r/ChineseLanguage: a community for those studying, teaching, or interested in Chinese languages!

Click here to see the previous Quick Help Threads, including 翻译求助 Translation Requests threads.

This thread is used for:

• Translation requests
• Help with choosing a Chinese name
• "How do you say X?" questions
• or any quick question that can be answered by a single answer.

Alternatively, you can ask on our Discord server.

Community members: Consider sorting the comments by "new" to see the latest requests at the top.

If you have a Chinese translation request, please post it as a comment here!

If it's an image (e.g. a photo), you can upload it to a website like Imgur and paste the link here.

However, if you're requesting a review of a substantial translation you have made, or have a question that involving grammar or details on vocabulary usage, you are welcome to post it as its own thread.

​

若想浏览往期「快问快答」，请点击这里, 这亦包括往期的翻译求助帖.

此贴为以下目的专设：

• 翻译求助
• 取中文名
• 如何用中文表达某个概念或词汇
• 及任何可以用一个简短的答案解决的问题

您也可以在我们的 Discord 上寻求帮助。

社区成员：请考虑将评论按“最新”排序，以方便在贴子顶端查看最新留言。

如果您需要中文翻译，请在此留言。

但是，如果您需要的是他人对自己所做的长篇翻译进行审查，或对某些语法及用词有些许疑问，您可以将其发表在一个新的，单独的贴子里。

Click here to see the previous 学习伙伴 Study Buddy Requests threads.

If you are a Chinese or English speaker looking for someone to study with, please post it as a comment here!

You are welcome to include your time zone, your method of study (e.g. textbook), and method of communication (e.g. Discord, email). Please do not post any personal information in public (including WeChat), thank you!

点击这里以浏览往期的「学习伙伴」帖子

如果您是一位说中文或英文的朋友，并正在寻找学友或语伴，请在此留言。

您可以留下自己的时区，学习方式（例如通过教科书）和交流方式（例如Discord，邮件等）。 但千万不要透露个人私密信息（包括微信号），谢谢！

I did this question in another sub but it was the wrong sub 😭 I'm still learning english (native spanish speaker) and my plan is study traslation in university where I will learn chinese. In 4 years, how much can I advance?

Hello.

I'm looking to start studying Chinese. I'm native in English and fluent in Japanese (hoping that gives me a head start on Kanji.

I'm looking for recommendations for resources/ apps/ websites to use to study. From experience, I know duolingo is crap. But it wasn't until I got a few years into Japanese that I found the really good resources. Hoping there are some helpful ones you can recommend?

I'm an American and I don't understand what this girl means when she says "I would be a dog". She will say it like if she does it again then she would be a dog. For example, she hates playing mahjong with her cousins because they like to play for several hours. The last time she played with them she told me "if I play with them again I will be a dog". I asked her what that meant and she said "I would be a dog if I play with them again". She doesn't speak English and we communicate on WeChat 🤣 can someone help understand what she means by this? She says it a lot

I'm trying to decide between one of these two lifetime paid plan options to, in the future, do a more immersive study of the language. Any of you knows about these courses? Any insights or suggestions?

I'm not in a hurry to purchase any of these. If any one knows about a Black Friday discount or similar, I would wait till then.I'm currently working HSK1, I'm more or less half way through.

My interest in the lifetime option in Mandarin Bean is the transcriptions and translations for the texts and the grammar exercises. About the other one, HSK Course, I'm interested in the exercises and the lessons.
But, about the latter, I think there's not much content and I don't know if there will be more uploads and more frequently or if there are lessons behind the paywall, as the content you can see for free seems a bit scarce.

Thanks for your time!

Hey everyone, so with the Steam Summer Sale in full swing, I thought I would mention a genre of games that has REALLY blown up in China recently and on Steam called FMV games. They are like Visual Novels, but they are live action video.

They are often dating simulators (but there is some with more mystery/action oriented plots) and you can think of them like interactive Cdramas. They generally have subtitles and great Chinese audio.

Here is a list of some of the big Chinese FMV games you can get right now:

Dating Sims
Love is All Around (-20%) $7.99 / 6 girls + 3 in dlc, the OG dating sim FMV
My Destiny Girls (-20%) $7.99 / 6 girls, Good production value
Charming Hearts (0%) $9.99 / 6.5 girls, Good production value
Knowledge or Know Lady (-15%) $5.94 / 6 girls, Quite horny, Decent production value
Seduction of Beauty (0%) $7.99 / 6 girls, Kinda difficult to win, Good production value
I'm Surrounded by Classical Beauties (-20%) $2.39 / 3 girls, Good production value, Historical setting
Secrets of the Heartbeat (0%) $5.99 / 4 girls, Decent production value
Beauties! They're All After Me (0%) $8.99 / 6 girls, Decent production value
Customized Girlfriend (-50%) $4.49 / 2 girls, Decent production value, Sci fi plot
To Be In Love With Girls Group (-50%) $4.99 / 4 girls, Meh Production value, Building a girl group
TryAndLove (-10%) $6.29 / 4 girls + 1 guy, Poor production value

Seven Lovers In The House (-15%) $8.49 / 6 girls, Good production value, No Eng
Proud to Love! (0%) $9.99 / 6 girls, Good production value, No Eng
Tomorrow's Love Puzzle (0%) / 6 girls, Good production value, No Eng
Wishful Journey:Love Across Time (0%) $9.99 / 8 girls, Historical setting, No Eng
天呐！找不到真爱就扑街! (0%) $6.99 / 8 girls, Good production value, No Eng
美女,应接不暇 (-30%) $6.99 / 6 girls, Decent production value, No Eng
糟糕！他们太爱我了怎么办？(0%) $3.99 / 4 boys, Decent production value, No Eng
Love Chase (-25%) $4.49 / 6 girls, Decent production value, No Eng

Thriller/Mystery
Vanity Fair: The Pursuit (-20%) $5.59 / Gamble your life away in the entertainment industry
Breakout 13 (-40%) $5.99 / Escape a correctional institution
Underdog Detective (0%) $7.99 / Historical detective comedy
Back Fire (0%) $11.99 / Gunfight action adventure
Lost in Darklight (0%) $8.99 / Urban mystery suspense

反转21克 (-35%) $5.84 / Sci-fi action thriller, No Eng

There are of course an abundance of traditional Visual Novels coming out of China on Steam as well, but I can't really attest to any of their quality and they have a higher barrier to entry Chinese skill wise. But if you like Cdramas or Visual novels you would probably like these Chinese FMV, they are relatively affordable and all offer many hours of gameplay with largely normal everyday speech in a subtitled environment with pausing capabilities!

From my understanding 的 is possessive while 得 is moreso an indicator of an adverb, or following a verb, however I'm really confused where 好的、好得 fits in.

Ignoring the written characters for a second, I know 好的/得 is used in two contexts, one meaning "okay" and the other one meaning "the good one", so is that where the discrepancy is?

Edit: typo, fixed adjective to adverb

[Image]

大家好， 我从小时候学汉语。HSK3, HSK4 AP中文都考，都通过。最近我不在中文上课。我很担心我的中文水平下降。有什么建议可以保持中文水平吗？请推荐一些好的自学资源！谢谢～

Cantonese and Standard Mandarin both fail on line 2 with the pronunciation of 識 lmao.

漢皇重色思傾國，御宇多年求不得。

楊家有女初長成，養在深閨人未識。

In the Tang dynasty Chang'an dialect 國 /kwok/; 得 /tok/; 識 /ɕjək/ are all 曾攝 and are at least near-rhymes.

Although if you use the literary readings for Mandarin/Lower Yangtze Mandarin pronunciation, where 識 is pronounced like Pinyin she you can make it considerably further and fail on line 9

承歡侍宴無閒暇，春從春遊夜專夜。

with the vowels in 暇 and 夜 having diverged from when they were /ɣæH/ and /jæH/ in Middle Chinese. If you ignore 識, this is also where Cantonese undeniably fails.

I'm especially interested if there is any modern dialect that can make it past the quatrain on line 12.

姊妹弟兄皆列土，可憐光彩生門戶。

遂令天下父母心，不重生男重生女。

Where 土; 戶; 女 are all 遇攝 and formed near-rhymes in the Tang dynasty Chang'an dialect as something like 土/tʰwoQ/; 戶 /ɣwoQ/; 女 /ɳøQ/

Full text of the poem here: https://www.arteducation.com.tw/shiwenv_09d31b73b44d.html

Keep in mind that at the time the poem was written, everything should have been part of a rhyming structure with the form of either:

• a quatrain of 4x7 syllables with the structure AABA
• a 2x7 couplet
  
• a 2x14 couplet with structure ABCB

The only exception is the line

春風桃李花開日，秋雨梧桐葉落時。

(平平平仄平平仄， 平仄平平仄仄平)

which is a 對聯 with all the tones being intentionally opposite in terms of level/oblique.

I have been granted the Huayu scholarship and registered in NTNU

I read in the conditions that "The language center should arrange at least 15 hours of language courses each week for recipients. This study time does not include cultural visits, speeches, and other self-learning curriculum or activities."

I am interested in following a Regular Class schedule that includes 15 hours of instruction per week, which consists of 10 hours of language class and 5 hours of Multi-task language training courses. Anyone followed this course before and knows whether it meets the requirements of the scholarship?

Seems on reddit that some did, however it does not quite feel right with the scholarship criteria.

Thanks !

EDIT: The question has already been answered, see comments here and on the r/Anki crosspost. I will probably not answer more comments, thanks again.

Take 就 as an example, it has 22 meanings (listed bellow). There is no way I can recall all of them. How would you handle this type of card? Thanks.

The 22 meanings of 就 in xiehanzi Anki Deck:

• at once
• right away
• only
• just (emphasis)
• as early as
• already
• as soon as
• then
• in that case
• as many as
• even if
• to approach
• to move towards
• to undertake
• to engage in
• to suffer
• subjected to
• to accomplish
• to take advantage of
• to go with (of foods)
• with regard to
• concerning

Getting back into flashcards after a long break and many of my cards have two different pronunciations if the word is commonly spoken with a neutral second tone.

Example:

• Card: 东西

• Audio1: sounds like dong1xi1

• Audio2: sounds like dong1xi5

Every time I review the card I will hear the given sound, trying to drill it into my brain. I have to decide whether I want to hear audio1, audio2, or both.

On the one hand, it's easier to use the neutral pronunciation if you already learned the full pronunciation than vice versa.

On the other hand, I want to have the sound be as close to actual usage as possible to achieve my goals.

My goals are:

• Able to listen to simple news podcasts

• Able to watch TV shows.

• Pass an HSK5 exam

Given these goals, which pronunciation do you think is best for me to learn?

Thanks 🙏

Edit with more examples: 答应 命运 枕头

As a beginner, I use 在 all the time for location and places then I stumbled 位于. Then I got conscious if maybe I was using 在 wrong sometimes. Can someone help me out their differences? Thanks.

But how is 如何 used? How different is it from 怎么？ Also I'm kinda confused about what 会 is doing here. Thanks!

Ive seen posts here asking if 29 is too old to learn Chinese and the responses were a resounding no. For spoken language I totally agree, but can an adult learn 1000s of characters, their pronunciations and their meaning?

How can I have a Chinese accent while speaking 普通话 my friend suggested shadowing Do you have any tips or even have an experience with shadowing Thank you in advance 💕

Do they have the same Character? I can't find anything online, only that people in Taiwan and Southern China? say "te" and not "chá"

So i wonder, do they have the same character?

I want to start learning to write characters by hand but all the online stroke order animation dictionaries use a calligraphy type font with little flicks which is different from the font used in online texts

[Image]

These are the Classical Chinese names of the day of the week. They are also used in modern-day Japanese.

Further questions: when was the 7-day week adopted in China? Do these terms predate this adoption, if so, what did they use to mean back then?

I've come across this words and cannot wonder what they do mean, even though after searching for their meanings.

Here is where i saw them the last time:

75 学而思学习机发布了一篇小红书笔记，快来看吧！ 😆 jcWfMut9Wu1rAms 😆 http://xhslink.com/cWUXyO，复制本条信息，打开【小红书】App查看精彩内容！

Thanks in advance 😄😃😀

tl;dr: I got an offer to study Chinese in Beijing for 10 months. What Chinese level can I realistically achieve? Is it worth it?

I am a beginner in Chinese. I did a language course in the past, but have forgotten most of it since then. I really enjoyed learning Chinese back then, but my motivation has gone down since then. I started a Masters and my focus on China has been lost ever since, or to put it otherwise, I started focusing on other subjects and areas. Prior to this, I have always enjoyed studying Chinese economics and politics, but I kinda have the feeling that the times to start this journey are over for me. In my mind I have long already given up on studying in China and learning the language, and it is kinda difficult for me to "reignite" my motivation.

Recently I got the opportunity to take part in a Chinese language course at the Beijing Foreign Studies University. Tuition fees will be totally covered and I will receive a monthly stipend of 2000€ (it's a rather unknown scholarship, not affiliated with the Chinese government or the university itself).

The program foresees 36 weeks of intensive language training (i.e. complete focus on the study of the Chinese language in full time, 5 days a week) over a period of 10 months. After the initial 10 months and the language course the program will continue with a non-language component, so I would stay in China for a total of 16 months uninterrupted.

Now, I am hesitant to accept the offer for the reasons mentioned above. I have to decide now on whether to finish my master quickly or postpone my graduation by a whole year. Therefore I have to assess if it is worth it to do the program.

So, is it worth it in your opinion?

1. How well will I be able to learn Chinese in this time?

2. Does it even make sense? I won't become fluent in this period; so what added value will there be in me learning Chinese in this late stage, right before finishing my masters and entering the job market? The field in which I aspire to work in seems to be quite eager to recruit China experts and people with Chinese language skills; but will it be considered an asset to have some basic knowledge after these 36 weeks of language training?

3. Money. I will receive 2000€ monthly. I will live on campus, so I will probably eat a lot at the canteen (which should be cheap I guess?). A single room in a dormitory is guaranteed, it will cost between 90 and 110 CNY per day. So between 2700 CNY (343€ / 372 USD) to 3300 CNY (419€ / 454 USD) per month.

Will I struggle with money in a city like Beijing? If I take part in the program I would postpone my graduation by a whole year, so I would miss out on a year's salary. I don't want to struggle with money in that case then...

Hi, I recently started learning Chinese using this app, I’m really a big beginner and I heard that it’s good for some basics My goal in this language is to comfortably read novels, I don’t need speaking for now if this fact matters:)) thank you very much for ur replies!