User Comments - paulinurus
paulinurus
Posted on: Finally
June 21, 2009 at 1:42 PMhmm.. the basic meaning of the character 菜 cai3 is colour (or color as our friends in the South would spell it). Maybe the first lottery tickets in China were printed with pretty colours, or maybe when the people win lottery they see colours? I wonder what the history is in calling a colour ticket a lottery ticket 彩票 cai3piao4.
Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Dongbei
June 21, 2009 at 12:32 PM@Matt,
The "average hole-in-the-wall restaurant in Dongbei to have an authentic culture/food experience," explains why the language is rough. Of course if one goes looking for food in hawker stalls and small eateries in any foreign country, the language would be rough and blunt and gutter like. If you guys had mentioned this setting from the start (remember, not all poddies have been around for years) then I would have understood it from the start. You guys are the teachers so it's up to you to set up the framework and environment in order to explain why certain language is used. Remember we are students from the West, and we become a riot when things don't appear to make sense or when someone uses the "we are professionals" approach.
Posted on: Finally
June 21, 2009 at 11:12 AMMike,
The verb in 他买了几十年彩票 is '买了'. Consider it as the 'ed' in English to make a past tense. 几十年彩票 is the object phrase.
他昨天看了电影 He saw a movie yesterday
我在香港住了几个月 I lived in Hong Kong for several months.
Note: there are two types of 了 : verb 了, and suffix 了。The verb 了 changes the sentence into a past tense. The suffix 了 implies change from a previous state.
我不吃肉了！Here it is a suffix 了implying that I no longer eat meat. Previously I do eat meat, but no longer.
And you can have both types of 了 in a sentence:
我在香港住了三年了. I lived in Hong Kong for three years now.
And as Changye pointed out, you can avoid using the past tense 了 by structuring the sentence to equivalent that of English present perfect tense.
我买彩票买了几十年。I have bought lottery tickets for decades now.
Hope above helps. That's what I learnt in the grammar class anyway.
Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Dongbei
June 21, 2009 at 1:13 AMBaba,
Of course only by hearing the tone on how words are said can we determine the context of any communication. A waitress of an earthy restaurant could say "sir" in such a warm and respectful tone that you won't feel the restaurant is being formal or starchy. Even vulgar words when said in a certain tone can make the communication sound playful, warm, and friendly, as I'm sure you've seen on tv. Yeah, tone is important and does make a difference. However, we don't have tones in the dialogue translations and we can only go with the words used. I'm sure in Australia there are certain phrases which are considered gutter language. "Wanna order some food, buddy?" is considered gutter language here. No waitress from a decent restaurant will dare to say this especially in a friendly tone except of course in a strip club where a soliciting tone is necessary. Surely, there are many other ways to translate 大哥，点菜吗？in English to reflect the warm and earthy people in Dongbei without using trailer park words of "Wanna order some food, buddy?" But you're a positive person Baba, always giving others the benefit of the doubt. Cheers mate!
Posted on: Finally
June 20, 2009 at 8:46 PMHi Mike,
Let me try to answer your grammar questions.
Pete's sentence 他开车开得很快 is known as a verb complement followed by an object. If there is no object, the verb complement sentence is quite straight forward e.g
他开得很快 he drives very fast.
Verb complement can be liken to the "adverb" in English i.e. to describe the verb. In Chinese grammer you need to have the 得 immediately after the verb before describing the verb.
But when you want to include an object to the verb, there is a conflict, because in Chinese structure the object also has to follow immediately after the verb. Therefore, the verb is repeated twice, firstly to accomodate the object, and secondly to accomodate the 得+adverb. So,
他开车开得很快 he drives the car very fast.
You can avoid using the repeated verb by shifting the object to the beginning of the sentence
车，他开得很快。
So was wondering whether you can say 我买了彩票买了几十年了
I don't think you need to repeat the verb in this sentence because it is a different structure from the verb complement sentence. This sentence is the "double 了" structure. The first 了 is the 'aspect marker' which basically indicates the completion of an action. If you just use one 了 in a sentence, it is basically liken to a past tense sentence.
他买了几十年彩票. He bought lottery tickets for several decades. It is a past action. He bought lottery tickets for several decades in the past. There is no indication that he is still buying lottery tickets at the present time.
However, if a second 了 is used, it indicates the time frame to the present time:
他买了几十年彩票了. He bought lottery tickets for several decades up to the present time.
That's what I learnt in the grammar class anyway.
Posted on: Finally
June 20, 2009 at 2:32 PM@Jenny,
This is indeed a very useful QW. I looked up 总算 and 终于 in my dictionary and it didn't explain the subtlety in usage. Cpod's the only place (as far as I know) to learn of such usage. Thanks to the team!
Posted on: Delivery Problems
June 20, 2009 at 2:01 PM胡, as well as being a surname, was also once applied to "non-Han peoples in the northwest", so perhaps in this sense it's a little like ancient Greeks calling non-Greeks 'barbarians'
err... reckless barbarians
reckless talk
nonsense talk
:-)
Edit: hi zhenglijiang... i read your post after posting mine. thanks for the reference to where changye explained the origin of 胡 very interesting!
Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Dongbei
June 20, 2009 at 1:16 PMOn top of all these, I believe you are here learning Chinese, but not translation skills.
It's quite insulting to remind us we're learning Chinese and not learning translation skills. Of course we are learning Chinese and why in the world would we be interested in learning translating skills here. The translation is merely the medium to help us learn Chinese. If the translation enhances our learning Chinese and makes us appreciate the culture in China, it is skillful. If provocative and self indulging, it is egoistic. The translation has to bridge the cultural gap between the West and the East. For the people like me who are not living in China now, the manner the sentences are translated is important for not only learning Chinese but also to appreciate the culture. What will we make of the culture in Dongbei if a waitress asking 大哥，点菜吗？is actually saying "Wanna order some food, buddy?" As Howard has pointed out, in the Western world, this sentence is gutter language used by pimps, whores, and gangsters. Surely the culture in Dongbei has been slighted by such gutter language translation.
And of course we can always use the online dictionary to learn the meaning of the words and sentences ourselves and simply ignore the translations. If so, why waste money hiring a translator?
Posted on: Delivery Problems
June 20, 2009 at 2:48 AM哈哈 rj, i was behind reviewing this podcast and didn't get to realize which Liza you were referring to.
Hmm... the phrase 胡说 hu2shuo1 is familiar since I've learnt 胡子 moustache before.
胡 hu2 = moustache, also= reckless. Probably in the olden days, sprouting a moustache is considered a reckless act, or to look reckless.
胡说 hu2shuo1 =moustache talking i.e. speaking nonsense
Great show podcast between Jenny and John this one!
Posted on: Finally
June 22, 2009 at 3:42 AMMike,
The word or the bunch of words after the main verb would be the object. Identify first the main verb in a sentence, the following word(s) would typically be the object. The object could be just one word, or a phrase, or a clause.