A Chinese podcast · Same story, 4 levels
佛罗里达给钱，请人找蛇：一个人十天找到了九十六条
Florida Pays People to Find Snakes. One Person Found 96 in 10 Days.
About this story
Florida Pays People to Find Snakes. One Person Found 96 in 10 Days. HSK 1 Chinese listening practice.
This is an HSK 1 Chinese listening episode that runs about 1 minute. The full Mandarin script is shown with tap-for-pinyin and a line-by-line English translation, so you can listen and read at once — comprehensible input in the sense of Stephen Krashen's i+1 theory. It teaches 8 key vocabulary words such as 多、知道、钱 and walks through 3 grammar patterns, each explained in English with examples. The same news story is retold at 4 difficulty levels — use the level selector above to find the version that is challenging but still understandable for you.
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原文Read the complete story in Chinese. Reveal pinyin and English only when you need them.
English transcript reference
Florida has a lot of snakes.
Shé means snake.
Florida has far too many snakes.
How many snakes are there?
Nobody knows.
These snakes eat small cats, and they eat small dogs too.
People in Florida said: there are too many snakes, this is not good.
People in Florida said: please come, look for snakes.
Zhǎo — look: my book is not here.
I have to take a look, here, and over there.
That is called zhǎo, to look for.
Whoever finds the most snakes, that person gets a lot of money.
More than nine hundred people came, all of them looking for snakes.
Among these people there was one man, his name was Tom.
For ten years, Tom has been looking for snakes.
This time, Tom found ninety-six snakes.
Ninety-six!
Nobody had as many snakes as Tom.
People in Florida said: Tom, this money is yours.
Ten thousand dollars.
Tom was very happy.
Think about it: there is a very, very long snake in your house — what would you do?
Listen again
Try it without the transcript and notice what sounds clearer.
What vocabulary does this episode teach?
词汇Used all through this episode: 很多蛇 (a lot of snakes), 太多了 (too many).
没有人知道 — nobody knows. A very common way to say something is unknown.
很多钱 = a lot of money. 一万块钱 = ten thousand dollars.
Tom 很高兴 — Tom was very happy.
X 说：… introduces what someone said, like a colon in English.
The whole story is about these. Glossed in the audio with the English word.
Taught in the episode with an example: your book is missing, you look here and there — that is 找.
一条蛇 = one snake. Used for snakes, roads, rivers, fish — anything long.
* beyond level超纲词
What grammar patterns appear in this episode?
语法太……了
"too …" — a complaint, not just a description. 蛇太多了 = there are too many snakes.
Florida 的蛇，太多太多了。
蛇太多了，这不好。
谁……，这个人……
"whoever …, that person …". A way to state a rule without an if-clause.
谁找的蛇最多，这个人有很多钱。
有多少……？
"how many …?" for countable things. Pair it with a measure word.
有多少条蛇？
Proper Nouns
专有名词Sources
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