User Comments - light487

Posted on: A Member of the 'Moonlight Clan'

Hrmm.. so I could say "píngcháng xiàwǔ yīyàng".. "the same as I usually have in the afternoon" kinda thing?

Posted on: A Member of the 'Moonlight Clan'

Actually.. think I worked it out, with the help of my Chinese friends at the coffee shop..

PíngCháng - "Usually I do this when this happens"

PíngShí - "At this time, I usually do this"

So I could use PíngShí when I want to express something like "Usually I would have the double-shot macchiato at this time of day but I'm going to have a chocolate milkshake instead today."

As compared with PíngCháng where I would use it to express something like "I want to do what I always do on Sundays."

Is that right?

Still slightly confused by it.. and how to really set apart the differences.

Posted on: A Member of the 'Moonlight Clan'

Have another question:

When I order my morning coffee, I just say píngcháng yīyàng to mean "the same as usual".. but in the dialog there is píngshí instead. In my dictionary they appear to have two different means but it is not entirely clear to me what these differences are when they are being used. Can I get a couple of examples or something?

Thanks!

Posted on: I Want an Electric Scooter!

Yay! :) Thanks! :) You know me.. need to know all the little details! :P Now I can look it up on the map and check it out :)

Posted on: Mudslide

Not sure on the full sentence.. but I am guessing the measure word for this is going to be qún.. eg. 100 qún shīzhōngzhě (A group of 100 missing persons)..

Posted on: Instant Noodles

We have FangBian Mian (sorry can't type Pinyin or Chinese at work) to basically say "Convenient Noodles" even though in the West we call them "Instant Noodles".. In my infinite wisdom (haha) I of course made the mistake of using FangBian to describe coffee... That is, fangbian kafei.. haha.. this is not correct as the fangbian is of course not meaning "instant". Instead, we need to say "jíróng kāfēi" which literally means: instantly dissolved coffee.

Just thought I'd share that, slightly embarrassing, lesson I learned on the road. :)

Posted on: I Want an Electric Scooter!

Could it also be more in line with a transliteration of the word "taxi" dadi.. kinda sounds like taxi in a way.. or am I reading too much into it? :)

Posted on: I Want an Electric Scooter!

Heilongjiang.. is the river that separates China from Korea as far as I remember.. or something like that.. that's a pretty long river.. any more specific and you might actually say which city she is from :P hehe

His Tianjin accent is also why he is using the "er-hua" sounds but at the elementary level, we should be used that by now.. :)

Posted on: I Want an Electric Scooter!

Haha.. yes. Having spent the last 3 years here at ChinesePOD (though I did take a break in the last 6 months), I always find it amazing to hear how much Jenny's English has improved in terms of using the little bits and pieces that make a native speaker sound native. For example, after my 6 month absence I noticed that Jenny now says "yup" and "nup" and "nope" a lot more now. :) :)

JiaYou Jenny, JiaYou! :)

Posted on: Blind Massage

It's similar in a way to how people who suffer from autism are referred to now. Previously it was ago to use the adjective austistic to describe them.. but now it is not politically correct to do so. Now one must say "person who suffers from autism" or "someone with autism"... therefore, not "autistic" vs. "normal".. same kinda thing..