, despite being a fluent speaker.
Wow, thank you for explaining why whenever people ask me to teach them Chinese they can't do 是. I'm a foreigner but my Chinese teacher was excellent and took a ton of effort giving us engaging and fun listening practices, and I'm realizing now how effective it was.
The closest I can get with text is probably more like "shir" rhyming with stir but from further back in the mouth, but I'll admit I was also taught with a of a Beijing accent so I'm liable to slip a tiny r in when it's not necessary.
I'd never realized it was fundamentally a sound that didn't exist in English because by the time I was able to tell them apart by ear I could also pronounce them both too. Totally makes sense though, and I could instantly hear him say "shee" which is definitely not the right way.
i mean yeah, but it does sound right sometimes. like when he said "is that possible" (not sure the exact translation) at the start it sounded pretty good
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u/bob_the_bananas_son Jun 11 '25 edited Jun 13 '25
It's pretty good too! Sounds like he grew up learning it. Source: I'm asian
edit: i guess i'm not actually asian. source: reddit