User Comments - auntie68

Posted on: I want to buy this one

@xiaohu: Are you very sure that zhongirl wasn't asking you whether tones were important for Chinese?

Posted on: 会 (Huì) and 能 (Néng) Face-off

@marcdevincentis: I think we really need the CPOD team to tackle this one. The word 会 can also be volitional, eg., "我会问他" as in "I'll ask him" or "他不会生气吗?” （“Will he not be angry?") or ”他会来的“ ("He will come/ will be coming"). HTH and Good Luck.

Posted on: Do you like China?

Hi zamzara. The entry in the "Grammar" section has not been completed yet, but for now, I would say that the 过 (guo4) in that sentence is an "aspectual participle" which indicates that the action (ie. 去 qu4) is in the past.

Eg. 你去中国 ＝ ni3 qu4 zhong1guo2 = You go (/are going) to China

你去过中国 = ni3 qu4guo zhong1guo2 = You have been to China (before).

Cf another aspectual particle -- 了 le -- which can indicate a past action (in a slightly different way from 过 guo4；here the 了 -- le -- merely indicates that the action 去 -- qu4 -- has been completed):

我吃很多中国菜 ＝ wo3 chi1 hen3duo1 zhong1guo2 cai4 = I eat a lot of Chinese food.

我吃了很多中国菜 = wo3 chi1le hen3duo1 zhong1guo2cai4

= I ate a lot of Chinese food (zhong1guo2cai4)

but

我吃过中国菜 ＝ wo3 chi1guo4 zhong1guo2cai4

= I've eaten Chinese food before.

HTH. Good luck!

Posted on: 会 (Huì) and 能 (Néng) Face-off

@misterjess: I'm very well, thank you! 

Posted on: 会 (Huì) and 能 (Néng) Face-off

@misterjess: Thanks for saying -- in a few, friendly, words -- what I was trying to say to acorrigan. I think that Fowler's, OED etc would be on his side. Again, thanks!

Posted on: 会 (Huì) and 能 (Néng) Face-off

@accorrigan: No, you didn't make a statement, in fact you sounded modest and courteous (to me...), which is why I want to show you some support now.

As far as I know, the English language has no official "watchdog authority" on what is, and what is not, correct English usage. However, I believe that Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage (first published in 1926) is considered to be fairly authoritative.

Speaking only for myself, I do like the Fowler approach because it rejects dogma; Fowler's has never hesitated to tear down "shibboleths" of English grammar (please pardon my Yiddish).

Recently, I've also noticed a similarly pragmatic and inclusive approach in other well-known practical guides, such as the Oxford English Dictionary (OED; mine is the humbler "shorter" version), the Economist Style Guide, Strunk's "Elements of Style", as well as -- that chunkiest of chunky books -- "Words Into Type" (which is written for professional copyeditors).

For what it's worth, I think that Strunk or the Economist Style Guide would cover the needs of any "civilian". They're very slim. Fun to read too. Good luck! 

Posted on: Morning at the Office

Okay, let's spick Chiniss now, everybody... Good night. Peace.

Posted on: Morning at the Office

@billbag: Sorry if you dislike seeing Japanese on this site, but if you take a closer look at changye's post, the one which contained some Japanese, it was directly relevant to the question raised by henning about long and short vowels in Chinese. Having grown up hearing Cantonese, I can tell you that the length of the vowel does make a difference in at least that dialect. For once, I really do feel that this criticism was quite unfair.

Posted on: Morning at the Office

Right. Let's hope that CPOD will ride to our rescue on this one soon!

@changye  (*and only changye, coz I think the others won't be interested in playing Grammar Table Tennis so early in the morning): My interpretation was based on the 了 qualifying not the single word 去 (in which case － ie 去了－ only the past tense would make sense), but the entire cluster 去哪儿, which changes the emphasis of the phrase. Hmm...

Posted on: Booking a Plane Ticket

@mattwhyndham: Erm, I'm not sure whether lai2ci4 (来次) would make any sense to a speaker of Chinese. There is a specific expression -- 来年 (lai2nian2; the coming year) --, but it may not be a pattern that you can apply here. I'd stick to 下次，上次，and of course 本次.

Do any native speakers out there have any wisdom for us on this?

@acorrigan, eunica: The 本次 (ben3ci4) uses a rather formal -- and economical -- construction which is actually equivalent to 3 (or 4) words: 这（一）次的. I did notice your question earlier but didn't attempt any answer because I'm not a Premium subscriber and had no idea what the problem sentence was!

If the problem sentence was in fact 月底将公布他本次访华的具体行程, then translating 本次 as "upcoming" doesn't sound wrong to me. Although the travelling itself will only take place at some point in the future, 本 is appropriate because the trip is an event which has already commenced. The writer is referring to the trip as an event which includes the preparations for the trip.

In this sentence it is not the 本次 which supplies the contextual clues as to whether the trip is a future event (ie upcoming rather than completed). The only cues which I could find were merely implicit (at best); the writer/translator seem to have assumed that the release of a detailed itinerary must logically precede a trip. As a former Special Assistant who used to plan official visits for diplomat bosses, I can say that this doesn't always happen!

HTH, anyway.