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1500 questions
11
votes
6 answers
How do you specify past tense for 是?
For example, 'She was a good teacher' ? Any and all translations I get are '她是好老师'. Is there anyway to indicate past tense explicitly?
athousandcups
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11
votes
3 answers
Which regions use 计算机 for computer?
Where is 计算机 used for "computer", and where does it mean "calculator". In regions where it means "calculator" what is the word for "supercomputer" (assuming that 超级计算机 is not used there)?
jsj
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11
votes
3 answers
Should 屋 and 居 use radical 户 instead of 尸?
户 means home. So these examples are not suprising: 房 fáng (house), 扁 biǎn (flat), 扇 shàn (fan [mostly used indoor]), 扉 fēi (door)
尸 means corpse, and it looks like it refers to tail or something leaving downwards, so these examples are not…
foobar
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11
votes
1 answer
How is the Kanji character 豚 related to the chinese 猪 / 豬
The Chinese character for pig is 猪 / 豬 (zhu1)
In many Japanese restaurants around Hong Kong I've seen this somewhat different character 豚 which appears to also mean pig.
How would you say it in Mandarin, and how did the japanese come to use this…
Matthew Rudy 马泰
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11
votes
5 answers
Learning Traditional first with the goal of learning both
I found this in the Mandarin wikibook:
"It is considered easier for people who learn Traditional to read both sets than people who learn Simplified only, but Simplified characters are less intimidating for beginners. In this wikibook, all examples…
brendyn
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11
votes
1 answer
What is the difference in usage between 以后 and 之后？
Today John Pasden linked to an old Sinosplice post in which he discussed how Chinese grammatical categories cannot be mapped neatly onto those of Indo-European…
Benjameno
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11
votes
2 answers
Why is it possible to replace 都 with 也 in 什么都没有?
I know 也 only as "also", but I see it now and then used in ways difficult to understand, especially in some negative statements. Why is this so? Does 也 also have some meaning not mentioned in dictionaries which is used in these cases?
dr Hannibal Lecter
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11
votes
3 answers
也 和 并 与 及 跟 而 同 difference?
I have read about connectives 也 和 并 与 及 and asked some questions about them but still I'm somewhat not satisfied with my understanding. Let me summarize my knowledge:
1. 与
connects: nouns only (old chinese), similar items of abstract and…
coobit
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11
votes
1 answer
Why does 息 mean news?
Why does 息 mean news?
The chraracter's etymology suggest it means "rest" -
"From nose indicating breath and also phonetic 自 and heart or chest 心. Meaning to rest."
Source:…
coobit
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11
votes
2 answers
What is the difference between 夜(yè) and 晚 (wǎn)?
Both characters mean night, also when they are together, when is it better to use each character ?
For example:
Beautiful night: 美丽的夜 can be rephrased to 美丽的晚 ?
Good night: 晚安 to 夜安 ?
marcanuy
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11
votes
4 answers
Pronunciation of 那个
I'm surprised this question hasn't been asked yet!
The pinyin for 那个 is nà gè, but in conversation, Chinese people often pronounce it more like nee-guh than nah-guh. I asked my teacher and she says this is just an example of spoken language…
Mark E. Haase
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11
votes
8 answers
Is "不會" a correct response to "謝謝"？
I live in Taiwan.There are occasions where I need to thank people, and sometimes they use "不會" to reply my "謝謝". Is this correct and what does "不會" in this occasion mean?
ChaoYang
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11
votes
3 answers
words where it is important to distinguish between the neutral tone and the citation tone
I'm working through the HSK vocab lists, and sometimes I find it hard to remember if a character should be pronounced with the neutral tone or with the citation tone.
It would help if I knew when it's important, and when it isn't; if I knew when…
goPlayerJuggler
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11
votes
2 answers
Are Chinese characters taught in school in Vietnam?
Vietnamese is a language that used to use Chinese characters, but doesn't use them in everyday language nowadays. Are they still taught in school?
Golden Cuy
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11
votes
8 answers
Why do Chinese people always use Chinese subtitles?
This is my question, almost every program, TV Show, movie...
everything has subtitles, one reason could be that there are many different accents in different provinces but I don't really find that convincing, because that happens in every…
aDoN
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