A Chinese podcast · Same story, 4 levels
哈尔滨：冰做的房子
Harbin: The City That Borrows Its Buildings From a Frozen River
About this story
Walk on the frozen Songhua River in Harbin, watch people cut ice blocks, and see the lit ice buildings at night. HSK 1 Chinese listening practice.
This is an HSK 1 Chinese listening episode that runs about 2 minutes. 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 冰、河、块 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
Today I'm in Harbin.
The weather in Harbin is very cold.
I have a lot of clothes on.
But I'm still very cold.
Harbin has a big river.
This river is called the Songhua.
It's January now.
There's no water on the river.
The river is all ice.
There's a lot of ice, and it's very big.
People can walk on the ice.
I walk on the ice.
I walk very slowly.
I see a lot of people.
Some people are running on the ice.
Some people are sitting on the ice.
In the afternoon, I see a lot of people working on the river.
They make very big blocks of ice.
One block of ice is very big.
I say: what do you want all this ice for?
A man says: we're going to make houses.
I say: houses made of ice?
He says: yes.
He says: this ice is for making houses.
There are lights inside the houses.
At night, the houses have a lot of colours.
I say: I want to see that.
He says: come in the evening.
In the evening, I come.
I see a lot of ice houses.
The houses are very big.
There are lights inside the houses.
The lights have a lot of colours.
Ice isn't one colour.
A lot of people are here looking.
I look for a long time too.
I'm very cold, but I don't want to go back.
Now, I go and eat something.
The food is very hot.
I eat a lot.
I'm not cold any more.
I say: in March, what happens to these ice houses?
He says: in March, it isn't cold.
He says: the ice goes back into the river.
I say: the houses are gone?
He says: yes.
He says: we make new ones.
I think: this is very good.
The houses are made by the river.
And the houses go back into the river.
Would you rather go somewhere very hot, or come to Harbin to see the ice?
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Try it without the transcript and notice what sounds clearer.
What vocabulary does this episode teach?
词汇HSK 1. Also the measure word for money; here it is a block of ice.
HSK 1. The condition everything else in the episode follows from.
HSK 1. What the food has to be here.
HSK 1. In March the ice 回 the river.
The material the whole city borrows every winter.
The Songhua, which becomes a road in January.
Buried inside the ice so the whole block glows.
Made of ice, and gone by spring.
* beyond level超纲词
What grammar patterns appear in this episode?
语法可以 + verb
可以 states what is possible.
人可以在冰上走。
是 … 做的
Says what something is made of or by.
房子是河做的。
但是
Marks a contrast with what came before.
我很冷，但是我不想回去。
Proper Nouns
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