what is the meaning of "他来了请闭眼" It is a TV series title I've been watching recently. Maybe closing the eyes is an idiom that I don't understand?

I think the idiom is adapted from the Chinese version of Mafia (party game).
Players close their eyes "at night".
In the Chinese version of the game, it's "天黑了请闭眼" (It's dark, please close your eyes (waiting for something to happen next).).
Also, I think the expression “他来了请闭眼” (He comes, please close your eyes (waiting for something to happen next).) contains elements of burlesque or joke.


Can someone translate this Chinese calligraphy into English? This was written by a relative of mine, Ahn Jung-Geun

Main text:

  一日不讀書口中生荊棘

  Thorns will grow in your mouth if you go one day without reading/studying.

  (하루라도 책을 읽지 않으면 입속에 가시가 돋는다)

The rest:

  庚戌三月 扵旅順獄中 大韓國人 安重根 書

  Third month of 庚戌 (1910), Imprisoned at Port Arthur, (written by) Ahn Jung-Geun, Citizen of the Korean Empire.


Is it acceptable to omit the main clause in 只要～ phrase? Is the following sentence over 人民網:

朝鲜最高领导人金正恩在20日举行的劳动党中央委员会第七届第三次全体会议上宣布，朝鲜将从21日开始，不再进行任何核试验和洲际弹道导弹发射，废弃朝鲜北部核试验场。只要朝鲜不受核威胁挑衅，朝鲜绝对不使用核武器，不泄露核武器和核技术。

When you use 只要～, it needs a main clause, which includes either 就 or 便. But this sentence does not carry such words.
So I wonder why it does not have. Is it grammatically correct to omit it, and how can I know what it would mean in the main clause? There would not be any one-fit-for-all clause here, as I came up with multiple main clauses (correct me if something is wrong in the comment). For example:

中国政府就支持朝鲜的恒久发展。
亚洲和世界全体的和平就实现了。

etc...

Ah. I think the tone matters here ( from MY own perspective).
When we read 只要……就 sentence, you may perceive that the stress is on 只要…… part. We are emphasizing the condition and 就 part is not as strong as the condition （就 weakened the tone）.
However, here Kim Jong-un is making a  vow that North Korea will NEVER USE NUCLEAR WEAPONS AND ......, unless she is threatened by nuclear annihilation (this is more like a supplementary condition). So 就 is supposed to be omitted to enhance the momentum.
PS. You may let a native read the sentences with and without 就 for you and try to feel the subtle difference.
试比较：

只要你不在此捣乱，我（就）决不撵你出去。( There could be a 就，but I prefer not.)
只要你不在此捣乱，我就不会撵你出去。


Can I get a clue as to the meaning of this spam? A US forum on home construction has recently been receiving spam such as:

精仿1：1制作原版内布拉斯加大学办理林肯分校UNL毕业证文凭微|Q603012914代办美国成绩单|学位证|伪造假毕业证假学历丨留信网认证+大使馆认证、教育部认证University of Nebraska Lincoln

Can anyone tell me what is being said?  (I apologize if this is not Chinese.)

high-quality forgeries 1 : 1 (meaning 100% scale; exact copy) production of original University of Nebraska,(issued at) Lincoln branch campus,UNL certificate and diploma|Q603012914 representing US (academic) transcripts|degree diplomas|graduation diplomas, counterfeit record of education |message network authentication + embassy authentication, education department authentication University of Nebraska Lincoln


How are individual seconds counted in Chinese? In English individual seconds can be counted by n + one-thousand:

  one one-thousand
  two one-thousand
  three one-thousand [...]

These terms are not easily found in any dictionaries though, any ideas?

How are individual seconds counted in Chinese?

This Tianya forum post reckons that the same formula can be used in Chinese:

  一千零一，一千零二，一千零三

In the medical field another approach is common:

  001 (零零幺)
  002 (零零二)
  003 (零零三)

If double o seven was translated back into English he might be called seven one-thousand.


What is the difference between 弯身, 弯腰, 俯身, and 屈身? Are the following four statements correct? Is one of them better?
1屈身行礼
2弯腰行礼
3弯身行礼
4俯身行礼

弯 (curve; bend) vs. 直 (straight)
弯身 = curve/ bend your body
Although bend your body from your waist (弯腰) is the most common way to bend your body, there are other postures that can be called 弯身.  For example, to get under and pass a police tape, you can curve your waist to one side (face sideway)
~
俯 (face downward)  vs. 仰 (face upward)
俯身 = body faces downward
Although bending your body from your waist (弯腰) does make your upper body face downward, there are other forms of 俯身. For example, you don't need to bend your waist when you 俯身撲向水池 (launch your body faces downward into the pool)
~
屈 (bend) vs.  伸 (stretch)
We use 屈 mostly for body parts that can be folded completely, e.g. 屈指一算; 屈膝下跪.
屈身 (bend your body) is similar to but not as commonly used as 弯身
~
弯腰 (bend your waist)
Since human's waist naturally bends forward. 弯腰 refers to this specific movement/ posture -- not bend sideways or backward


What is the nature of the term 什么都? While talking on discord someone typed that they were studying, to which I jokingly replied,  "我已经学会什么都了，没有没学的", though people were quick to correct me, apparently 什么都 is not a noun and belongs before the verb. I don't like this one bit, 什么都 to me seems like the object of the verb and I can't make sense of it as an adverb. I thought maybe historically 什么都 was preceded by a verb that has since fallen out of fashion, making the sentence originally function as a serial verb construction (我已经_什么都学会了) which makes intuitive sense to me but is pure conjecture. Whatever the case is, I would like someone to clear up my confusion

This might help you to understand it better.
我已经(把)什么都学会了.
And 我已经什么都学会了 just omits 把.
Another example: 我把这本书读完了. Colloquially, you can say 我这本书读完了.
More: 我把话说完了/我话说完了。
But the omission doesn't always work well.  E. g.  我把这件事给忘了.  It doesn't sound right to say 我这件事给忘了.  In this case, we do need 把 and can't be omitted.
So be cautious of this omission in practice.


噗通 PK 扑通: What's The Difference? If Any? Most dictionaries (ABC/A Chinese-English Dict) claim that 噗/扑 are variants of each other, while giving 扑 as the simplified form of 撲.

Liang'an seems to say that 扑 is the simplified version of 噗. [This seems wrong].

Hanyu Da Cidian offers another alternative: 噗嗵.

百度知道 has the following question: 扑通与噗通的区别

  扑通一声跪下

  还是

  噗通一声跪下

  请路过的大侠给指条明路

With the best answer having been chosen as:

  扑通形容动作

  噗通形容声音

Another answer claimed:

  都是拟声词，但形容跪下一般用扑通，因为有滑稽、贬义的效果，还用在有物体向下落的时候，比如球落水扑通一声。

  噗通则用在中性的语句中，比如“噗通一声，瓶盖开了”

and lastly another reply:

  扑通不是声音大姐

  噗通才是声音大姐

I'm not sure where the claims that 扑通 is not onomatopoeia are coming from, as it seems to be widely accepted that it indeed is.

Can Anyone Clarify Things A Bit: What's The Difference Between 噗通 and 扑通?

The way I see it is that 噗通 is neutrally describing the "plonk" sound when you drop something into a liquid, while 扑通 describes something going "plonk" into a liquid (there are other uses of these characters to describe other sounds). Generally, one is an action, the other is a sound.
Because the 2nd one is an action of "going plonk" (to phrase it inelegantly), it could be used comically to describe somebody falling into a pond, for instance. But, I wouldn't say that it's usage is connected to something being comical all or even most of the time.
Contrary to what one of your sources says, 噗 and 扑 are not variants of each other, and 扑 is not the simplified form of 噗 (it's the simplified form of 撲). It just so happens that the two are interchangeable in this one word.
Even though this difference exists, most people seem not to distinguish between them because they sound the same and are so similar in meaning. Many people will just use 扑通 all the time, especially on a computer when sifting through 扑通 and 噗通 is a pain.
To back up my claim with google:

扑通: 969,000 results
噗通: 639,000 results (and most of them a K-drama)
噗嗵: 74,000 results


How would you translate "grit" (personality trait) to Chinese? According to psychologist Angela Duckworth and colleagues, "grit" is defined as "perseverance and passion for long-term goals".

What would be the closest term for "grit" in Chinese?

Google gives me "sand" and "gravel" as its meaning.

砂砾 (shālì) = gravel
沙子 (shāzi) = sand
粗砂石 (cū shā shí) = coarse sandstone

Thanks, Nate
PS. I've also inquired Professor Duckworth and still waiting for her response.

毅力 (n)
perserverance; willpower
He has grit = 他有毅力

~

堅毅 (adj)
be strong-willed and perseverant
He is very gritty = 他很堅毅

~

堅毅 (n)
strong will and perserverance
This grittiness = 這份堅毅

Example sentence:

推行革命要有毅力 - Carrying out the revolution requires perseverance (grit)

堅毅的人能衝出困境，走向高峯 - perseverant (gritty) people can break out of  predicament and get to the top

成功全憑民眾的一股毅力/成功全憑民眾的一份堅毅 - Success depends on the perseverance (grittiness) of the people


What is the English for "地宮"? I know that "underground palace" can be a translation of "地宮", but I'm not too sure on the "correct" translation.

Seeing some pictures on baike, "underground palace" doesn't really seem to fit what the pictures depict.

From what I see, I think that something like "underground maze" would suit it better, stemming from "迷宮". However, with the English translation of "underground palace", should the "palace" then not be taken literally as a "palace"? I'm a bit confused since from the pictures, "地宮" seems to be more like an "underground tomb" than a "palace".

Without the context its kind of hard to know which definition you're looking for, but Oxford gives us two definitions with explanations:

NOUN
1 地下陵墓 tomb chamber

Underground tomb/mausoleum

2 地下藏经室 underground shrine housing Buddhist relics

Buddhist sutras collection room


How do you translate "misalignment spacers"? I'm looking for the word for "misalignment spacers", which are mechanical parts for use with Heim joints (鱼眼轴承). Anyone know what they're called in China? Here's a photo. Misalignment spacers are the pair on the right. The left is just a Heim joint. Any mechanics around here?

"High misalignment aluminum spacer" is named 高偏差铝垫片.

So, "misalignment spacer" is 偏差垫片.


Can 弗 Mean Dollar In Chinese? 弗 means dollar (as in USD, $) in both Korean and Japanese.
Korean

불
[弗] a dollar

Japnese

ドル
noun

dollar (from Dutch, orig. an abbr. of ドルラル; also written as 弗) (see also: ドルラル)

Grand Ricci says that 弗 fú is:

6 (Écon. – Fin.) Car. empl. pr le symbole $ : dollar.

the pronunciation of the dollar symbol in Chinese.
I haven't seen any other acknowledgement of 弗 fú having anything to do with US Dollars in any other dictionaries.

Can 弗 Mean Dollar In Chinese?

From Wiktionary, the possible meanings of 弗 are:

as negation (as in, 不 and 否 for "no")
gust of wind
writing brush

There is no mention if it can mean dollar.

On the other hand, in Japanese, the possible meanings are:

fluorine
the dollar sign ($)

The reason of the dollar sign is because of the similarity of the sign itself (弗 vs $).

  Repurposed for its visual similarity to the dollar symbol $. This reading is ultimately a borrowing from Dutch dollar.


Is spelling with numbers a viable option to remember tones? This question is about the technique to remember tones via spelling in pinyin with the unaccented letter followed by the tone number as opposed to the superscript.  For example, remembering nǐ as ni3 or lǎoshī as lao3shi1.

What are the pros and cons of this method?  Would you recommend it?

For natives, I think the learning path would be:

  Speaking/talking -> Pinyin -> Characters

For example, when we see a word like 你好，we would think about what it's pronounced like and then figure out what tone should apply to them.

I think this could be a good way for non-natives to remember tones for characters as well.

With the way(lao3shi1) OP suggested, you have to remember tones by rote, and it's very easy to forget, and you might not apply those tones well when you speak, because you have to think about the tones all the time while you are speaking.

Hope this could help.


Why do Chinese translations of English names sound very inaccurate? I have noticed that most Chinese translation of English names sounds really inaccurate and weird.

For example, the common translation of person's name "Robert Wilson" is "罗伯特·威尔逊", which is not similar to the English pronunciation at all, "若波特·维欧森" could be a better one.

So who came up with those common name translations in the first place? And why do they sound so unlike their English pronunciation?

So who came up with those common name translations at first place?

Those common name translations are known as 音译 or transcription.

In Chinese, transcription is known as yīnyì (simplified Chinese: 音译; traditional Chinese: 音譯) or yìmíng (simplified Chinese: 译名; traditional Chinese: 譯名). While it is common to see foreign names left in their original forms (for example, in the Latin alphabet) in a Chinese text, it is also common to transcribe foreign proper nouns into Chinese characters.

Homophones abound in Mandarin Chinese, so most English words have multiple possible transcriptions. Since there are many characters to choose from when transcribing a word, a translator can manipulate the transcription to add additional meaning. The official reference guide for transcription is Names of the World's Peoples (世界人名翻译大辞典), published by the Xinhua News Agency.

Chinese is written with monosyllabic logograms which may not correspond to the syllables in the foreign words. For example, a word of three syllables will be transcribed into at least three Chinese characters, in most cases three meaningful verbal units. Transcriptions into other Chinese dialects such as Cantonese will differ from Mandarin transcriptions, since transcription based on one dialect may not sound close to the original when pronounced with another dialect.

Names can be transcribed differently between the official transcription standards used within each of the different Chinese speaking regions. For example, US President Barack Obama's surname is rendered:

  欧巴马 / 歐巴馬 Ōubāmǎ (Official translation)
  奥巴马 / 奧巴馬 Àobāmǎ (used mostly in mainland China, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia and Singapore)

When transliterating foreign names whose pronunciation does not correlate to the spelling (especially in Russian names), Mainland China tends to preserve the original pronunciation, while Taiwan tends to transcribe along the spelling. For example, Putin, the former Russian president, is called 普京 （pujing）in Mainland China and 普廷 （puting）in Taiwan. In this case, when t meets i, its pronunciation will become tʲ.

Source: Wikipedia

And why do they sound not similar to their English pronunciation?

The IPA pronunciation of "Robert Wilson" is /ˈrɒbərt ˈwɪlsən/

Referring to the English-into-Chinese transcription table from the semi-official Names of the World's Peoples (世界人名翻译大辞典), compiled by the Proper Names and Translation Service of the Xinhua News Agency:

/ˈrɒbərt ˈwɪlsən/ is transcribed as "罗伯特·威尔森 (森 not 逊)"

The person who came up with the original transcription may not be able to follow the pronunciation close enough resulting in some Chinese words sounding quite different from the original pronunciation. But since it has already become a standard, people tend to follow it and not come up with new things.

Notice also in the table that 若,维,欧,波 have already been used elsewhere, so changing one will affect the other.


What does 第四台 mean in the context of immovable property? What does 第四台 mean, in the context of an immovable property site which e.g. rents out or sells rooms and buildings.

This is a Taiwanese term.

There were only three wireless TV stations in Taiwan long ago.

台視, 中視, 華視 (with the 教育頻道)

All other channels went to cable.

So, 第四台 means the cable TV.

If you see 老三台, it means the above original three stations.


Which word is correct 秒 or 妙 This text is talking about a man who adored a film star for a long time when he was a young man. Ten years later he met her and was not impressed.

I find for 美妙：beautiful; marvellous; nice; splendid; wonderful. I don't find this word as a noun.
I am tempted to write 'splenditity', except that word does not exist! 'splendidness' also sounds awkward. I don't like 'beauty', because '向往给你带来的' 就是 'beautiful feelings' or 'beautiful moments' rather than actual beauty, in my opinion. You won't be more beautiful because you dream about a film star.

In 1. I thought 'He means '美妙的感觉

In 2. he refers to 这美妙 with 它, which very clearly makes it a noun.

天下许多事，你都可以尽性地去向往，向往给你带来的无穷美妙其实已经足够了。

Later it says:

这美妙，就是在于它不真实的一面，一旦实现，便要大打折扣。

Do you think this may be a typo for 秒？ Then I could translate 美秒 as 'beautiful seconds' = 'beautiful moments' and '这美秒' as 'these beautiful moments'.

「美秒」is not a word. It also doesn't make any sense.

In this context, 美妙 means "awesomeness", "wonderfulness". Noun or adjective isn't that important in Chinese as long as it makes sense.

  天下許多事，你都可以盡性地去嚮往，嚮往給你帶來的無窮美妙其實已經足夠了。

"There are a lot of things that you can long for in this world. The unlimited wonderfulness you get when dreaming about it is actually already enough. "

  這美妙，就是在於它不真實的一面，一旦實現，便要大打折扣。

"This wonderfulness comes from the fact that it is not real. Once you reached the goal of having the things you longed for, that feeling will get discounted (will no longer be this wonderful)."

These sentences sound like they are from a novel. The full text I found

  人生在世，有許多解不開的結，也有許多莫須有的煩惱。因為天下許多事情，你都可以盡情地去嚮往，嚮往給你帶來的無窮美妙，其實已經足夠了。不要為嚮往的沒有實現而遺憾，實現了也許更遺憾！

  人世間有許多事情，只有一直嚮往著才是最美好的。這美妙就是在於他有不真實的一面，一旦實現便要大打折扣。如果真的讓他實現了，最好只有一天，一夜，一會兒，或是短短的一瞬間，真的不能再長了。

have some deep meaning. Feels like it's something that young girls like to read in a coffee shop. It's basically saying you don't need to reach your goal to be happy. The journey is often more enjoyable than the short moment of you reaching the goal.

PS: Some people are saying this is not a good text and I don't see why. This style of writing is quite common in novels.


Difference between 与，和 and 跟? Do the following three sentences mean the same thing, that is, can they be used interchangeably?

她的父母就来我们家与我的家人见面了。
她的父母就来我们家和我的家人见面了。
她的父母就来我们家跟我的家人见面了。

I would reword the three sentences as follows instead:

她父母来我家与我家人见面。
她父母来我家和我家人见面。
她父母来我家跟我家人见面。

In this case, they can be used interchangeably as each one of them means "and".
Here are the minute differences:

与 [yǔ] is more elegant and formal, and is usually applied to similar items of abstract and contrasting nature. E.g. 天与地 (heaven and earth), 是与非 (yes and no).
和 [hé] is more general and informal, and can be applied to list dissimilar items and more often on objects. E.g. 汽车和现金 (car and cash), 蓝宝石和翡翠 (sapphire and jade).
跟 [gēn] is used more often in speech, and is usually applied to similar items and more often on humans. E.g. 他跟她 (he and she), 我跟你 (you and I).


How the 4 tones originated? My native language does not have tones. Why tones are part of Chinese language? How the tones were started initially?
Is it because they do not have so many words?
In my native language full sentences tone changes normally more than words. But in general

The first tone is for general discussion, no high feelings are Low feelings.
Second tone or rising tone is to raise voice, question aggressively...
Third tone is respect
Fourth is like commanding.

In world how many languages have tones?
What happens if I just hear the voice of word from dictionary voice and follow the same?

Old Chinese did not have tones but had consonant clusters, and a larger number of consonants.  It gradually lost consonants and simplified all consonant clusters to single consonants and had to disambiguate words by tone.


Are 根 (gēn) and 条 (tiáo) both measure words for 油条 (yóutiáo)? I asked a Chinese friend if the measure word for 油条 (yóutiáo) is 条 (tiáo).  They said I should use 根 (gēn), but I'm unsure why.  It might be because it's plain wrong, or perhaps just that 根 is better.

Question: Are 根 and 条 both measure words for 油条?

From 小马词典:

条 classifier for long thin things (ribbon, river, road, trousers etc)
根 classifier for long slender objects, e.g. cigarettes, guitar strings

It seems to make sense to use 条 (especially since it's called 油条), although it also seems to make sense to use 根.

This is 油条 being cooked:

Image source: Wikimedia commons.

I think the main reason is that 油条 already includes the character 条, so to avoid double use, we say 一根油条.

This is the same as we say 一根面条，一根薯条，一根木条，...


How Recent Is the Divergence In Taiwan- and PRC-Accented Mandarin Speech? Many have compared the differences in standard (news broadcaster) accents in of Taiwan 國語 and PRC 普通话 to the differences in British and American accents.  What linguistic factors have contributed to the divergence in these accents (particularly, what has caused Taiwanese-accented Mandarin to sound noticeably different) and when did this divergence become noticeable?  Did the divergence begin/accelerate following gradual relaxation of KMT rule in Taiwan in the 1980s?

Some clarifying points to hopefully save this question from being closed as too broad:

I am focusing on "standard" speech of CCTV/NTBS news anchors - which doesn't differ as much within either country (i.e., the speech of any two news anchors within either PRC or Taiwan will not diverge as much as the speech of any two people in the larger populations), yet is is notably different between either country (i.e., the speech of a news anchor from PRC and another news anchor from Taiwan will consistently diverge, likely in predictable ways).  The difference is particularly obvious when CCTV4, for example, includes snippets from Taiwanese news outlets narrated in speech that differs markedly from that of the PRC anchors.  A stab at cross-strait comity that ironically brings to mind the gap.
My interest is that since KMT pushed 國語 repressed use of 台语 as part of a political agenda following their retreat to Taiwan, one would think that they would have used news broadcast speech as a tool to advance this political agenda, in a similar way as the PRC does now (in the PRC case, perhaps more a desire for linguistic unification than oppression, per se).  Given the origin of KMT from Mainland (admittedly, many parts of Mainland), I would like to know whether the speech Taiwan news anchors of 40-50 years ago is (a) markedly different from the speech of modern Taiwan news anchors ; (b) if so, was it more similar then to the speech of modern PRC news anchors ; (c) if so, when did the divergence begin.
One alternate possibility to a growing divergence over time wrt news anchor speech is that from the beginning, in Taiwan, the KMT came up with a different conception of what standard 国语 should sound like, and that standard, enforced from the getgo, was already divergent from what is currently spoken by news anchors in the Mainland.

I was simply not around when all of this was/not taking place, so am curious to hear from folks who were.

Actually, until around the 1990s, the spoken language in official sources were very similar.

Famous singers like Teresa Teng spoke pretty much like people from China nowadays. Here's an example of an interviewee from those earlier days: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cWEcZvhfnzA&hd=1 (There's a great quote about how Teresa Teng's songs brought comfort for those miserable mainlanders!). There's a lot more stuff from those earlier days you can search via youtube.

There are a couple of important factors as to why they diverged.
1) The northern parts of Taiwan are its political/economic center and early on home to most of the refugees from Mainland China. Because of this, they strongly emphasized standard Mandarin as a sign of status/power etc. However, on the other hand, southern Taiwan has always been home to Chinese variants different from the mainland due to the influence of the people who were there before the KMT came to power.

2) Until the 1990s, the KMT strongly enforced a 国语运动 (presumably the 国语 back then was similar to how mainland Chinese is now). This meant if you were at school, in public, in meeting involving more than 3 people and you were found to be using a (gasp) non-国语 language, you would be heavily punished (3000-10000 元).  (Here's wikipedia on this: http://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-cn/%E5%9C%8B%E8%AA%9E%E9%81%8B%E5%8B%95)

3) In the 1990s the DPP started to gain traction in south. They advocated a Taiwanization movement. They wanted to have a Taiwan distinct from China. This meant no more 国语运动 and allowing for more of the Chinese variants.

In summary, I would say that Taiwanese variant of Chinese has always had some amount of difference from the mainland. However, because of various political reasons, those variants were never heard publicly. In some aspects, they were suppressed. But with the rise of a more tolerant government and the Taiwanization movement, Taiwan wanted to carve out a distinct variant of 国语, and thus we now have quite a big difference between the mainland and Taiwan.


Differences between "Verb + Adj", "Adj + Verb", "Verb + 得 + Adj" and "Adj + 地 + Verb"? I am having some difficulties understanding the differences in meaning between the following structures (the examples are from Line dictionary):

Verb + Adj
e.g:

走快了她会累。
Zŏu kuài le tā huì lĕi.
Walking quickly tires her.

Adj + Verb
e.g:

我们快走。
Wŏmen kuài zŏu.
Let's go!

Verb + 得 + Adj
e.g:

你的表走得快，还是走得慢?
Nĭ de biăo zŏudékuài，háishì zŏudémàn?
Does your watch gain or lose?

Adj + 地 + Verb
e.g:

一个打杂的很快地走过来了。
Yīgè dăzá de hĕnkuài dì zŏu guòlái le.
Very soon a cleaner marched over.

I know this topic has been asked partially (except structures 1. and 2.) in:
Difference in MEANING (NOT structure) between 得 vs 地
what is difference using of "地" and "得"
的-地-得, when do you use which?

I will suggest my ideas (probably there are some mistakes, so please point them out). For each case I believe there can be several possibilities.

Verb + Adj :

Adj is an adverb defining or restricting the meaning of the Verb. For example,

一个人会走快很多，但两个人好像更有趣。
Yīgèrén huì zǒu kuài hěnduō, dàn liǎng gè rén hǎoxiàng gèng yǒuqù.
One person walks a lot faster, but two people seem to be more interesting.

Here, 快很多 is an adverb that specifies a relevant characteristic of the verb to walk. The important idea is not to walk but to walk a lot faster.

The ... + Verb is the subject of the adjectival verb Adj. For example:

我们出去好。
Wǒmen chūqù hǎo.
It would be good if we go out.

Here, 我们出去 (we go out) is the subject of the adjectival verb 好 (is good).

The Adj is the direct object of the Verb. For example:

我觉得很惭愧。
Wǒ juédé hěn cánkuì.
I feel very embarassed.

Here, 很惭愧 (very embarassed) is the direct object of the verb 觉得 (to feel).

Adj + Verb:

If the Adj is an adverb of time, it signals the time of the action. Such is the case of 快 which can also mean soon. For example:

他快回来了。
Tā kuài huíláile.
He'll be back soon.

The Adj is actually a verb. For example:

我每天都努力学习.
Wǒ měitiān dū nǔlì xuéxí.
I study hard every day.

努力 is a verb meaning to make a great effort. So here we have Verb + Verb and 学习 is the direct object of the verb 努力: to make a great effort studying.

The Adj is placed in the topic position but the underlying structure is Verb + Adj. For example:

这道题很难解。
Zhè dào tí hěn nán jiě.
This problem is difficult to solve.

Here, 这道题很难 is the object + verb placed in the topic position. We can rearrange the sentence to its "natural" order:

解这道题很难。
Jiě zhè dào tí hěn nán.
It is difficult to solve this problem.

We see that actually 解这道题 (to solve this problem) is the subject of the adjectival verb 很难 (very difficult).

Verb + 得 + Adj: The adjective describes (instead of restricting) the manner or the result of the state of an action. For example:

他走得很慢。
Tā zǒu dé hěn màn.
He walks (in a manner) very slowly.

他教得累了。
Tā jiào de lèile.
He taught so much (to the result) that he is tired.

Adj + 地 + Verb: The Adj + 地 is an adverb that defines or restricts the manner in which the action is carried in a particular situation. Because of this, it can be used for commands. For example:

你快快地跑。
Nǐ kuài kuài dì pǎo.
Run quickly!


What is an accurate translation of 自立自强? I encountered the sentence 儿子说，他下定决心要自立自强 in the HSK6 Coursera course; week 4 第16课.  However, CC-CEDICT's entry for 自立自强 is:

自立自強 自立自强 [zi4 li4 zi4 qiang2] /to strive for self-improvement/

But some example sentences (YouDao; Jukuu) translate it to "self-reliance", which gives me the impression that CC-CEDICT's definition is inaccurate.  E.g.:

在家庭中，孩子从小就被灌输自立自强的观念。
In the household, young kids are imbued with concept of self-reliance.

Question: What is an accurate translation of 自立自强?
I expect its precise meaning is simply the sum of its parts: "self-reliance 自立 and self-improvement 自强", but maybe there's more to this (e.g., multiple meanings).

Question: What is an accurate translation of 自立自强?
I expect its precise meaning is simply the sum of its parts

Yes, it is simply the sum of its parts
自立 - hold oneself up = self-reliance
自强 - strengthen oneself = self-strengthen
If you are independent, you wouldn't need to beg for other's help
If you are strong, you wouldn't be afraid of other's hinder or assault
It fit perfectly into China's nationalistic ideal

自立自強 自立自强 [zi4 li4 zi4 qiang2] /to strive for self-improvement

To make oneself more self-reliant and stronger is to improve oneself


What is the meaning of 很搭? I have never heard of this adjective...?

Also I checked on Baidu and it was less than helpful...

http://zhidao.baidu.com/link?url=RobUqePv2YKUWD1PXNi_ZHv9awWxDw4oSQoJQPtHo5st56o9ELMlOm2-CAExjxKrGNRrEbKem5soSudPG34cCPP3Pq5XaMHdQDBCO02Oc-W

You can think of it as two words 很搭 but it generally means very compatible, suitable, a good match.

The 很 is used as an adverb. ex: 很帥, 很酷, 很好
The 搭 is used as slang for being compatible.
You can also change up the adverb and use 滿搭

It's usually used for clothing, 你穿這件還滿搭的. This clothing matches you.


Why is 名字 used with 叫, but 姓 isn't? Examples:

我姓李。
我名字叫张。

Why not 我姓叫李?

From my answer to this question: Why is there such a difference between "first name" and "last name"?

"你姓什么?" - the noun '姓' here is acting like a verb (is family-named)
.......
We only use 名字 as a noun, therefore we need a verb '是'(is) or '叫'(called) when asking what is someone's name. e.g. "你的名字是什么" or "你的名字叫什么"

When you say "我姓李", the word "姓" is acting like a verb
"我[姓]李" = "I [am family-named] Lee"
When you say 我名字叫李小龍, 名字 cannot only be treated as a noun, not a verb, therefore you need to add a verb '是'(is) or '叫'(called)
From another related post: What happens when you use the individual characters in 姓氏 and 名字?*

For example:
曹操 Cao Cao
姓:曹 (is last-named: Cao)
名:操 (is first-named:Cao)
字:孟德 (is courtesy-named: Meng Deo)

When you use just 名 instead of 名字 , you can omit "叫" and treat "名" like a verb, and say  "我姓曹名操"  instead of "我姓曹, 名字叫操"
The reason for omitting "叫" is: "名" (is first-named) already acting as a verb, the verb "叫" (is called) is redundant


Is the 边～边 the synonym for 一边～一边? Is the following sentence:

  并与当地青年一同BBQ，边烧烤边交流。

Is the 边～边 the synonym for 一边～一边, which mean "doing ~ while doing ~"? Or is there any difference?

[边 (verb A) 边 (verb B)] is the shortened form of  [一边 (verb A) 一边(verb B)].

Both mean (verb A) and (verb B) are being carried out concurrently.

If (verb A) and (verb B) are single words or very short verb phrases, it is better to use [边 ~ 边~]. For example: "边走边吃" (short and direct)

If (verb A) and (verb B) are long verb phrases, then using [一边~ 一边~] is better. For example "一边工作謀生, 一边照顧他生病的父母"

(Add a comma to break a long sentence in half for easier reading)

"边工作謀生边照顧他生病的父母" is grammatically acceptable, but it make the sentence too long and doesn't emphasize the two verb phrases individually like using 一边 does.


Relation between「帳」and「賬」 「賬」is said to be a derivative character (分化字) of「帳」, itself being a derivative character of「張」. The meaning of「帳」is related to tents, screens, or curtains:

《玉篇》帷也，張也，幬也。

「賬」has meanings relating to accounts, bills, and debt, but I don't quite see the connection to「帳」. Outlier outlines the semantic extension like so:

(orig.) to pitch a tent
→ tent, canopy
⇒ accounting records (written on cloth of some sort)

However, the jump from 2. and 3. seems a bit big. Is there something missing in between this gap, or a more detailed explanation describing this jump?

Also branching a bit from the above, but is the relation between「帳」and「賬」similar to that of「帖」and「貼」, in the sense that the latter is derived from the former?

Edit: From Taiwan MoE's 異體字字典:

按：此字本為帳幕之義，後亦用為錢項計簿之義，此義或从貝作「賬」。清．翟灝《通俗編．貨財》云：「幃幄曰帳，而計簿亦曰帳者，運籌必在幃幄中也。今市井或造賬字用之，諸字書中皆未見。」

Seems like this briefly touches on this semantic extension, but I'm hoping someone else can verify this, or provide more insight on the topic.

簡易六書原則

形聲:

在中國文字中，形聲字的比例最多，「形聲」就是形符和聲符的配合，「形符」表示字的類別；「聲符」則表示字的字音

Both 帳 and 賬 are 形聲字 (Pictophonetic characters)

貝 indicates the character is related to 'money/finance'. It is the semantic component of the character 賬

巾 indicates the character is related to 'tent/cloth'. It is the semantic component of the character 帳

長 is the phonetic component of both 帳 and 賬

張 is a 會意形聲字. [弓 = bow --> bow extends + phonetic 長]

Wang_xiao_ming posted:

按：此字本為帳幕之義，後亦用為錢項計簿之義，此義或从貝作「賬」。清．翟灝《通俗編．貨財》云：「幃幄曰帳，而計簿亦曰帳者，運籌必在幃幄中也。今市井或造賬字用之，諸字書中皆未見。

It said 帳 originally meant 'tents', acquired the meaning of "accounting" later because "運籌必在幃幄中也" meaning: "to calculate war strategy, one must be in a tent" (in the army, close to the battlefield)
Since accounting involves money, the 巾 radical was replaced by the 貝 radical.  The meaning of 'account --> (debt)' in '帳' thereafter, was transferred to '賬'.
'今市井或造賬字用之，諸字書中皆未見' However, at the beginning, 賬 was considered a made-up word by the general public, not listed in any reference book.


Wh-questions in Chinese As far as I could learn through research, wh-questions in Chinese are formed by keeping the wh phrases "in situ", I mean, the wh part is not fronted (like it is in English, for instance).
Some exceptions would correspond to conjoined wh-questions, like "who did Mary see and Peter visit?".
Assuming that I got it right (and please correct me if I didn't), is there any possible way of asking something like "which picture of himself did he take and she post?" ("he" and "himself" beeing the same person) using a fronted wh phrase in Chinese?

Tl;dr: Placement depends on whether the wh-word is the subject or object of the sentence, and whether emphasis is intended.

Given both Chinese and English follow the SVO structure (hence their comparability), fronting in English (or the in-situ-ness of Chinese) is best observed when the wh-word is the object of the sentence:

Wh-word
Chinese
English

Subject
a. 誰偷了蘋果？
Who stole the apple?

Object
b. 瑪莉看見了誰？
Who did Mary see?

In Chinese, it is unideal when there are two doer-action pairs in a single sentence. For simplicity, let us consider Which picture he took did she post? instead (the she–post part is still grammatically identical to the original sentence - no loss of generality). Now following the logic in 1., since which picture he took is the object, shouldn't that be placed at the end of the sentence? Yes and no, depending on whether emphasis is intended. Therefore,

Emphasis
Chinese
English

–
a. 她發佈了哪張他拍的照片呢？
Which picture he took did she post?

+
b. 哪張他拍的照片是她發佈了的呢？
Which picture he took is the one she posted?

In fact in sentence 2b. (both Chinese and English), the picture has become the subject. Also, notice how the 是～的 has been insidiously added in sentence 2b. That is precisely for emphasis. Without it, the sentence would sound awkward. (In fact, to aid your understanding, you may consider 哪張他拍的照片是她發佈了的*照片*呢？: the analogous structure of this hidden 照片 is the one in English, which is normally omitted in Chinese.) Have a look at example 5 of this link.

Of course you may argue sentence 1b. can also be phrased as 誰被瑪莉看見了？, apparently violating the in-situ rule. But technically this sentence is in the passive voice, which also changes the object of its active voice analogue (誰) into the subject.


What are the characters in this seal? (Characters identified: 拏雲心事人不知) What are the characters in this seal? Does this phrase come from a poetic or philosophical Chinese text?

the characters are “拏雲心事人不知”, read from top to bottom, right to left.
the “script” is slightly distorted from standard
“拏” (to grasp, to reach) + “雲” (cloud) is a metaphor of “shoot for the moon” / “have lofty aspirations” (比喻志向遠大)
http://dict.revised.moe.edu.tw/cgi-bin/cbdic/gsweb.cgi?o=dcbdic&searchid=Z00000056063
so, 拏雲心事人不知 would be:
the lofty aspirations (拏雲) in my heart (心事), nobody know (人不知)
it’s from the poem “去歲君逺㳺送仲梁出山” by 元好問, of 金 dynasty

去歲君遠㳺今年客它州青天萬古一明月只與行人生暮愁問君㳺何許情多地遐兮偏處處金鞭㫁折騏驥死萬里長鴻思一舉憶識子梁王臺清風入座無纎埃華嶽峯尖見秋凖金眸玉瓜不凡材西園日晴花滿烟五雲樓閣三山巔玉樹瑶林照春色青錢白璧買芳年・三年一夣南陽道・汴水迢迢入秋草・拏雲心事人不知 ・千首新詩怨枯槁・破屋仰見星踈衾風露清匣中有長劒爲君鳴不平泥途乆辱思一濯去去舉足皆清冷鄧州大師材望雄愛客不减竒章公軍中宴酣笳皷競銀燭吐熖如長虹幕中多士君又徃談咲巳覺南夷空東州春迴十月後梅華分香入春酒平生得意欽與京青眼高歌望君乆浙江南下青沄沄石門細路蒼烟屯五松平頭白日静千山萬山如亂雲菊源不逐時事改芝嶺自與啇顔鄰他日想思一廻首漁舟時問武陵人

or, derived from the poem “致酒行” by 李賀 of 唐 dynasty

零落棲遲一杯酒・主人奉觴客長夀・主父西逰困不歸・家人折斷門前栁・吾聞馬周昔作新豐客・天荒地老無人識・空將牋上兩行書・直犯龍顔請恩澤・我有迷魂招不得・雄雞一聲天下白・少年心事當拏雲・誰念幽寒坐嗚呃


Why use 非 and 亚 for continent names? Why was 非 chosen for 非洲 (Africa) and 亚 chosen for 亚洲 (Asia)?

I can't find a particular reason to use these characters.

亚洲 is short for 亚细亚洲 while 非洲 is short for 阿非利加洲.

See the article "各大洲名称由来".


What does 社会 mean in this context? 社会generally means society, community.

But what is its real meaning in the following cases: 1. 社会力量办学；2.此为公交专用车道，社会车辆不得驶入; 3.走出校门，走进社会？

My understanding is: 1. schools run by private sector; 2. this is the track for public transportation only, private traffic is denied. So 社会 means private?

As for No. 3, I think it means I leave the school and enter the society, but isn't school part of the society?

社会力量办学；

社会 VS 国家 or 政府

  2.此为公交专用车道，社会车辆不得驶入;

社会 means any 车辆 that not from 公交部门

  3.走出校门，走进社会？

Here is the typical usage of 社会.

Most of organizations was run by government before 改革开放, these organizations  are usually called 机关, 单位 or 组织 etc...

If a man does not work in that kind of organizations, he lives in 社会, he is not 组织中的人.

For example, 社会人 is an interesting words, in some situation it means they do not have a formal job, they have complex relations with different kind of people... it is very complex, I did not prepare for this term.

And 学校 is opposite of 社会 in China.

社会 is not only society in China, it has some negative meanings from history periods.


I believe this asian artwork is from China. I am seeking the translation of this artist signature! I will include photo of signature! Could someone help me translate this artist signature please?  Many thanks in advance!  Picture attached.

I managed to find another piece by the same artist.
Tsunenobu hitsu “常信筆”– Japan 17th – 18th century
https://www.catawiki.com/l/23453837-painting-silk-flowers-cotton-rose-large-painting-on-silk-signed-tsunenobu-hitsu-japan-17th-18th-century-japan-edo-period-1600-1868


Chinese given names with 3 or more characters? Most Chinese given names are 1 or 2 characters long. Were there any proper, Han Chinese given names of 3 or more characters, that weren't transliterations or pseudonyms?

Surnames are different; while most are only one character, there are quite a few that are two characters or more. However, I haven't found any example of given names being longer than 2 characters. For example, despite keeping their Manchu surname, the Aisin Gioro clan adopted Chinese naming conventions: Puyi's brother was named 愛新覺羅溥任, with a 2-character given name.

Traditionally, naming is mostly based on family tree. But in recent years, we are given more freedom to name our children. From people I know with 3+ given names, I understand that there are several considerations from their parents.

  1) Literal translation from original names in their ethnic groups other than
  ethnic Han.

I've seen people with 4 or even 6 characters in their given name.

  2) Add mother's surname in it.

I have some friends whose name structure look like father's surname + mother's surname + 2 characters. This is not the traditional way like adding husband's name before wife's whole name, it's more based on some casual reasons like "It means I'm the love of my dad and mom", or "It sounds good".

  3) Surname happens to be the initial character of a 4-character
  phrase/idiom.

One of my friend told me her grandpa loves an idiom so much and the initial character happens to be her surname, so she got her name as it is right now.


Where can I find Chinese language soft subtitles for domestic television programs? I am looking for Chinese language soft subtitles for domestic tv dramas (e.g. 白夜追凶) for language learning purposes. While domestic tv has captions hardcoded onto the broadcast, it is inconvenient to use these with dictionary tools as handwriting recognition is cumbersome and optical character recognition is unreliable.

Search engine efforts have not been fruitful as the vast majority of Chinese language soft subtitles appear to be for foreign media.

Thank you for reading!

Are you looking for subtitles like this?
You can try to link


What does the 光 in 时间之光 mean? In the novella I am reading this sentence appears:

  他的瘦小的身体穿过时间之光，一寸一寸地长大。

I am rather sure that 「穿過時間之光」must mean "with the passage of time". But If I try to translate it literally, I come up with:

  pierced by the rays of time ,

which is a very odd metaphor for me. Is this a common saying in Chinese, or some kind of literary flourish?

The author is 魏微，born in 1970. Hails from Jiangsu Province, studied in Nanjing. The relevant chapter can be found here.

时间之光 is the long version of 时光.

时间之光 ＝ 时光 ＝ 韶光 ＝ 光阴 ＝ time

光 ＝ 时 ＝ time

《重编国语辞典》[名]4

  时间。如：“光阴”、“时光”。
  唐．李白〈前有一樽酒行〉二首之一：“青轩桃李能几何？流光欺人忽蹉跎。”

 国学大师 - 光 〈名〉(8)

  光阴,时光 [time]
  始屏忧以愉思,乐兹情于寸光。——南朝宋· 鲍照《观漏赋》

They all have the same meaning, the time.

穿过时间之光 is just a writing technique.
It is the same as 随着时间, with time.

We can also interpret as follows.

The light won't stop.

穿过时间之光 is similar to 经过时间的流逝 or 随着时间的流逝, as time goes by.


What is the glyph origin of 克? I've looked around and one place says it's from the skin of an animal, another one says it's an axe striking a beast and another one says it's a battle helmet with an animal skin.

So what's the story behind it and it's relation to the meaning today?

Thanks!

Dislcaimer: The interpretations of the glyph forms and OC reconstructions are my personal opinion. Professional opinions state that this character is still open for interpretation.

商甲甲1249合集31219西周金大克鼎集成2836春秋金公克敦集成4641今楷

I guess you can view「克」(Baxter-Sagart OC: /*kʰˤək/, to achieve victory over/subdue/defeat an opponent in a military confrontation), as being a merger between semantic「由」(battle helmet, now written as「冑」) and reduced phonetic「革」(/*kˤrək/). The graphically reduced「革」looks like「⿱廿尸」or「⿱口尸」(picture of animal skin and horns).

  Specifically, the bottom part of「由」is merged with the top part of the reduced「革」.

For reference:

「由」

商甲甲2123合集557戰國・楚簡帛六德・19郭店楚簡今楷
「皮」(skinning an animal)

西周金九年衛鼎集成2831秦簡秦律十八7睡虎地秦簡西漢隸孫臏・220銀雀山漢簡今楷
「革」(picture of flattened animal skin). Roughly speaking,「⿱廿尸」or「⿱口尸」is「革」folded in half along the animal's spine.

商甲花東474　西周金康鼎集成2786戰國・楚簡帛遣策天星觀楚簡秦簡秦律雜抄16睡虎地秦簡今楷


What does 2月头的样子 mean? In the following sentence:

  2月头的样子，有一起去泰国的朋友吗？

It would mean something like:

  Any friend who can travel to Thailand together at the start of February?

However, what does the 样子 mean?

The dictionary says appearance, shape, pattern, etc... as the meaning, and they are what I know on the word 样子. But they don’t seem to be a good fit in this context.

So what does it mean and what is the difference with or without 的样子?

It means “about the beginning of February ”
”二月头的样子” means “大概二月初”


What are the differences between the different words for mammoth? 猛犸和毛象有什么区别？ I often pick up relatively esoteric animal names, and I got looking at mammoths one day... I found two words for mammoth: 猛犸 and 毛象. What is the difference between these two words?

They are the same, just translated in different ways.

猛犸 is a transliteration. 猛 means robust dog. 《说文解字》: 猛，健犬也。 犸 seems a more modern character, only used here.
长毛象 is more common than 毛象. The literal translation is "elephant with long hair".


How to say "Problem Management" as a profession in Chinese? So, 问题管理 (Problem Management / Issue Management) is a profession. How would I say:

My profession is Problem Management?
I am a Problem Management-er?

Can I just say 我工作是问题管理？

It is the 主管/ 经理 (supervisor/ manager)'s job to manage problems. If your job is to provide solutions to solve problems for the company, but don't have the power of a supervisor, then you would be a  问题管理顾问 (Problem Management Consultant) or 问题管理专家 (Problem Management Specialist)


How to end an email asking for permission from my boss in Chinese? I need to ask my boss permission to move forward with a project.  I am sending him an email, but I'm not sure how to close the email.  I understand that it is common to wish health and happiness, etc. (See this question), for example:

敬祝！安康！
祝你一切都好！

But I would like to also convey my appreciation if he seriously considers my ideas. Is there also a way to say something like, "Thank you for your time", or "Thank you for your consideration"? Is "谢谢您的考虑" something people say?

Consider 敬上

书信
古代用于书信结尾的敬语或谦词，表示对收信人的尊敬。现多见于日语。
用法：
......（正文）
xxx（写信人）
敬上

I've received many messages set-up this way. "Thank you for your time" or "Thank you for your consideration" are very English-isms, you're best just to go with the Chinese way to do things.


Writing-out numbers in mandarin till 19999 algorithm My current task includes writing-out numbers in different languages, also mandarin. I have never grappled with mandarin but I checked several resource and tested my algorithm to the best of my believe. But to really make sure that everything works fine I would highly appreciate a second look of a native speaker. Since I don't know any native speakers I came to this place looking for help.

My algorithm can be accessed here: https://codepen.io/f16r/pen/xvrwOx
It is intended to work from 0 to 19999.

Any help is highly appreciated.
Thank you very much!

Your algorithm have to handle 0 between first and last digits as well. Insert 零 for those cases.
For example,

10003 should be 一萬零三.
10301 should be 一萬零三百零一.
30028 should be 三萬零二十八.
41009 should be 四萬一千零九.


How are abbreviations determined in Chinese? There doesn't really seem to be a clear standard, if you will, of how things are abbreviated in Chinese. For example:

中华人民共和国人力资源和社会保障部 -> 人社部
(传染性) 非典型肺炎 ->  非典

So: How are abbreviations determined in Chinese?

In whatever way that makes it convenient. There are probably endless different techniques used if one bothers looking for examples.

The situation is analogous to acronyms in Western languages. If you read that wiki article you'll find a huge list of examples and techniques used. Sometimes it's taking the first letters of words (North Atlantic Treaty Organization). Or the first few letters (Geheime Staatspolizei). Sometimes even numbers are used (K9, 3M). Sometimes it's whatever the creators think is cool (GNU).

Back to your examples:

  中华人民共和国人力资源和社会保障部

The 中华人民共和国 is highly redundant, so remove.

  人力资源和社会保障部

This is actually 4 words, 人力资源, 社会保障, 部. Words like 和 are redundant so remove. Take the first character of each word and voila:

  人社部

With 非典型肺炎, it's a bit unusual. There are two words here, but the 非 modifies 典型 so you can't remove it without changing its meaning. So the best you can do using common techniques is "非典肺". From there it's easy to simply drop the 肺.


What is the meaning of 确定 in 你确定你是外国人? I was told this sentence:

  你确定你是外国人→_→

When I looked up the meaning of 确定 it said it meant definite/certain. So, my guess for this sentence is:

  Are you certain you are a foreigner/are you definitely a foreigner?

Am I right? Why was 确定 used in this context? What is its actual meaning?

確定 as a verb means "to determine"

「確定你是外國人」literally means "determined you are a foreigner"

To illustrate the meaning of 「確定」 as a verb more clearly, let's look at the following sentences:

「可以確定這是假貨」( can determine this is a fake)

「可以肯定這是假貨」( can be certain that this is a fake)

「名單已被確定」( the list has been determined)

「名單已被確認」(the list has been confirmed)

"Are you certain you are a foreigner?" -「你肯定你是外國人?」


How does 驕's 2021 meanings appertain to its semantic component 馬? I know little about horses.  Did the Chinese think horses were arrogant? Why?

Above is Yellowbridge above.
Below is Oxford Chinese Dictionary (2010) p 365.

A horse might not directly represent 'arrogance', but status, wealth, power, elite, proudness, and unruliness are all potential cause of arrogance

Owning horses was a sign of wealth and power in the time most of the population were farmers

The number of horses you were allowed to use for a carriage indicated your status, No matter how wealthy you were, if you were not a noble, you could not have a four horses carriage and only the emperor could use a six horses carriage

Only Elite warriors ride horses

Wild horses are proud, unruly

Notice: 'proud' and 'arrogant' are very similar, differ mostly in degree of outward expression. 'proud' is more likely the original meaning of 骄 and 'arrogant' is a logical extension


What usage do left tortoise shell brackets (〔) play in plays? The beginning of Press-Ganging Able-Bodied Men《抓壮丁》has the following passage filled with three consecutive lines starting with left tortoise shell brackets (〔) :

and transcription:

  〔中秋节前一天。
  〔一个暴发户，货高利货，大斗进小斗出，盘剥起家的地主的堂屋。（如在广场演出，只要一张桌子，四根板凳或椅子就行了。）
  〔开幕时，李老拴坐在桌前抽水烟，一边唱着《江油关》。

I find it especially interesting that the brackets don't close, i.e.: you don't see the opposite facing tortoise shell bracket (〕) close off the sentences.

What role do these "〔" brackets play here?

What you are reading is a play script.

It is one of the common ways to mark non-dialogue lines in the script with "〔" or "[" ahead of the line. So in this case it's not actually functioning as half bracket, but rather just a head mark.


I'd like to know any resource to check the Measure Word for a given word There are many resources that offer a list of Measure Words, but I'm interested in finding a resource where I can type a word and get its Measure Word back.

Thank you very much in advance to anyone who knows about it.

"measure word" is called "classifier" in days gone by. the most completed list that i know, is in "中西譯語妙法" (page 4 - 26); 43 classifiers, with 370+ examples. this book was printed in shanghai, in 1893. you may download it from internet archive (which was blocked in xxxxx nowadays; well,  guess where?)

first lessons in chinese

though this book talked about english and shanghai dialect, i think that most of these classifiers are valid and appropriate, in modern usage.

have fun :)


佰 vs 百: inconsistency in use I saw a portion of a video course of Japanese tutorials aimed at Hong Kong Cantonese speakers, and notice that while introducing Japanese numbers, they translated the Japanese word for 600 as 六百, then straight afterwards, the word for 800 as 八佰 (with the hundreds place in 大寫).

I can't think of a reason for the inconsistency — can you?

A possible answer which accounts for the fact that the video was made in Hong Kong:

The cangjie (倉頡) code (the input method prevalent in Hong Kong) for 八佰 is HO OMA, and the code for 八百 is HO MA. A simple duplicated character would account for the error.


How to say "cool" in Chinese Basically I am looking for words in common usage which are roughly synonymous with English "cool", "wicked", "awesome", "sweet", and related positive slang adjectives.

I would also like to know how common these kind of words are in Chinese (because in English there are so many).

酷！= "Cool!", transliteration from English
酷毙了！= "Cool to die for" (was a popular phrase in the 90s)
牛！ = literally means bull, but here means "genius"; used to describe people only

  他数学太牛了！He's so good at math!

  这个杂技演员太牛了！The acrobat is so talented!

太棒了！= literally "Too great!", or "Fantastic!"

  爸妈下周带我们去海边。Mom and Dad will take us to the beach next week.

  太棒了！Awesome!

帅！= "Handsome!" ("帅翻了" is also a popular phrase used among teenage girls. I don't know how much adults understand/like this usage.)
帅呆了！(was a popular phrase in the 90s)

  周杰伦已经过气了，现在最火的是许嵩。你看了她新出的MV了吗？Jay Chou is passé. Xu Song is what everybody's been talking about lately. Have you seen the music video he just posted?

  一个字，帅！(Literally:) I can only use one word to describe it - handsome!

爽！= what you say when you are feeling refreshed and comfortable (after having some ice-creams on a hot summer day, taking public revenge on your long-time enemy
爽死了！
真好！= "Really/truly good!"
真不错！= literally "really not bad"; "Really good!"
厉害！= used to express admiration of someone's skill (If you want to use it in a sentence, remember to say "他很厉害/他特别厉害/他超级厉害"; "他厉害" is incorrect.)


How widely used are 印章 compared to signatures? 印章 appear all over chinese works, especially in the past. Most noticeably in documents relating to business and arts, companies and individuals would use seals in place of signatures.

In modern China, how commonly used are these in opposition to western-style handwritten signatures? Celebrities obviously have handwritten autographs, and many institutions do still use 印章 to authorize or mark documents associated with them, but how likely is a common person to use one? In legal documents, do people require 印章 (as Japan does), or are written signatures accepted?

Under which scenarios is each used, and how commonly are either seen in modern China (both the mainland and Taiwan, which I take are different in how much they still use seals).

Organizations often use 印章 while signatures are used personally.
If you are representing an organization, 印章 usually are required, but signature is acceptable for a person representing himself.
Example:
A bank is providing a loan to me, on the contract there will be bank employee's signature, bank's 印章 and my signature, this is acceptable.
Of course, if you have a personal 印章, you can use it with your signature, that's fine.
PS: This is in mainland China, not sure the what the situation is in Taiwan


How did lotus come to mean hold or carry? Reading a little about 'dark matter': 暗物质是宇宙的重要组成部分，它是一种比电子和光子还要小的物质，不带电荷， ....
I read: 不带电荷：doesn't carry an electric lotus! (Maybe that's why it's dark!!)
电荷： electrical charge, literally probably: electricity carry or hold
Apparently 荷 meant lotus first：Original meaning 本义: Meaning lotus.
One meaning of 荷 from zdic.net
(8) 荷：拿，持 [hold]。如:荷杖(拄着拐杖)
Maybe 荷 got this meaning of 'hold, carry' because the Buddha is often pictured sitting on a lotus?
How did this meaning arise?

Note that in today's Putonghua 荷 meaning "lotus" is hé (the 2nd tone) and meaning "carry" is hè (the 4th tone).

字源 (the image above) and a couple of other dictionaries say that the verb meaning "carry" was originally written as 何. Later 何 was borrowed to write the word meaning "what", so the written form of the verb meaning "carry" was changed into 荷 to avoid confusion.
So it is a chain of borrowing!


How to translate 'grade school 風紀/風紀員' into English? When I was a grade school student in Hong Kong, some students in school would be assigned positions of  duty or authority. For example, 班長 (class representative) , 行長 (roll leader) and 風紀(whose duty is to maintain order in teachers' stead, for example, keeping peace during recess, help maintaining order in morning speech etc.)

I can't find a translation of 風紀 in this context and  Google translates 風紀員 as "discipline officer". I wonder is it appropriate to call a student 'officer'

Should I translate 風紀 in this context as 'student discipline officer' or 'student discipline team member? If there's an existing official translation, please let me know

It's called "prefect".

not "perfect" of course :-)


Chinese this and that In English, we use this to indicate something close to us, or the first one and that to indicate something further off, or the next one. Apparently, early English did not have this distinction.

This quote is from here:

  that: From c. 1200 opposed to this as indicating something farther
  off.

Chinese has 这， 那 which seem to correspond with this, that.

Has Chinese always made a distinction between this and that? In old Chinese was this distinction present?

The distinction was present early on. In Classical Chinese, this is「此」, still used in Modern Chinese, while that is「彼」, which is not really used anymore except fossilised in some words.

《詩・唐風・綢繆》：「今夕何夕，見此良人！」
《易・小過》：「公弋取彼在穴。」


Would it be correct to use “它” in a sentence like this "它在外面下雪了."？ Just as the title says, would it be correct to use “它” in a sentence like this "它在外面下雪了." or I could just say "在外面下雪了"？

It's not correct.
The correct sentence is

  外面（在）下雪

In Chinese, as in some other European languages, weather verbs have zero valency, which means that they take no arguments, neither object nor subject. Therefore you must omit 它.


Congratulate someone for having a baby What is the most natural way to congratulate someone for having a baby. I know that 恭喜 means congratulations, but I think also 祝贺 means congratulations. Which one is better suited, or is there a better word I didn't mention?

恭喜 is more colloquial.

祝贺 is more literary.

Both can be used as a verb for "congratulate"

"大家都去[恭喜]李先生家中添了個男丁"
"大家都去[祝贺]李先生家中添了個男丁"
"Everyone goes [congratulating] Mr. Li who has added a son to his home."

Since 恭喜 is more colloquial, it is the one we use as an exclamation in speech:

"恭喜恭喜! 恭喜你們家中添了個小男孩"(Congratulations!! Congratulations on adding a son to your home)
or
"恭喜恭喜! 恭喜你們家中添了個千金" (Congratulations!! Congratulations on adding a daughter to your family)

~

恭喜恭喜! is the exclamation (optional, but very common)
恭喜你們家中添了個小男孩 (or 千金) is the detailed congratulations. This phrase can be used in speech or in writing

You should only use the literary 祝贺 in writing. And you don't need to add an exclamation

祝贺你們府上添了個小孩 (Congratulations on adding a child to your home)

Related term: 恭祝 (wish/ bless)


What does "a84" mean to Chinese people? I own the Internet domain a84.com. Quite often I get unsolicited inquires from individuals in China asking if I would sell the domain. The inquiries come only from China.

I'm not sure if the interest is based on the domain being a three-character "dot com" or if there is some special meaning to the characters "a84" to Chinese people. My only guess is that perhaps those characters are used to enter a Chinese character using a western keyboard -- but that's only a random guess.

Can anyone tell me if there is any significance to the characters "a84" for individuals in China who buy domain names?

For many Chinese, a domain like a84 is easy to type and remember.

First, consider that typing English words and phrases is very unnatural for Chinese. Even if the user is familiar with typing (and this aptitude would be low compared to developed nations), they would be accustomed to typing single letters and numbers, depending on their IME. Your average Chinese computer user would be typing sentences using keystrokes like wmyqdmj3b2!. Typing google or stackexchange would be much harder for them.

Second, English aptitude is fairly low in China compared to most developed nations. Rather than trying to remember how to spell an English word, Chinese would find it easier to remember a short sequence of numbers, and letters if they have to. You can see this in some of the most popular Chinese websites:

163
qq
92
12306
1688

Technically we can have Chinese character domain names now, but support is by no means widespread and it takes even more keystrokes to type than simple numbers.

There's also the numerology factor to consider, but 84 is pretty average in that regard (8 is great but 4 is awful).

There's an interesting article on this subject here: http://www.newrepublic.com/article/117608/chinese-number-websites-secret-meaning-urls


Difference between learning Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese Hokkien for visiting Taiwan I'm planning on visiting Taiwan as a tourist for about one week next year. Both Wikipedia and Wikivoyage say that Mandarin Chinese and Taiwanese Hokkien are common languages there.

What advantages and disadvantages do the two languages have? Is one language easier than the other for a lazy person who only wants to learn a few phrases? Are both of them tonal? How many sounds that don't exist in English are there in the two languages? Does Mandarin Chinese have more learning resources in English-speaking countries like Australia?

(In my case, I'm a native speaker of English, and speak enough Japanese to get around as a tourist in Japan and have a little bit of a conversation)

If you're only going one week, just learn some Mandarin.

The advantages of learning Mandarin is that there are a lot of free resources, cheap and useful phrase books, and most people you will run into will understand Mandarin.

I've been studying Minnanhua (spoken in Fujian and pretty much mutually intelligible with Taiwanese) for about a year and I struggle with a couple of main obstacles:

The pronunciation is tough for English speakers. Lots of labial and glottal nonsense. I haven't counted the differences.
Pinyin is tough to figure out and there are two camps, there is a Xiamen University pinyin which favors consonants, and Peh-oe-ji, which was invented by missionaries in Taiwan.
There are more tones than Mandarin. Also some tones rules are not clearly expressed (some tones are based on pronunciation, for example if it ends in <-n>; <-m>, <-ng> then the word is tone 1)
Native speakers won't let me practice, they will often switch to Mandarin.

Have a good trip.

Also you can check out:

Peh-oe-ji

Hokkien

Learn Hokkien


Typing Yale Romanization I learned Cantonese using Yale Romanization, but I'm unable to type it easily because of the accent marks representing the tones.  Is there a quick and easy way to do this without using a special character set or keyboard layout?  If not, what's the best (read: simplest) character set to use that will give me the accents I need for Yale Romanization?

There are these input plugins for OSX (There is one for Jyutping and one for Yale). I have never used them myself.


How to describe differences between Cantonese and Mandarin? When I tell people I speak Cantonese I'm often asked, "What's the difference between that and Mandarin?".  This inevitably leads to a very poor explanation that includes references to the differences between Portugese and Spanish (which I feel is a poor analogy) and an explanation that Cantonese is a spoken dialect only, and "written Chinese is the same but Cantonese speakers pronounce the characters differently, but they don't even use the same words when speaking", and really I find it a difficult thing to explain.  How would you explain the differences between the two?

The analogy to Portuguese and Spanish is a good one. Just don't forget that the writing system is a bit like Latin. In the middle ages nobody spoke Latin but many people could read and write it. Written Chinese was the equivalent to written Latin. Now, people write in Modern Standard Mandarin, which is the same as the spoken language taught in the schools. It's like when they started teaching the Spanish children to write in Spanish instead of Latin.

Both dialects have similarities but they pronounce most words totally differently. In some cases, Cantonese uses different words for the same meanings. For example, (I'm told that) "we" is not "我们" but rather something like "我地". Cantonese speakers understand "我们" and if reading it aloud could chose to pronounce it as "我们", but "我地" is how normal speakers would say "we". This type of difference is fairly common.

Here is an example of an ad that only makes sense in Cantonese:

  去 緊 旅行，仲可以日日update，至勁係你.

Which would probably be written in Mandarin thus:

  旅行當中，還可以 每一天update，你最了不起.

Essentially, if you are trying to explain the differences to someone who is not really interested in it but is just asking to be polite, you could sum it up as "two different languages that use the same writing system". Different pronunciations, different vocabulary choices, different grammar, and even some different characters.


What's the difference between 主任 and 主管? As per title, what's the difference between these 2 terms?
My teacher said that in China, 主任 is considered as low position, and 主管 is higher.
But looking at the translation 主任 means director, which is generally a high ranked position, whereas 主管 means supervisor which can be just anybody's 1st line manager.

Is it true only in China or elsewhere?

When "主管" is used as a noun, it is usually a title for a position in a private company, who is in charge of a department, e.g., "人事部门主管".  It is a very general word, sometimes informal.  But if there are "主管" and "主任" in the same company, then often "主管" is of higher position, but not necessarily. I seldom see in the press that "主管" is used as a noun to describe an government officer or nation-owner company because  basically they often have more formal titles, which can be "主任" when he or she is the leader of a "中心" or "办公室", and for department X=科/处/局/厅/部/乡/镇/县/区/市/省 is "X长", basically, e.g, "信息化与网络中心主任", "劳动局局长".  It is safe to say "政府各部门主管" （leaders of departments of the government）, but in mainland it is often as "政府各部门领导同志".  However, it may be used as a verb to describe a government officer, e.g., "陈副市长主管教育。"（Vice Mayer Chen is in charge of educational affairs.）

I believe "主任" is seldom used as a verb.  It is mainly used as a noun, which is title of the chief officer of "中心" or "办公室", sometimes "委员会".

The interesting part is, "主任" is not necessarily a leader, but only a high-end professional.  "王主任" can often mean an experienced doctor (Physician, surgeon , dentist ...)

So 主管 and 主任, who is more powerful?  In a private company, "主管" can be in a higher position, but it varies with companies.  But when the 主任 is of government or who works for government, his or her position varies a lot.  He or she can be "街道办主任", who is an officer of not-that-high position, in charge of several blocks, or "中央网络安全和信息化委员会主任", who is, well, President Xi Jinping.


"candidates for cross-border leadership assignments" in Chinese? I've had some trouble translating this phrase into Chinese:"candidates for cross-border leadership assignments".
Can anyone help me please?

Will be glad for your help :)

Can I have the full paragraph? If not here's the translation
跨境領導任務的人選


Place of 都 in a sentence meaning all Where is the correct place of 都 in this sentence, before or after time definition? Is there a rule for this?

德国人今天不工作。

都 is an adverb, so it should go before the verb.

  德国人今天都不工作。

.. means all Germans aren't working today.

(Time) Subject (or time can go here) (adverb) verb (object)

Time can go either before or after the subject.


Cantonese slang - What does 'Primary Chicken' and 'Secondary Chicken' mean? A friend sent me a screenshot of her message history in Cantonese, and she was describing a couple and saying how they're like 'primary chicken' or 'secondary chicken', I think in a negative light. Anyone knows what this means? I have tried the Cantonese slang dictionary with no success obviously...

It's "primary school chicken" (小學雞), not "primary chicken". The term refers to someone who's as childish or as immature as primary school pupils. It has the derivative "secondary school chicken", which means someone who behaves only slightly more maturely than primary school students.


List of classifiers for Cantonese? There are many resources listing classifiers for Mandarin, but do any pages exist that document classifiers for Cantonese?

Check out the list of classifiers on Wikipedia -- it notes that particular classifiers are Cantonese only, like zam6 for smells, bung6 for walls, gaan1 for stores, zoeng1 for chairs and so on.


Should I use 就 in when translating "when you say it like that, I feel confused", e.g. ...我就感到困惑? If I want to say "When you say it like that, I feel confused" would it be "你这么说的时候，我就感到困惑"? Also, if I just wanted to say "saying it like that makes me confused" would that be "这么说让我感到困惑"? Trying to get a feel for how sentences are constructed. Thanks.

In short:

你这么说的时候，我就感到困惑.
Whenever you say it like that, I feel confused.

你这么说的时候，我(会)感到困惑.
When you say it like that, I feel confused.


What is the meaning of 不同而不同? This is taken from the phrase:

  口感依成分不同而不同

Sounds like it means "manifold" or something like that?

No, here the real pattern that you should focus on is “依[A]而[B]", which means "according to A, B is/does...",remember 依 means "according to, based on" here. So your example means:

The tastes are different, according to differen ingredients.
Or you would say, The tastes of different ingredients are different.

Another example:

单价依采购量而定。 The unit price is determined based on the purchase quantity.


Why is 比率 in 一家名为 RATIO 比率的店面备受关注? Chairman’s Bao has an article containing this sentence:

  在上海淮海路K11购物艺术中心 ， 一家名为 RATIO 比率的店面备受关注 。

I don’t understand the presence of 比率 here. I know it can mean rate and I am fairly certain the meaning of the sentence is

  the business area/premises of a company named xyz have attracted attention.

So, is 比率 part of the company name?

In this context, 比率 is just a translation of "RATIO" written immediately after the name. It does not contribute any other meaning to the sentence.


How do I best translate the interjection "Entertaining!"? How do I best translate the interjection "Entertaining!" as in "This event is entertaining!"?

I used "娛樂!"; this seems safe since, at worst, it can be interpreted as "Entertainment!", which has roughly the same meaning. I'm thinking that this should have been "在娛樂!" though based on usage described at https://resources.allsetlearning.com/chinese/grammar/Expressing_actions_in_progress_with_%22zai%22.

All examples of the "在 + verb" construction that I've seen involve personal pronouns (such as "我在..." and "你在..."), however, which leads me to be skeptical that this rule is generally applicable.

In other words, is it good Chinese to say "event + 在 + verb" (where "event" is a personified object) (e.g., 端午節在娛樂!) and then shorten that to "在娛樂!"?

'This event is entertaining'
'這個活動很富娛樂性'

'Entertaining' in this context is an adjective, which is translated as '富娛樂性(的)/有娛樂性(的)'in Chinese.

[entertaining] = [富娛樂性]

[entertaining + noun] = [富娛樂性(的) + noun]

'Entertaining event' is '富娛樂性的活動/節目'
'Enjoyable event' is  '讓人享受的活動/節目'
'Fun event' is '有趣的活動/節目'
~
Edition:
Patrick Dark wrote:

I changed my text to "娛樂性!". "富" would seem to be unnecessary since that's implied by use of an exclamation mark.

No, 富  or 有  is necessary in this context
娛樂性 means

(adj) ' of entertainment'

Example: 這是一個娛樂性活動 (this is an event of entertainment / this is an entertainment event)

(n)  'entertaining element'

Example: 這個活動的娛樂性不高 (this event's entertainment element is not high)
富/有娛樂性(的) literally means "~ that have entertainment element". It is used as an adjectival phrase in a whole. Equal to 'entertaining'(adj) in English.
'


How to pronounce 你是什么意思 in spoken Chinese? Looking up the Chinese translation of 'What do you mean' in my (pocket) dictionaries and in some translation engines on the internet results in 你是什么意思. In spoken Chinese I hear sounds like 'si mi si' and I'm under the impression that there is some character contraction here. What is the Pinyin pronunciation of 你是什么意思 in spoken Chinese?

Except for established elisions – e.g. 之於 (zhī yú) -> 諸 (zhū), 不用 (bú yòng) -> 甭 (béng), 這一 (zhè yī) -> 這 (zhèi), even if you write out what you hear in pinyin (assuming you followed all the orthographic rules, of course), it is meaningless, because normally you cannot correlate multiple syllables with one character, or multiple characters with one syllable. Pinyin is a system of romanisation, not of phonetic notation.

Using IPA to truthfully record your observation is however acceptable, because it is a rigorous system of phonetic notation. (See how IPA was used in elision studies of Taiwanese Mandarin here) So you may argue a native could understand [ni˨˩ s/ʂɯ˧˥ mi˥˧ sɯ꜊] or even [ni˨˩ s/ʂmi˥˧ sɯ꜊] as 你什麼意思？ or 你是什麼意思？, but this 1) requires more linguistic proof, 2) is not a 'good' pronunciation (from a prescriptivist point of view), and 3) does not have an equivalent in pinyin.

However, I can support the /n/ to [m] assimilation in 什麼 shén me (see here), which may have a role in the elision of your sentence. The dropping of one of the consonants in 是什 out of similarity is also likely. Finally, 意 begins with a semivowel, which may also facilitate its merging with the previous consonant [m] in 麼.


Same radical/character with different pronunciation I'm currently learning the 214 radicals and also the words for HSK1. I have noticed a few times that some characters in the radical list have a different pronunciation to the characters in the HSK1 vocabulary.

For example, in HSK1 the character 丨 is pronounced 'gǔn' but in the list of radicals it is 'shū'. My chinese keyboard recognises both pinyin spellings of the character.

Another example is 丶 which is 'dian' in the list of radicals but 'zhǔ' in HSK1

Could someone explain this to me? Is it just that when we are talking about radicals within a character we use one pronunciation and when using that radical as an independant character we use another pronunciation?

I think the test you did, typing in both pronunciation with your input method to see if you could generate the correct glyph reveals what you need to know. In short, there are different ways to refer to different elements (e.g. radicals) of Chinese characters.

From my experience, there haven't really been any times where I would have to name a radical by its individual name (and I don't imagine most Chinese people would know these, except for maybe some very common ones). Usually I've encountered people choosing to referring to the part of a character (“语” 的左边) or simply drawing the radical on their hand, phone, etc. It would be interesting to find out if people on this site with more formal Chinese education from a Chinese speaking country are familiar with terms for radicals and such. I would guess most people that use Chinese writing frequently don't think too much about them, though.

A parallel in English to discussing radicals might be something like talking about what a "descender" is. (Google: In typography, a descender is the portion of a letter that extends below the baseline of a font.) While certainly some people with some design experience will be familiar with this term, most people just intuitively know what this thing is and work around it, by leaving room at the bottom of a piece of paper for descenders when space gets short, for example.


Meaning of 的 in 只有三个得满分的 The full sentence is

他考得很好，得了满分。听说只有三个得了满分的。

I get a bit confused with 的. I understand that the sentence means “there are only 3 people that get full marks.”

Please help me out. Thank you guys :D

听说只有三个(考生)得了满分 -- I heard that only three (examinees) got full marks

听说只有三个得了满分的(考生)--  I heard that there are only three (examinees) who got full marks

The object 考生 was omitted

考生 = examinee

得了满分的考生 = examinee who got full mark

'得了满分的' is an adjectival phrase that describes '考生'


Is there an explicit/crude saying for bravery in Chinese? I am looking for something similar to the english 'having big balls' as an indication of bravery.

The size of one's 胆 (gallbladder) is metaphorically an indicator of courage, 胆大 = brave; 胆小 = cowardly

有种   (have pedigree) --> having great pride --> brave

Example sentence:
有种你别跑!  - if you have pride (dare), don't run
有种你别再追!  - if you have pride (dare), stop chasing me

斗胆: (gallbladder as big as a 斗): bold; brazen

吃了豹子胆  (ate leopard gallbladder) = brave; bold; brazen

胆大包天 / 胆包天 (brave enough to take on the world) = brave; bold; brazen

Cantonese:

胆生毛  (gallbladder grows hair) It is so big and manly, it grows hair

沙胆 (sandy gallbladder)  sandy-> rough -->tough = brave

胆粗 (gallbladder is thick): brave; 胆粗粗咁 (adv): bravely

够姜 (enough ginger = has a lot of spice): brave --> dare to do things plain people don't dare to do

敢死/ 夠胆死 (dare to die/ courageous enough to die) = "damn dare" as in "乜都夠胆死" (damn dare to do anything)


How to make a tenseless sentence? When making up a sentence in Chinese we all can make many types of mistakes. But I'm interested in one particular mistake, namely "a mistake that makes native Chinese speakers to wonder about the "tense" of the situation described by the sentence."

Yes, I know there is no tense in Chinese, only aspect. But still . . . One local agreed with me that a sentence like this:

  我吃完饭.

sounded "tensless" i.e. he couldn't figure out where to put it (in time) in the future, past, present . . .

This is logical because 吃 is a verb without any implicit bound (you can just keep eating forever). So the sentence:

  我吃饭.

experesses a boundless acivity of eating. So I figure out it is 100% not in the past, and 99% not in the future, so only present left.
But as soon as 完 added to 吃:

  我吃完饭.

Everything becomes a little bit strange. 完 adds a bound on the main verb, namely,

  吃 = eat, but 吃完 = eat-up.

So activity is bounded and cannot be attributed to present tense but it can not be attributed to other tenses since no other indication of time is given. (There is no 昨天, 明天, etc.) And there is more to it: no indication of 'existency/actuality' of the situation (adding 了) is given.

So the reader puzzled: "Eating process completed but when?" or "Has this situation taken place at all?"

Please, natives, provide us with more examples of simple (small) sentences which make you wonder about the tense of the event.

There are two things to be cleared:

To say a language is tenseless means it does not have a grammatical category of tense (e.g. word morphology, auxiliary verbs and tense particles in English). Chinese sentences do refer to time but by using lexical words such as adverbs and verbs, with a combination of aspect, mood and other language elements.
The examples in your question are not complete sentences. They are sentence fragments, such as clauses and phrases, that may or may not contain time references. When they are used in a complete sentence, in most of the cases, a time reference will exist in one form or another.

  我吃完饭 sounds tenseless

That's true, because it is a sentence fragment without any time reference. To make a complete sentence with it there are two options:

Add 了 particle:

  我吃完饭了。I am done eating (now).

了 is a complicated matter and doesn't indicate tense by itself. But in this sentence, 完 (complete; done) and 了 (state change marker) together form a verb+完+[object]+了 phrase, which is a clear signal for present perfect tense.

Use this phrase as a adverbial clause:

  我吃完饭，就去写作业。I'll do my homework after I'm done eating.

The lack of time reference in either clause (吃完饭, 去写作业) suggests neither has happened yet, so it's a statement of plan, which maps to simple present tense in English.

The ambiguity though, is we couldn't tell if the speaker has already started eating, but the same can be said for the English version.

Now back to the subject of the question, how to make a tenseless sentence? Strictly speaking, given how grammatical tense is defined (see #1 in at the beginning of this answer), all Chinese sentences are tenseless and the language is a tenseless language.

I think what you really want to know is 'what are some common sentences with ambiguous time reference'. After some thought, I couldn't think of any real sentences in their actual contexts like that. I couldn't think of any sentence or even clause that has ambiguous time reference while its English counterpart doesn't, either.

For example, the clauses 我吃完饭 and 我吃饭 sound 'tenseless', the same can be said for 'I finish eating' and 'I eat'. Grammatically they are simple present tense, but as sentences they don't make any sense.

So if you want to create sentences with ambiguous time reference, simply omit any verbs, adverbs or other language elements that refer to time, but they sound either incomplete or unnatural.


What's difference between 国籍 and 民族? I'm revising vocabulary for HSK4 and I found many words with similar meanings. A pair I found today was: 国籍 and 民族. What's the difference between them?

国籍 = nationality (as based on what nation you are from)
民族 = ethnic group

For the majority of Chinese people their:

国籍 = 中国 (Chinese)
民族 = 汉 (Han)


Is there a chengyu to mean "undeserved reward" or "undeserved luck"? Let's consider someone who sits on their buttocks all day, but, in spite of not working hard, gets rewarded anyway.
Some examples:

a particularly lazy coworker who gets a promotion/raise even if they did absolutely nothing to deserve it.

someone who is clueless about a specific task but somehow lucks their way to a satisfactory result (copy-pasting random code from the internet and obtaining a working program)

someone who doesn't mind deadlines but somehow doesn't get burnt when the day of reckoning comes (forgetting to file the tax declaration, but not getting investigated by the tax authority)

These examples might be not entirely related, as undeserved reward and undeserved luck are not exactly the same thing.
However I wonder if there's a chengyu to express such a thing.

a particularly lazy coworker who gets a promotion/raise even if they did absolutely nothing to deserve it.

It is 無功受祿 or 竪子成名

If it was you who get the undeserved reward, you can use 受之有愧: as a self-humbling respond.

~

someone who is clueless about a specific task but somehow lucks their way to a satisfactory result (copy-pasting random code from the internet and obtaining a working program)

It is 歪打正着

~

someone who doesn't mind deadlines but somehow doesn't get burnt when the day of reckoning comes (forgetting to file the tax declaration, but not getting investigated by the tax authority)

you can call it 大難不死，福大命大 or 時辰未到 (time for the karma to take effect has not come yet/ not the time to die yet )

不勞而獲:  'to succeed with no effort' doesn't state a reward someone obtained is deserved or not. (you can get a reward with no effort by working smart) therefore not included in my answer

Is there a chengyu to mean “undeserved reward”

無功受祿 fit the bill. (clearly stated the reward is undeserved)


How to say when a university was established Chinese universities can use  建立于1926年 or 创立于1926年 or 创办于1926年to say "established in 1926." Are there significant differences between these?

Also, is there any standard short form comparable to the English abbreviation "est. 1926"?

Searching on Google shows the various options described in the comment and the answer are almost equally common, both in connection with 大学 and without that.  The results seem to be heavily influenced by machine translated web pages, so may not be reliable.

What stood out to me was that results for 创立 immediately gave much more reference to prestige universities than others I tried. That may just be chance.  But Siyi Deng also suggested this was the most prestigious--and prestige is the point of anything to do with trademarking.

创建于

建立于

创立于

创办于

are all acceptable, but for university I believe 创立于 is the most accurate one, the 立 here adds a subtle preeminence hint, and the 创 implies hard working.

In contrast, 创办于 does not have the "greatness" flavor, and 建立于 can be used for any institute in general.

I don't think there is an abbreviation that can convey the same implications.


Why is there the first 看 in 她看都没看过我一眼? From 标准教程HSK4上 (page 93):

  她看都没看过我一眼，怎么样才能使她喜欢我呢？

Google Translate is not great here, but it gives some idea of how it works.  I think it translates to something like:

  She has never even glanced at me, how can I get her to like me?

I don't understand how the first part 她看都没看过我一眼 pieces together.

I think the logic is something like:

一眼 = a glance
看一眼 = a glance at
看我一眼 a glance at me
看过我一眼 glanced at me once
没看过我一眼 never glanced at me once
都没看过我一眼 never even once glanced at me
看都没看过我一眼 ???
她看都没看过我一眼 She has never even glanced at me

So...

Question: Why is there the first 看 in 她看都没看过我一眼?

Baidu gives some examples where we just drop the 看, but they're relatively rare (so could be erroneous), e.g.:

  自始至终，她都没看过我一眼！  (link)

This is a common pattern used for emphasizing that something "hasn't even been...":

  v + 都没有 + v

动都没有动 = hasn't even been touched
看都没有看 = hasn't even been looked at
翻都没有翻 = hasn't even been flipped through


What exists (存在) in the sentence 孩子在家接受教育存在不足? On page 17 of 发展汉语，高级口语（I）in 课文 09 there's this a discussion about homeschooling. The first sentence is:

  孩子在家接受教育存在不足。

It literally translates to something like:

  Kids [孩子] at [在] home [家] receive [接受] education [教育] exists [存在] insufficient [不足].

So it likely means "homeschooling is lacking". I'm not sure why 存在 is used here.

Question: What exists (存在) in the sentence 孩子在家接受教育存在不足?

I'm guessing what exists is "insufficiency", but I'm not sure.

孩子在家接受教育存在不足。

It is a [topic] + [comment/ opinion sentence]

[孩子在家接受教育] (children receive education at home) is the topic

[存在不足] (insufficiency exist ) is the comment/ opinion

孩子在家接受教育存在不足 means "insufficiency exist in children home schooling "

To make it clear, let's expand the sentence

不足處 (insufficient areas)
存在於 (exist in)
孩子在家接受教育 (children receive education at home)
的系統 (the system of)
之中 within

不足處存在於孩子在家接受教育的系統之中 = insufficient areas exist in the system of children receive education at home (home schooling children)

Back to the original sentence

存在不足 = insufficiency exist/  have insufficiency

存在 (exist/ have) is a verb here

It is an odd way to use 存在 without a preposition in a Chinese sentence.

The typical way of using  存在 is with a preposition

Example:

[不足處 (subject)] [存在 (verb)][於 (preposition)] [孩子在家接受教育的系統 object][之中 (preposition)]
[雙方(subject)] [之間 (preposition)][存在著 (verb in continuous/ progressive tense)] [矛盾 (object)]


What is the proper meaning of 随便? 由于版权原因，Up主不能随便阅读别人的小说进行视频创作。

I looked up 随便, and there are 3 possible meanings,

casual

random

informal

Which one do you think fits?

随便 can 'do as one wishes'

'freely' would be a suitable translation in this context
不能随便阅读别人的小说 - cannot freely read other people's novels


How Did 是 Come to Mean "To Be"? I have been looking into the etymology of the character 是.
The site Chinese Etymology notes that this character was: "originally meaning straight or correct. The sun 旦 rises or 早 in the correct 正 place." It also notes that it is: "from sun-day 日 rì and foot-complete 正 zhèng".
I am wondering how a character for "straight" or "correct" came to have the meaning of "is or "equals".

時期字體
字形
參考資料

西周金

虢季子白盤集成10173

春秋金

陳公叔父甗集成947

戰國・楚簡

4包山竹簡

戰國・楚簡

036信陽書簡

秦簡

24.28睡虎地秦簡

東漢隸

孔宙碑

楷

「是」 (Baxter-Sagart OC: /*[d]eʔ/) is comprised of phonetic 「止」 (/*tə/), which is the lower component. The earliest meaning of 「是」 was this, later extended to mean to be.
The upper component's functionality is unknown, and was later corrupted to look like 「旦」. Note that 「旦」 or 「早」 in the corresponding time periods do not form part of 「是」, and so are unrelated to 「是」.


Chinese ellipsis marks How is an ellipsis 省略号 written in Chinese?

。。。

...

or

......

The only reference I can find on this is this word reference forum which states ....... This also says 6 dots.

E.g.,

在這裡輸入您的訊息...... （Type your message here...）

Six dots.

It is called 刪節號 in Taiwan, and 省略号 in China. Both use 6 dots.


Pronounce ellipsis 《●●● ●●●》 in Mandarin When I'm reading ellipses in English out loud I usually say et cetera or and so on. What should I say in Mandarin? 等等?

等等 is the official and only globally recognized way to read ellipsis in Chinese, unlike in English there are more than one (et cetera, and so on, and so forth, etc.)

In casual occasions you can also say 等 for short. In formal speeches like news broadcast it's always 等等. (Note I am talking about the pronunciation of ellipsis; I am not saying single 等 or other alternatives are grammatically incorrect or cannot be used in formal conversations.)


Chinese characters for "bu da jie" meaning unrelated Can someone assist with providing the correct Chinese characters for the saying "bu da jie" which means unrelated.

This saying appears in the Suzhou dialect so it is quite common in our household, but I don't know how to write this.

不搭界 (bùdājiè in Mandarin) is a common informal expression in Wu dialects (which include Shanghainese and the Suzhou dialect). Its literal meaning, as indicated in the comments, refers to 'not having a common boundary'. In current usage, it refers to two matters, objects or people having no shared connection or relationship.

An example, of two people quarrelling:

  A: 阿拉从此浑身不搭界！
  B: 随便侬！

  A: We don't have anything to do with each other from now on! (lit: We from now on are unrelated all over the body)
  B: Whatever! (Lit: “Do as you wish”)


What is the difference between 完成 and 完毕? So, both mean 'to finish, complete sth.'. I guess 完毕 is more formal, because the examples given for it include things like court cases, whereas 完成 seems to be things like homework/general tasks.
Any other differences between the two?!
Regards,
A very thankful Hashamyim

完成 mainly mean 'accomplish' ('成' in '完成' means successfully or become) ; 完成 is mostly for 'something people do'
完毕 mainly mean 'end' ('毕' in '完毕' means 'end'); 完毕 is mostly for 'something that happens'
完毕 syn 完結 (ended)

完成 (v) to complete; to accomplish; to fulfill; to finish; to succeed
完成 can be used with or without object
E.g. 已经完成工作 and 工作已经完成 are both correct

~

完毕 (v) to end; to finish; to complete
完毕 doesn't take object
E.g. 學期完毕; 工作完毕 (you can't say 完毕學期 or 完毕工作) (學期  and  工作 are both subject in the phrase )

When you want to say an event is 'ended', you have to use 完毕

When you want to say a task is 'accomplished', you have to use 完成

Do not use 完成 for 'an event is ended' (學期完成 is incorrect, )


Is there an expression in Chinese for saying "I'm taken"? In English you can say "I'm taken" to express that you already have a significant other (girlfriend/boyfriend/husband/wife/etc.) and are not open to romantic advances from other people.

Is there an equivalent expression in Chinese, other than explicitly saying something like 我已经结婚了 or 我已经有女朋友?

You can use 名花有主  to describe a third person 'being taken' in a romantic sense. For example: "他已经是名花有主" (he is already taken)
Since it sounds arrogant to call oneself  "名花" (quite a catch), "名花有主" is only appropriate when describing a third person.
Also "名花" is usually a description of a lady. Using it to describe a man is less common, therefore someone would say "名草有主" instead
Or you can use "心有所屬" to declare you are "taken"
"我已经心有所屬" = (my heart had already settled on someone)
But 心有所屬 is quite a literary phrase, rarely used colloquially.

我已经有女朋友

It sounds most natural in native Chinese speech


How to address fellow students junior to oneself (学妹，学弟)? I have sometimes wondered what would be the appropriate way of addressing (fellow) students that are junior to oneself. Given name? Full name? Name + 妹/第? Are there even cases where one can use 哥/兄 etc.?

I assume 小+surname is not used, is that correct?

And: does one have to take gender into account? I.e. boy addressing girl, boy—boy, girl—boy, girl—girl.

If one is not sure, how does one find out what the other person is comfortable with?

To be honest, although you could use 学弟, 学妹, etc. to address other students, the most natural way of addressing them (especially when you interact face to face) is by full name. Full names retain a reasonable amount of respect without making it sound too formal. Adding a suffix would only make it overly formal and consequently awkward. For example, full name + 同学 might be used by a teacher when announcing an award given to the student.

Side note: 兄，哥 were used in more ancient times such as 师兄 and 师哥. Back then things tend to be much less casual. For example, if you and your older "classmate" both train under the same martial arts master, you'd might call that student 师兄.

Reference: I grew up in China.


What does 为 mean in 该公司目前为多达80款不同菜系提供外卖...? In the following sentence:

  发言人表示，该公司目前为多达80款不同菜系提供外卖，“这一点足以说明我们英国人是全世界菜肴的吃货。”

I understand the meaning, which is something like the follows:

  The spokesman said that the company now provides 80 different types of delivery foods. This is more than an enough explanation of why British people are the best gourmet in the world.

However, what does the 为 mean in this sentence? I feel that the subject is 该公司 and the verb is 提供外卖, so 为 would be a preposition...

Does it mean "with" or something others?

You almost get it.

  为...提供 means "provide ... with" or "supply ...with"

Hence, the correct pronunciation here is wei4, not wei2.

Depending on the verb, 为, as a preposition, can mean "for, to, with". Prepositions in English and Chinese are quite different I think.


Best translation for: “Frequent abuse leads to restrictions”? My Google-fu and Cantonese brain selected these translations for “frequent abuse leads to restrictions”/“you abuse it, you lose it”:

濫用多就邀請限制 (lànyòng duō jiù yāoqǐng xiànzhì) frequent abuse invites restrictions
濫用請對策 (lànyòng qǐng duìcè) abuse leads to countermeasures

(Basically, I try to find the combination of words that gives the most hits on Google and makes sense to me, a Cantonese speaker.)

It’s supposed to come off in an admonishing/I-told-you-so kind of way. The idea is that frequent abuse has motivated the establishment of stricter measures (like a child taking too often from the cookie jar, resulting in the jar going under lock and key).

Is there a an equivalent with more brevity? An equivalent that is more standard? I get a lot of characters for translations from English, but I don’t really have a good grasp of the nuances.

濫用 is only one of many aspects of abuse. Abuse is inappropriate way to use something. When you get the meaning, you are free from fixed expressions. Say, 愛用宜守規，違者得限制。


usage of 'L' in colloquial cantonese utterances I found this in what I suspect is a very colloquial Cantonese website:
點解觀塘咁L塞
What is this 'L'? I am sure I must have seen this before, but I do not understand in what context.
Thanks

From 廣東粗口五大字

撚:

讀作nan2。此字乃是假借字，「撚」字是指把玩、揉搓、撥弄等的動作，在部份場合下不被視為粗口，例如「撚手小菜」即解成拿手小菜、「撚雀」則是飼養雀鳥。

當用作粗口時，正寫為「尸」字裡加個「粦」字，[發音為 lan2]，俗寫為「門」字裡加個「能」字，即是「」字。當作為粗口時，則解成下列意思：

名詞，「陽具」的意思 (Noun: "penis")

語氣助詞，只用於加強語氣，用於句子中；(Modal auxiliary words, only used to strengthen the tone and used in sentences)

助詞，用作顛倒句子原本意思，可視為反語。

近年網民使用時，有時為避免出現粗口字，會以英文字母「L」代替。 (In recent years, netizens sometimes use the English letter "L" instead to avoid swear words.)

點解觀塘咁(L)塞 = 點解觀塘咁(撚)塞 = Why is Kwun Tong so (damn) congested
'塞' is short for '塞車' (be congested)-  of traffic
We also use:

'小' for '屌'

'忍' for ''

'狗' for '㞗'

'西' for '屄'

'實' for '杘'


Can I use a rare character like 飂 in a name? I am trying to find a new Chinese name for myself. Before, I simply used a transliteration of my western name. Now, as my Chinese progressed, I would like to find something that does not immediately reveal that I am a foreigner.
While leafing through my dictionaries, several rare characters attracted my attention. I like them, not only because they are exotic, but also because of their meanings and their components.

But I am not sure if they may be used for names. I tried to baidu that question, but they seem to be to rare...
I think my question is twofold: First, do native speakers use rare characters for names? And, specifically concerning the character 飂:

Could I use a character like 飂 for my name?
would a native speaker use a rare character like 飂 as name?
what does a native speaker think seeing a name containing such a character? Is it simply rare? Or really strange?

From what the dictionaries (mainly Longman and the dictionary of the Taiwanese ministry of education) told me, 飂 is used as 姓 (although I could not find any examples), and can mean either the sound of wind, wind in high places, or a west wind (what perhaps somehow fits to a westerner).

edit:  I'm comfortable with reading Chinese sources when needed.

Q1: Could I use a character like 飂 for my name?

Yes. In fact, you can freely choose any character for your name. However, for whether it is a good Chinese name, there may be many criteria. The most important criteria are supposed to be:

Elegant meaning. 飂 is a good one, meaning gone with the wind and implying a noble, unsullied, lofty, and proud character of a person. One derivation of this character is in 道德經

  澹兮其若海， 飂兮若無止， 衆人皆有以， 而我獨頑似鄙。

Well, I'm not good at writing English poem ... the translation below is just a simple explanation line by line for the piece of 道德經 above:

  Being indifferent to fame and wealth, as floating on the sea;Being gone with the wind, as never heading for an end that can be seen.Everyone is too busy, for their own living;But just stubborn as me, keeping such an attitude like this!

I guess you can feel the feeling of 飂 now :)
Good and easy pronunciation. It depends on character combinations so I can't tell whether a name containing 飂 (liù or liáo) sounds good or not. But it's really a rare character so that most people would have to look up a dictionary before calling your name; and being even worse, 飂 has two kinds of pronunciation -- people would be confused for which one is your preference. This is unlike a Japanese name. As a character would have many sounds in Japanese, they often write down the phonetic symbol, i.e. Hiragana or Katakana, for each name that is intended to be read out in documents. Thus, in conclusion, although polyphonic characters are even sometimes (in fact not often) used by native Chinese speakers for their names, I don't recommend to use them.

Other criteria, like some superstitious rules (e.g. 姓名學), won't be introduced here. If you are interested in them, you can see the link for more information.

  Q2: Would a native speaker use a rare character like 飂 as name?

Yes. But it will be probably considered as you are showing off.

  Q3: What does a native speaker think seeing a name containing such a character? Is it simply rare? Or really strange?

Whether it is strange depends on character combinations. That is to say, only when seeing a full name, one can answer such a question :)


Typing Chinese radicals? Is there a way to type radicals on a computer? I'd like to insert some in a  document I'm writing but I'm not sure how to write those that don't correspond to an actual word. Any tips? Thanks!

Install input method tools such as Google Pinyin Windows only
type u start to input
then type follow to input radicals

丨 shu 竖
一 heng 横
丿 pie 撇
礻 shi 示
衤 yi 衣

But I think most easy way is Ctrl+C,Ctrl+V
There is a list of radicals. Find it and copy it.