How does 麦 connect 烧麦 (shāomài), a kind of dumpling, with 大麦 (dàmài), 小麦 (xiǎomài), and 燕麦 (yànmài), which are types of grains?

It's nothing to do with 麦 (grains).

From wikipedia,

  烧卖，又称稍麦、烧麦、捎卖、稍美、干蒸、烧梅、肖米、鬼蓬头。

  烧卖及其他与之谐音的名称的来由有多种说法，没有定论。

It's explained a little in the English version.

  The name was given "捎卖", meaning the product was "sold as a sideline", with tea.

  The name was later transformed into modern forms like "烧麦", "稍美" and "烧卖", changing the characters while keeping the original pronunciation.


What are the rules for using commas and periods in Chinese?

I think using Chinese punctuation by following English punctuation rules is acceptable, but native Chinese readers may find it a little bit strange.

It is not necessary to use a period 。 to separate every pair of SVO sentences. When you want to put many related components/sentences together, you can just use commas ，.

When you are going to talk about another topic or another step, use a period to end the current sentence and start a new sentence.

In general, be brave in using commas.

For example:

使用中文标点符号时，简单地说，不要太过拘泥，只要将相关的句子成分放在一起，再用逗号隔开即可；对于无关的成分，采用句号隔开。

Translation: In general, be brave in using Chinese punctuation. If some blocks of a few sentences are related, use commas to connect them together. If some other blocks are not related to the former blocks you are talking about, use a period to separate these two topics.

虽然很多时候要同时表达时间、地点、人物、起因、经过、结果，句子会变得比较长，但是这些成分都是一起的，有联系的，所以仍然可以使用逗号。

Even though sometimes your sentence gets very long because you need to put when, where, who and how altogether, be brave to use commas because these components are, still, connected.

正确地使用逗号可以让句子的意思更加清晰并充满节奏感，正确地使用句号可以让段落更有层次感。

If you use commas correctly, your sentences will become clear and have rhythm. If you use periods correctly, the whole paragraph will be perfect in terms of grammatical structure.


A personal experience, most etymology explanations of characters are not definitive. Explanations can be derived from theoretic work or maybe just personal imagination.

That been said, I searched in google and found:

Figures on how 奴 as written in ancient and modern times. Link from hkbu.edu.hk. Now, please look at the figure below, which is 奴 in its 小篆 form (the character written form standardized when China was first united in Qin Dynasty after 221BC).

As described in the same page, 奴 --> 女 + 又 --> 静坐的女性(Female seating courteously) + 手的象征 (Symbol of hands) --> Female who work with her hands (hope you can get this point from the figure below).

To go further, this explanation links 奴 to one of its main meanings -- 奴婢/奴仆/奴才, which is similar as servant or maid in English.

Here, there is nothing about the 'servitude'. But, of course, one can explain 奴 from another main meaning -- 奴隶\奴役, which means slaves or servitude.

This is really a side-proof that etymology of characters are open to ones' empirical/theoretical research or even imagination.


What is the real original of 微妙在智，触类而长 ，玄通阴了， 巧夺造化

the 四庫全書 (imperial collection of four), 文淵閣 version,  had the book 葬書. the author was marked as "郭璞" of 晉 dynasty.

my mistake here, as another comment indicated, the last fourth character is "功", not "巧".

there are two occurrences of the verse "微妙在智﹒觸類而長", both of them is followed by "玄通陰陽﹒功奪造化".

one of them is the text, another one is remark.

secondly, based on my experience, the verse "玄通陰了" is non-sense, in literary chinese.

btw, the internet archive has a copy of "葬經箋註"

https://archive.org/details/02094303.cn

lastly, imo, any text that's earlier than 1911, you must do the research in traditional chinese.

then, no baidu, use google.


Can someone translate this Chinese calligraphy into English?

Main text:

  一日不讀書口中生荊棘

  Thorns will grow in your mouth if you go one day without reading/studying.

  (하루라도 책을 읽지 않으면 입속에 가시가 돋는다)

The rest:

  庚戌三月 扵旅順獄中 大韓國人 安重根 書

  Third month of 庚戌 (1910), Imprisoned at Port Arthur, (written by) Ahn Jung-Geun, Citizen of the Korean Empire.


Is there more than one way to pronounce "knee" in Chinese?

It is a non-standard pronunciation, but it is reasonably common. It is not in any way associated with the Fuzhou dialect specifically — even some northerners say qigai. Here's an interesting blog post and discussion about the free variation of the pronunciations of knee.


Is spelling with numbers a viable option to remember tones?

For natives, I think the learning path would be:

  Speaking/talking -> Pinyin -> Characters

For example, when we see a word like 你好，we would think about what it's pronounced like and then figure out what tone should apply to them.

I think this could be a good way for non-natives to remember tones for characters as well.

With the way(lao3shi1) OP suggested, you have to remember tones by rote, and it's very easy to forget, and you might not apply those tones well when you speak, because you have to think about the tones all the time while you are speaking.

Hope this could help.


Normally I would express that in Chinese as "今天簡直是太好了"


Do you mind checking my grammar in a presentation about my family?

original:
這是我的家人。
我家有六口人。
有爸爸、媽媽、哥哥、兩個姊姊、弟弟和我。
我爸爸和媽媽都現在退休了。
如今他們喜歡旅行。
我哥哥和兩個姊姊都結婚了。
他們不住在我們的家了。
我弟弟很聰。
他是醫生。
我愛我家人。
suggest:
我爸爸和媽媽都(現在)退休了。 remove 現在
他們(現在)不住在我家。 add 現在
我弟弟很聰(明)。 add 明
我愛我(的)家人。 add 的
pinyin:
這是我的家人。
(Zhè shì wǒ de jiā rén.)
我家有七個人。 有爸爸、媽媽、哥哥、兩個姊姊、弟弟和我。
(Wǒ jiā yǒu qī gè rén. Yǒu bàba, māmā, gēgē, liǎng gè jiě jie, dìdì hé/hàn wǒ.)
我爸爸和媽媽都退休了。 如今他們喜歡旅行。
(Wǒ bàba hé/hàn māmā dōu tuì xiū le. Rú jīn tā men xǐ huān lǚ xíng.)
我哥哥和兩個姊姊都結婚了。 他們現在不住在我家。
(Wǒ gēgē hé/hàn liǎng gè jiě jie dōu jié hūn le. Tā men xiàn zài bù zhù zài wǒ jiā.)
我弟弟很聰明。 他是醫生。
(Wǒ dìdì hěn cōng míng. Tā shì yī shēng.)
我愛我的家人。
(Wǒ ài wǒ de jiā rén.)


Strategies to discourage uptalk in Chinese language learners?

In class, I can see that as a problem. I agree the best approach is the teacher asking them to repeat themselves again and again, particularly while doing reading. I could really feel the pressure so I knew I had to know exactly which tone it was, and then be definitive in what I said. There was a lot of 再說一次.

However, once people are outside of class, I think it will be impossible to get around. In Taiwan, people just wouldn't understand me at all when I said a word like a question because I wasn't sure. And typically if I was definitive, the conversation would continue on normally with full (hopefully) understanding.


You may need words of 2 characters, but I'm sure Chinese can do that. Specifically, what do you want to express? Hot or cold: passion, zeal, enthusiasm, interest, love, desire, hate? Here are some pairs of opposites.

热情 —— 冷静
热心 —— 冷淡
热门 —— 冷漠

Furthermore, you can write:

  他冷冷地对我说了 ...
  我热情地微笑着, ...


In modern Shanghainese and some other of Wu dialects, the adherence to the five tones has basically diminished in speech (still exists when referring to single characters), and converted into three pitches(low, mid, high).
Pitches for the same character, however, do vary through speech. For example, notice how the pitch for character 大's one pronunciation "da" differ from word to word: first the characters, then Shanghainese and corresponding pitch, then meaning, and finally the character's Mandarin Pinyin.

High: 澳大利亚 [O-da-li-ia] {lo-hi-md-md} (Australia) Ao4-da4-li4-ya4
Low: 大世界 [Da-su-ka] {lo-hi-md} (an entertainment venue) Da4-shi4-jie4
Mid: 大饼 [da-ping] {md-hi} （large flatbread) da4－bing3

(I'm not using any established romanization system for Shanghainese, instead I just used my own way for this ad hoc purpose.)
I couldn't find the definition to "pitch accent language," so I can't answer you whether Shanghainese has become one.


poems/phrases/quotes/sayings/idioms/stories/allegories: evil vs. good

to contrast the good & evil, i would suggest the pairs of "君子" vs "小人" & "善" vs "惡".

論語﹒述而

君子坦蕩蕩﹒小人長戚戚

莊子﹒山木

君子之交淡若水﹒小人之交甘若醴

國語﹒周語下

從善如登﹒從惡如崩

公羊傳﹒昭公二十年

君子之善善也長﹒惡惡也短﹒惡惡止其身﹒善善及子孫


What is this de 地 or deyu 地与 doing in ...只有选好了工作地点，才能有选择地与招聘单位联系和洽谈...?

http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/dictionary/characters/33/

  [粵] dei6 | [國] de5

  [suffix] used after an adjective (usually polysyllabic) to form a literary adverbial phrase

Example:

巧妙 (clever) | 巧妙地 (cleverly)
強烈 (strong) | 強烈地 (strongly)
準確 (accurate) | 準確地 (accurately)

有选择(selective) may not be a common adjective, but 有选择地 is still a literary adverbial phrase.

有选择地 与 招聘单位 联系

与(with) is preposition
招聘单位 (hiring department) is the object
有选择地  is  the adverb modifies the verb 联系

One more example:

無條件投降 "unconditional surrender"  is adjective + noun
無條件地投降 "unconditionally surrender" is adverb and verb

Update:

Seems like that dictionary might left something out.

有选择 is not an adjective,  it is a descriptive phrase, functions as an adjective only when it is a part of an adverbial phrase 有选择地.

Example:

Descriptive phrase:

漫不經心 ( not paying attention)
假仁假義 ( fake kindness)
貪得無厭 ( greed with no limit)

Adverbial phrase:

漫不經心地 ( absentmindedly )
假仁假義地 ( pretentiously )
貪得無厭地 ( greedily)


Obviously it's something that the author made up. It doesn't hurt if you use pinyin or any funny sounding word you come up with.


Before simply answering "there is such a font", I would like to seriously suggest you should not differentiate a dot and a slash. The reasons are:

Many Chinese people don't distinguish them when writing, even calligraphers. We care about "fast" and "beautiful".

The standard glyphs among mainland, Taiwan/Hong Kong, Japan and Korea, are usually different, you can't tell which one is the most authoritative.

If anyway you need a computer font to do such analyses, check

標楷體 and 國字標準字體 for traditional Chinese. This font (edukai-3.ttf, title: TW-MOE-Std-Kai) can be downloaded from the website of Ministry Of Education of Taiwan.

微软简楷体 for simplified Chinese. This font (simkai.ttf, title: 楷体. Offered by ZHONGYI Electronic Co., Beijing) is the default Kai font in MS Windows for simplified Chinese. Note that though it is named "simplified Kai", it includes traditional characters.

In the examples of the wiki page 國字標準字體, the first column is "standard" and the second is "conventional" (both should be considered correct):

Some distinction of a dot and a slash is highlighted (維, 內, 集, 遨, 說, 眾). Yes, I should also mention even in Taiwan many scholars criticize this standard, "sometimes it departs from convention too much". And I've never ever seen any native speaker strictly follows such a standard when they are writing.
Other minor differences can be also found, see the comparison (微, 標):

I guess you can figure it out :) So, I'm afraid it's better not to differentiate a dot and a slash in a "character system".


Stamped Chinese characters on a banknote

Read right to left, top to bottom.

富行揀選
樣券

富行 was short for 雲南富滇銀行 (The Yunnan "Fu-Tien" Bank), 揀選 meant "select, pick".
樣券 means "banknote sample".

PS: Welcome to Chinese.SE. However, this kind of question is off-topic. Because

Questions asking for translations are off-topic unless prior research effort is clearly indicated; we're here to help you learn, not provide a bulk translation service.


Think of the phrase "You fool!" or "you idiot" -  depend on the relationship between the two people, the reason behind saying that, and the tone of the speech, it can be a playful, affectionate flirt,  or a contemptuous comment.

笨蛋 is such a word.

Of course it is a degrading term. But 笨蛋 is not a word of hate in general. Only best friends would call each other fool or idiot casually.


聯綿詞

聯綿詞 is a terminology in Chinese phonology. They are still functional 詞(compound words).

  do they convey a poetic or archaic connotation?

Some 聯綿詞 adjective and verb do sound poetic or archaic (e.g 玲瓏, 翩翩, 叮嚀,  拮据).

Some 聯綿詞 adjective and verb had become common day-to-day words (e.g. 荒唐, 嘮叨, 累贅, 凌厲)

Almost all 聯綿詞 noun are common day-to-day words (e.g. 琵琶, 橄欖, 鞦韆, 蝴蝶)


I am working on some tiny SMT project at the moment and I was looking for this too, the only one I could find is this word list from this corpus of mid-20th century Hong Kong Cantonese, It might not be great if you are using them for learning Chinese, as it's mid-20 century's.


From What does "青年文明号" mean?
号 is a common designation word for naming man-made vehicles like ships, planes and trains.
For example:
Ronald Reagan = 罗纳德·里根
USS Ronald Reagan = 罗纳德·里根号 (super-carrier named after Ronald Reagan)

泰坦尼克号 (鐵達尼號 in Cantonese) is so famous, even if you omit '号' at the end, people would still understand you are referring to the ship that sunk in 1912.
You are correct, just 泰坦尼克 (鐵達尼) would be enough for a movies title, that's why you saw it without 号.
However, if a movies is about '里根, the super-carrier', it is better to refer it as 里根号 to avoid confusion. (people would think the story is about 'the person, President Ronald Reagan' without the 号 at the end.)


What Chinese podcasts are available to improve my listening skills?

I don't know what kind of material is your favorite,but you can try to search "有声小说"，there are a lot of audio novels in the results.I recommend a novel with the name"明朝那些事",it is about the history of Ming dynasty, and it's popular in China.


What do Chinese write on a condolence card?

The link user6065 gave is somewhat misleading. Chinese do not have the tradition of writing a condolence CARD. The wiki how page provided seems to be a machine translation of the English wiki how. So it doesn't mean anything if you want to write its counterpart in Chinese. The second link is about 唁电/唁函, which is a very formal letter or message you write personally after someone's death, to express condolence to the family and friends of the dead. It's not very similar to a condolence card in English context. Only if having very important relationship with the dead, and not able to mourn for the dead in person, can you write a 唁电/唁函. It's weird to write one for the death of a pet, or your neighbor you don't know much about.

To write a well-composed 唁电/唁函, one needs to 遣詞雅正 用語沉肅 不枝詞蔓語 賣弄文采 亦不因陋就簡 有失鄭重.

Knowing all these above, let's talk about how to write a 唁电/唁函.

Start with addressing the person or collective you write to:

-No other words needed.

敬爱的陈旭师母：（incorrect）

陈旭师母：（correct）

Main body

-Main body comprises 4 parts:

-Express your deep sorrow at the news

-Exalt the dead for his good qualities and good deeds, from your memories.

-Express gratitude, for how the dead helped you during lifetime. And you will always remember the dead and his spirit.

-Comfort the family/friends, encourage them.

Appropriate closing

-There are many standard opts for this part.

Your signature, time and date


懒 (lazy) is mainly an adjective (less often as a noun)

Example:

懒人 (lazy person)

人懒 (the person is lazy)

  懒惰 (lazy/ laziness) can be an adjective or a noun.

Example:

由于他懒惰，他的花园里充满了杂草 (Due to he being lazy, his garden is full of weeds )

由于他的懒惰，他的花园里充满了杂草 (Due to his laziness, his garden is full of weeds )

  The adjective 懒惰 preceding a noun usually requires the adjectival prefix '的'

Example: 懒惰的人 (lazy person)

  The adjective 懒惰 after a noun doesn't require adjectival prefix '的'

Example:人懒惰 (the person being lazy)


頭大 figuratively means to be distressed/overwhelmed/worried. In English, the equivalent word is the figurative headache.

英語太難了，學得我頭大
English is too difficult; studying it is (too overwhelming) / (giving me a headache)


How do I say "who" as in "I have a few friends who are in that class"?

Use '的' to make the second phrase an adjective phrase for the object noun(朋友).

我有一些朋友 (I have some friends)
参加那个班 (attend that class)
我有一些(参加那个班的)朋友 = I have some friends (who attend that class)

More example:

我那个哥哥 (That older brother of mine)
踢足球 (play football)
我(踢足球的)那个哥哥 = (That older brother of mine who plays football)


Maybe "他讲英语讲得很好。"? And the explanation is that the first 讲 is just left out?

Exactly this.

The grammatical rule here is pretty simple, but sometimes overlooked:
with complements of grade (得 + verbal phrase) the main verb is doubled, in order to keep the strong bound between verb + object and between verb + grade particle, so your example would be actually written:

  他讲英语讲得很好

Then, the first occurrence of the main verb (the one before the object) can be omitted, so you end up with:

  他 (subject)
  讲 (main verb)
  英语 (object)
  讲 (verb doubled)
  得 (grade particle)
  很好 (verbal phrase)


Placeholder name for a Chinese person targeting foreign audience, ie. John Doe equivalent

张三
Is pretty much the Chinese equivalent of John Doe.
There's the well known phrase 张三李四 which means:

any Tom, Dick, or Harry (ABC)

any man in street (Oxford)

张三 is the first part of the phrase and you could totally use it as a name. 李四 like-wise would also work; there are two other names: 王五 and 赵六 that are mentioned in this word: 张三，李四，王五，赵六 which again means:

1 four proverbial names
2 Tom, Dick and Harry (CC-CEDICT)

Any of those four could actually be options to you. With 张三 being the most well known followed by 李四, leaving 王五 and 赵六 as the two least unlikely candidates.

大名
Is another name that might work.
Literally meaning big, name. It is often used as a Chinese name in learning Chinese langauge texts for foreigners.


宗门 is a buddhist term, the more general word is 教派 or 宗派. If your setting is buddhist, as most martial art is, then you should most likely use buddhist concepts.

Otherwise people tend to use 家 to categorize different schools. Sect and faction are more narrow concepts, just as in English, and can have negative connotations.


In soccer commentary, what do Chinese say when a player scores a Goal?

In Cantonese they say "入波!!!!" (Rù bō)

EDIT: In Mandarian they might say "进球啦" (Jìn qiú La)


You can place 给：

before the main verb when it's used as a preposition (usually "to")
after the main verb when it expresses the result of an action

In the first case you are not expressing the result of the action, just the target of the action:

  照片，我给你已经发好了 --- I already sent you the pictures (to you)
  你打算什么时候给你父母介绍你的女朋友 --- When do you plan to introduce your girlfriend to your parents?
  我不知道怎样给我的领导提建议 --- I don't know how to provide suggestions to my boss

In the other case you are expressing a result that stems from the main action, and you can find some implied temporal order in it, sometimes explicitly marked by other particles:

  照片，我已经发给你了 --- I've sent you the pictures (results in you having them)

  申请单必须提交给商务局批准 --- The request form must be submitted to the commerce bureau for approval (results in them having it; which leads to the approval)

I don't think you can find an exhaustive list of the verbs that support either construction. What you can do is to consider whether 给 expresses a target or a consequence/order. For verbs that support both, usage depends on what meaning you want to emphasize. In your examples:

  Preceding: 请 你 把 那些 照片 发给 我 --- (result of sending: I have the pictures)
  Following: 我 给 你 发 了 一 封 邮件 --- (target of sending: you, not someone else)


What does this calligraphy say? who is it by?

The words are "天行健，君子以自强不息。地势坤，君子以厚德载物" from 《周易》。

君子以自强不息 means one(君子) should keep on hard working and self-improvement.

君子以厚德载物 means one should take responsibilities and be open-minded.

This is a motto of man's behavior. "天行健" and “地势坤” are terminologies of 八卦, a kind of divination. The way of man's life is extended from the result of divination.

Although many people do not believe in 八卦, this motto still motivates people to improve their ways of life.


My impression as a learner is that 弄 functions as a unspecified verb.  Basically, we take a sentence and replace a specific verb (or multiple verbs) by the unspecific 弄.

弄 is typically used within a result complement such as 弄到, 弄坏, 弄丢, 弄清楚, and so on.  I'll focus on this common usage.  In this way 弄 offers a short-cut to the result without specifying the verb which caused it.  (It's also used in 弄得怎么样 and 怎么弄.)

In English, an unspecified verb would normally be phrased "to do", which is sometimes an appropriate translation.  We'd use it in English in the phrase "get my hair done" in place of "get my hair cut", "get my hair dyed", etc.

Why do this?  This is probably an incomplete list but here's some reasons...

1. Ignorance of which verb is correct

Let's start with this example:

  客人打坏电视机[src]
  The guest broke [by bashing] the TV

In Chinese, the verb is 打 = "hit" and the result is 坏 = "break".

Now suppose we didn't know how the guest broke the TV, only that they broke the TV.  Maybe they spilled a drink on the TV.  Maybe they installed some software on it that broke it.  Since we don't know what verb to use, we might use the unspecific 弄:

  version 1: 客人弄坏了电视机
  version 2: 客人把电视机弄坏了[src]
  The guest broke [in some unknown way] the TV

Note: It's common to use 把 in conjunction with 弄 as above (see: Using "ba" sentences).

Other examples:

  男子弄丢共享单车被索赔2.55万[src]
  Boy lost [in some unknown way] a public bike; asked for 25,500 yuan in compensation

  小孩不慎弄瞎他人眼睛[src]
  Kid inattentively blinded [in some unknown way] another person's eyes

2. Multiple ways of doing something

This is similar to how "done" is used in "get your hair done" in English.  If you go to a hairdresser, they don't immediately know what verb is appropriate for your hair.  Maybe "dye" or "cut" or some other verb applies.  Maybe multiple verbs are needed (e.g. the customer wants their hair both cut and dyed).  For example:

  怎么弄头发好看又简单图片[src]
  How to do hair, both good looking and simple: photos

  破案了!韦世豪为何要弄这样的新发型?[src]
  Solved! Why Wei Shihao wants to do this kind of new hairstyle.

Other examples are:

  怎么才能弄清楚自己想要什么?[src]
  How to be able to make clear [in some way] what you want?

  离职时,一定要弄明白这四点,不然只会越跳槽越糟糕[src]
  When leaving office, [you] must understand [in some way] these four points, or else it will result in more job-hopping and more bad luck

We "make something clear" or "understand" = "make something understood (to yourself)", but there's not a singly way of achieving this.

3. To encompass all possibly ways of doing something

Let's start here:

  别把衣服洗坏了
  Don't damage your clothes by washing them.

  别把衣服穿坏了
  Don't damage your clothes by wearing them out.

  别把衣服剪坏了
  Don't damage your clothes by cutting them.

We can say all of these (and more) at once using:

  别把衣服弄坏了
  Don't damage [in any way] your clothes.

Other examples:

  在这个球馆打我的最后一场比赛，你们别把我弄哭，因为我现在很高兴。[src]
  In this stadium, I played my last match, don't make me cry [in any way], because I am now happy

4. To withhold this information

  沙溢把郭敬明弄哭了！[src]
  Sha Yi made [in some unspecified way] Guo Jingmeng cry

You need to read the article to understand how Sha Yi made Guo Jingmeng cry.

  你已经弄乱我的心，什么时候弄乱我的床[src]
  You've already messed up [in some unspecified way] my heart, when will you mess up [in some unspecified way] my bed?

Cheeky!

So let's try it on the given examples:

  Don't make the child cry.
  别把孩子弄哭了

I found this used here.

  Loosen the belt.
  把腰带弄宽松一些

The closest I found online is:

  新买的t恤袖子有点紧怎么弄宽松一点[src]
  Newly-bought T-shirt sleeves are a little tight, how to loosen them?

  There is one more problem that has yet to be clarified.
  还有一个问题没有弄清楚

I found this used here.


saying nice to finally meet you in cantonese

聞名不如見面 is a comment. It means "better to see it in person than belief hearsay".
Example:

"I have heard a lot about Paris, now I am here, it really is 聞名不如見面" (implies the actual place is not what you expected, maybe better, maybe worse, maybe totally different)

If you use this comment as a greeting, you should also state what good thing about that person you've just found out upon meeting him
A polite way to say 'nice to finally meet you' in Chinese is '久仰'
Example:

「陳老師， (初次見面)，久仰，久仰！」- "Master Chen, (first time we meet,) I have always admired you!"

You can skip 初次見面 because 久仰 already indicated you have only been hearing about him but had not met him before
久仰大名 (long time admiring your fame) is a polite way to say "hearing a lot about you for a long time"
幸會 (it is a fortunate meet) is also a polite way to say the same thing, but not as humble as 久仰
Example:

「陳老師，(初次見面)，幸會，幸會！」

Another polite way to say "nice to finally meet you" in Cantonese is to  "「好榮幸，終於同你見面！」 (It is an honor to finally meet with you)
If you don't want to be too formal, you can say:「真係好高興，終於同你見面！」(glad to finally meet you)


The short answer: because Sun Yat-sen proclaimed it so. In a 1916 speech given in Shanghai, he asks the question:

  何以不曰「中華共和國」，而必曰「中華民國」？

  Why instead of 中華共和國, must one say 中華民國?

The reasons he gives boil down to drawing a distinction centred on the 民: saying that this is the fundamental difference between Qing dynasty feudalism and the Ancient Greek republic (and by extension, modern China).

Although 共和 carries the idea of the res publica of Latin, he acknowledges this, and proceeds to give 民 greater importance.

As of early 2019, the only states to officially use 民國 are the Republic of China and the Republic of Korea.


Which one is correct, "有名" or "受欢迎" for translating "comics are so popular in Japan"?

Here it should be "受欢迎".

"有名" means famous, well-known.


What's the exact realization of Chinese glides (in medial position)?

The distinction between [pʲu] пю and [pju] пью for a Russian speaker may be very salient, but for the majority of Mandarin learners of Russian, it is a very difficult one to pick up.
That is because the equivalent phonetic difference is not phonemic in Mandarin, and it does not matter much for comprehensible Mandarin. It is thus unsurprising that the glide is more audible in slow Mandarin than faster-paced Mandarin.
Nonetheless, acoustic analysis from several sources as well as psycholinguistic tests e.g. involving rhyming and game languages seem to all agree that in Modern Standard Mandarin, the glide is part of the onset.
Note that diachronically, the glides of Middle Chinese were firmly in the final, not the onset, and this is still the case for many other varieties in Chinese, e.g. in Taiwanese Hokkien.


鼓 = (beat) Drum
吹 = blow (trumpet)

"Beating the drum and blowing the trumpet around the person"

Similar terms: 前后部鼓吹，两部鼓吹


Most appropriate word for proxy/substitute/surrogate

proxy: 'the authority to represent someone else, especially in voting' is "代理" or "代理人" in Chinese

surrogate: 'a substitute, especially a person deputizing for another in a specific role or office' is also "代理" or "代理人" in Chinese

The baseball term "代打" (substitute batter) also obtained the meaning of 'substitute' (for any role)

  For the sake of clarity, let's say you wanted to kill someone, but wanted someone else to do it for you.

借刀殺人 is a common idiom for "arrange someone to kill for you". It literally means "borrow knife to kill" and the "borrowed knife" is someone other than yourself. He can be your willing agent, or an unwitting pawn

假手於人 is a common idiom for "make someone else to do your job"


Difference between "蝈蝈", "蟋蟀" and "蛐蛐" (Also: 纺织娘)?

according to wikipedia(and my understanding as a native speaker):
蝈蝈,纺织娘 should be two sub species belong to the family: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tettigoniidae

蛐蛐,蟋蟀 is the same thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cricket_(insect)


What is the difference between 究竟 and 到底 ？

1) "究竟" is more formal than "到底". In everyday spoken Chinese, "究竟" is rarely used. It is used almost only in drama and written Chinese.

2) Well, I would say that the magnitude of "究竟" is equal to that of "到底". They are all equivalent to "on the earth".


What is the meaning of 忽爾間 in the song "說散就散"?

I think it is more common to say 忽然间 than 忽尔间，but it is a song!

忽然间他看见了我,就往回走, 伸出手来.
Suddenly he saw me, and walked towards me, holding out his hand.

因為成長, 我們忽爾間說散就散
Because (we had) grown, changed, we suddenly said break up then broke up.

There is also 忽而 。。。 忽而，but that is a different kettle of fish!


To be good at something. Is 很會 appropriate?

"很會" emerged in modern time, used in vernacular chinese. imo, it's ok in most usages, just plain dull :(
well, to enrich your vocabulary, here're some alternatives:
閑熟

况及今刷選得人﹒猶須按舊制演習禮儀﹒非數月不能閑熟﹒比及閑熟﹒两宫已告成矣
我何人斯又能閑熟六藝﹒以求全儒林之宗旨哉

閑熟六藝 is roughly "skilled at six arts"
精, 究

有究韜略精武藝者

究韜略 is roughly "good at strategy"
精武藝 is roughly "skilled in martial arts"
善

丞相達之妹善畫﹒巧妙無雙

roughly "the sister of prime minister was good at drawing"
have fun :)


The definite article has no equivalence in Chinese. Its functions, however, can be found in Chinese.

Something previously mentioned or known

Compare:

He is a murderer. 他是个杀人犯。(杀人犯 is a murderer, a man that has commited murder. 个 is like the indefinite article.)

He is the murderer.

By using nouns inherently specific.

他就是凶手。(凶手 is the murderer , it cannot be used without context.
他是个凶手(incorrect))

By using demonstratives: 这/那/这些/那些/此/彼

他就是这个杀人犯。

Something unique or identified by the speaker, terminologies.

I cannot pronounce the four tones well.

我发不好四声。(平上去入(tradition)/阴阳上去(modern mandarin), as a whole isn't referred as 四个声调)

Particularly, these sets of similar things are usually referred without measure words.

四书/十三经/六艺/五行/四君子/十八罗汉/一百零八星宿......

Unique things, such as the sun, the moon... are referred exactly its name (Actually the definite article is unnecessary semantically)

As for "I want to go to a/the park", it's not hard to appreciate that 我想去公园。 already fully conveys the two possible interpretation, depending on the listener.


According to An article on Chinese Government Official Website

The differences of word usage may be explained like:

  “机车”在大陆一般指“用来牵引列车车厢的动力车，即火车头”，在台湾则指摩托车

To translate in English, "机车" in Mandarin means locomotive, while "机车" in Taiwan means motorcycle.

one can buy a paper-based dictionary at amazon dot cn.

I am not sure I can post urls to a commercial site, so please perform a search by yourself on amazon dot cn with keyword: 两岸常用词典. The search had returned at least 3 results for me on 2012/09/26.

And according to the article:

  据悉，《两岸常用词典》网络版已于２月在两岸共建的“中华语文知识库”网站上开通

one can also access Taiwan-version dictionary online or Mandarin-version dictionary online
now. :)

If you try to look for "硬碟(Taiwan Usage)", it will also show you "硬盘/硬磁盘(Mandarin Usage)".

Please try it for yourself!


What is the difference between 因为 and 应为?

"应为" does not mean "because". If it is used as because, then it is an error, maybe a typo.

"应为" used together, it is usually two separate words, and can mean "should(应) be(为)".


What is the difference in usage between 似乎 and 宛如?

似乎(as if; seem like) is more modern and colloquial, 宛如(just like; as if) is very classical and literary

似乎 mainly refer to metaphorical resemblance, 宛如 mainly refers to physical resemblance

Example:

似乎要打仗了 (seem like we will go to war)

似乎忘了自己是誰 (seem like/ as if forgotten who he is)

五座山峰一列排開，宛如五指，故名五指山 (the five mountain peaks stand side by side, just like five fingers in human hand, hence the name 'Five Fingers Mountains'

看他面目猙獰，宛如惡鬼猛獸 (look at his ferocious face, just like a demon or a beast)

The modern/colloquial equivalent of '宛如' is '就像'


卻 in this context means 'however' or 'but', serves to connect the two phrases.

光照在黑暗裡 (The light shines in the dark)，黑暗不接受光 (the dark does not receive the light.)

光照在黑暗裡，黑暗[卻]不接受光 (The light shines in the darkness, [however], the darkness does not receive the light)


Is 涼台 not used anymore and does it differ from 陽台？

Both 陽台 and 涼台 can be translated as 'veranda, balcony and deck'

I suppose 陽台 refers to a deck you can sit on to enjoy sunshine, and 涼台 is a deck you sit on for cooling down. Which means the location of this deck determines how you call it.

陽台 should locate in an area that is open and have access to plenty of sunshine. While 涼台 should locate in an area with shade. surrounded by tree, or near water.

陽台 is a more common term because most people live in cities don't have a backyard to build a deck for cooling, but most apartment buildings do have balconies.


就 in 你现在就去做 functions as the adverb "just".

你现在去做 = you go do it now

你现在(就)去做 = you (just) go do it now

  Example of 就 = at once; right away:

吃完飯去 = go after finish dinner

吃完飯(就)去 = go (right away) after finish dinner

吃完飯 is the requirement. Once this requirement is met, then 去 occur at once

完成工作付工資 = when you finished work, I will pay your service fee

完成工作(就)付工資 = when you finished work, I will pay your service fee (right away)

完成工作 is the requirement . Once this requirement is met, then 付工資 occur at once

Since 你现在就去做 doesn't include a requirement, 就 doesn't carry the meaning of 'at once; right away'

If it was 你等到明天就去做 (you go do it at once when tomorrow comes); 等到明天(wait till tomorrow arrives) would be the requirement.


Establishing the difference between 综合, 结合 and 组合

综合 can be adjective or verb

结合 is a verb

组合 can be verb or noun,

It is hard to compare the three when they are different types, therefore, we only look at them as verbs here.

综合 (+ objects) = to collect objects from different areas or categories into one unit. E.g. 综合各人的意見 = Sum up everyone's opinion
结合 (+ objects) = to combine/ merge individual objects into one unit. E.g. 结合两人的力量 = Combine the two people's power
组合 (+ objects) = to assemble parts into one unit. E.g. 棺材是用四塊半木版组合而成的，所以棺材又俗稱 '四塊半' = Coffin is assembled with four and a half wooden plates, so coffin is also commonly called 'four and a half'


How many different dialect known to exist in the Chinese language and what are they?

There are 7 kinds of dialects mainly: 官话(Mandarin-Similar Dialect)、吴方言(Wu[South Jiangsu, North Zhejiang and a part of Anhui]Dialect、赣方言(Jiangxi Dialect)、湘方言(Hunan Dialect)、闽方言(Fujian Dialect/Hokkien)、粤方言(Guangdong Dialect/Cantonese)、客家方言(Ke Dialect). Here is a easy picture for you:

But they cannot describe all the dialects. For example, Mandarin-Similar Dialect includes 东北话(Northeastern Dialect), 陕西话(Shaanxi Dialect), 云南话(Yunnan Dialect). They are quite different in Chinese people's opinion. So these 7 kinds have many smaller kinds of dialects, such as 吴方言, has 6 dialects, including 太湖(Lake Tai)/台州(Taizhou)/金衢(Jinhua-Quzhou)/上丽(Shanghai-Lishui)/瓯江(Oujiang)/宣州(Xuanzhou) 片. So, in fact nobody can confirm the exact number of Chinese dialects.
There were no Mandarin Chinese speaker several hundred years ago in some areas, even now, some people in Tibet cannot speak Mandarin well. So there's no dialect in Tibet, Xinjiang and Qinghai.


Mandarin has relatively few distinct sounds (about 1300) and each character corresponds to one of those sounds.  The language has tended toward more disyllabic words to reduce ambiguity.  Often these words consist of two characters whose meanings are both close to the meaning of the whole.


What kind of words can be followed by the character 感？

For illustration purpose, I compiled a list of words ending by 感 fetched from moedict.
Here is a words-list with English explanation.
傷感: sad, emotional, sentimental, pathos
動感: sense of movement (often in a static work of art), dynamic, vivid, lifelike
反感: to be disgusted with, to dislike, bad reaction, antipathy
口感: taste, texture (of food), how food feels in the mouth
同感: (have the) same feeling, similar impression, common feeling
善感: sensitive, emotional
喜感: comicality, comical, (Buddhism) joy
多愁善感: melancholy and moody (idiom); depressed personality
好感: good opinion, favorable impression
安全感: sense of security
幽默感: sense of humor
快感: pleasure, thrill, delight, joy, pleasurable sensation, a high
性冷感: frigidity (lack of libido)
性感: sex appeal, eroticism, sexuality, sexy
情感: feeling, emotion, to move (emotionally)
惡感: malice, ill will
感: to feel, to move, to touch, to affect, feeling, emotion, (suffix) sense of
手感: the feel (of sth touched with the hand), (textiles) handle
敏感: sensitive, susceptible
無力感: feeling of powerlessness, sense of helplessness
痛感: to feel deeply, acute suffering
第六感: sixth sense (i.e. intuition, premonition, telepathy etc)
罪惡感: feeling of guilt
美感: sense of beauty, aesthetic perception
肉感: sexiness, sexy, sensuality, sensual, voluptuous
臨場感: the feeling of actually being there
觀感: one's impressions, observations
語感: a feel for language, instinctive understanding
讀後感: impression of a book, opinion expressed in a book review
責任感: sense of responsibility
質感: realism (in art), sense of reality, texture, tactile quality
遙感: remote sensing
雜感: random thoughts (a literary genre)
靈感: inspiration, insight, a burst of creativity in scientific or artistic endeavor
預感: to have a premonition, premonition
骨感: bony, skinny

The following words-list with Chinese definition is rather complete compared to the previous one (it contains words having no English translation).
交感：互相感應。
交感：性交。《初刻拍案驚奇．卷一七》：「此後恍恍惚惚，合眼就夢見吳氏來與他交感。」《二刻拍案驚奇．卷三○》：「遂欣然留與同宿，交感之際，一如人道。」也作「交會」。
今昔之感：從眼前的現狀回憶過去的情境。多表示對世事的感慨。
使命感：對某種重大責任，有應該擔負的自覺。
偶感：突然的感發。
傷感：有所感觸而悲傷。
優越感：心理上自覺超過他人。
動感：形容人活潑熱烈、魅力十足。
反感：反對或不滿的情緒。
口感：享用食物時的感覺。
可感：令人感動。
可感：感動。
同感：相同的感受或感想。
善感：容易引發感觸。
喜感：人在舉手投足之間，深具喜劇效果。
壓迫感：個人因外在因素的影響，產生的一種緊繃、不舒暢、侷促等的心理感受。
外感：受外來刺激而起的感動。
外感：中醫上指風寒暑溼自外侵入的病。
多愁善感：形容人感情脆弱，易憂愁傷感。
好感：對人對事有滿意或喜歡的感覺。
安全感：安全無虞的感覺。
幽默感：善於運用機智的言語或手法應對問題的能力。
律動感：有節奏變化的感覺。
快感：愉快或舒服的感覺。
性冷感：女子缺乏性慾的反常現象。
性冷感：性交時女子毫無樂趣的身心反應狀態。
性感：富有性的誘惑力。
悲傷感：文學、美術作品或臺上表演所描述的狀況，在讀者或觀眾心理上產生的憐憫、同情和悲傷。
悲感：心情悲傷。
情感：內心有所觸發，而產生喜、怒、哀、樂等的心理反應。
惡感：不好的感覺。
感：震撼。
感：接觸、引起。
感：覺得。
感：互相影響、應和。
感：傷嘆。
感：對別人所給的好處表示謝意。
感：受到外來刺激所引起的情緒反應。
感：某種自我認知的看法或想法。
慚感：感激。
應感：文藝創作過程中因外物而產生靈感的現象。
應感：特指天人感應。
應物斯感：因應外在的事物而有所感悟。
懷感：懷念感恩。
懷感：唐代一位高僧的法號。專修淨土法門，通釋關於往生淨土的疑難。對唐代淨土宗的發展，貢獻很大。著有《釋淨土群疑論》七卷。
成就感：付出努力後獲得成果的滿足感。
手感：用手觸摸時的感覺。
敏感：一種神經上的病態，對外界情況容易引起迅速而強烈的反應。
敏感：泛指心理、生理上超乎尋常程度的感受與反應。
敏感：尖銳的、容易引起是非的。
機感：佛教用語。早期的佛教徒認為眾生有善根之機，能感知佛意。
正義感：好善嫉惡，有維護正義、主持公理的心思與熱情。
民族優越感：以自己的民族為最優秀，將其他民族視為較低劣的心態。
無力感：心裡的願望，因受阻礙或能力才幹不能全然發揮，所產生的挫折感。
疏離感：因社會變遷與都市工業化的影響，使人在面對生活環境時，失去其原有的和諧與親密關係，終而形成現代人面對其生活周遭環境時，自覺無意義感、無能為力感、社會孤立感、自我分離感等複雜心態，稱為「疏離感」。
病識感：精神病患對自己所罹患的病症有自我察覺的意識。
痛感：深刻的感覺到。
百感：各種感想。比喻感受很多。
空間感：影片創作者根據透視原理，運用各種手法，如照明、光學、物體的不同顏色等，造成光影明暗、色彩的差別和對比，使其在平面的銀幕上獲得立體、縱深的感覺。
立體感：具有深度、方向的逼真感覺。
第六感：眼、耳、鼻、舌、身等五身器官感覺以外的特殊敏感，是一種直覺或靈感，具神祕色彩。
罪惡感：個人在實際行為上或想像中，因有違家庭、宗教或社會規範，引發內在良心譴責而感到愧疚難安的一種主觀意識經驗。
美感：對美的感覺與體認。
肉感：肉體所引發的刺激或感覺。
臨場感：如同在現場的感覺。
臨感：臨別的愁緒。
自卑感：個人對自己所具備的條件、言行等感到不滿的心理感受。通常由幼年時期逐漸形成，為人類的普遍現象。
自感：自己感覺。
自感：電路上的電流隨時間變化，而在本身產生感應電壓的現象。
至感：極其感激，常為書信用語。
至感：至誠的感通。
觀感：觀察人或事物後所得感想。
語感：對於語言文字之心理上的反應。如對「田園」一語，詩人所感在其閒適的情趣，而園藝家所感則在其實際的效用。
讀後感：看完文章或書本內容後的內心感受。
責任感：擔負責任的心理認識。
質感：對物品質地的感覺，如粗糙、細滑、柔軟、堅硬等。
遙感：近年新開發的探測技術，對遠距離的事物進行偵測或產生感應。參見「遙感探測」條。
量感：繪畫與雕塑製作中，使人在視覺上有輕重、厚薄、多少等感覺。如泥土的沉穩感、棉花的輕柔感等。
銘感：感激不忘。
雜感：即興而成的片段感想。
雜感：零星細碎，沒有條理、沒有組織的感想。
靈感：靈驗有感應。
靈感：思考活動中，忽然出現且超越平時思考層面的想法。
音感：對音色、音高等音樂現象的辨識能力。
預感：預料事情要發生的感覺。如：「我有不祥的預感，他可能會出事。」也作「豫感」。
風樹之感：比喻父母亡故，兒女不得奉養的悲傷。參見「風木含悲」條。
骨感：形容極為消瘦。

For those who are interested in the way to generate these lists, here is the bash script.
English words-list:
curl 'https://raw.githubusercontent.com/g0v/moedict-data/master/dict-revised.json' | jq '.[] | select(.title | match("^.*感$")) | {title: .title, def: .heteronyms | .[0].definitions | .[0].def} | .title ' > results.txt

cat results.txt |
while read -r a ; do
    curl "https://www.moedict.tw/a/$(echo $a | tr -d '\"').json" |
    jq '.translation.English as $en | {title: .t, en: $en | join(", ")} | [.title, .en] | join(": ")' | tr -d '`~\"' >> results-en.txt
done

Chinese words-list:
curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/g0v/moedict-data/master/dict-revised.json | jq '.[] | select(.title | match("^.*感$")) | {title: .title, def: .heteronyms | .[0].definitions | .[].def} | [.title, .def] | join("：")' | tr -d "\"" > results-zh.txt


First and foremost, I think it's very dangerous to try to approximate Mandarin sounds with parts of English words, partly because we all pronounce English slightly differently, and partly because some sounds just don't exist in English. There is no "ü" [y] in English, so trying to use English here will just trap students and never really allow them to learn the sound. It also makes answering your question impossible, because no matter which English words you choose, none of them will contain [y].

In order to straighten out pronunciation in the case of "j/q/x + u", we need to first look at basic spelling rules in Pinyin. There are two distinct vowel sounds in Mandarin, spelt "u" and "ü". They are very different, although they look similar, and are mispronounced by a large number of English native speakers. The first is a close back rounded vowel, the second is close front rounded vowel. Don't think of "ü" as being anywhere close to "u" because it isn't; these are two very different sounds in Mandarin.

The problem (for learners) is that the dots are only written when there is ambiguity, which is only the case for "lü" and "nü", because "lu" and "nu" also exist in Mandarin. In all other cases, the dots are left out, and we just write "u". This happens for all syllables starting with j/q/x, so "ju" is really "jü", "quan" is really "qüan" and "xue" is really "xüe". There are no "lün", "zhün" or "chüan" and any such pronunciation is definitely not standard.

So, to answer your question, the "u" after j/q/x (and in "yu", "yun) should be "ü" and is pronounced completely differently than a normal "u". In IPA, this sound is written [y] or perhaps more accurately as [ɥ] in glides.

The other sound, Pinyin "u" (the one that never had any dots to start with), is written in many different ways in IPA depending whom you're asking, but [u] and [ʊ] are the most common.

These two sounds never overlap (except after "n" and "l" as mentioned above), they are in what's called complementary distribution. This means that deviating pronunciation is less problematic than it might seem at first, because if you get these finals right (i.e. the following vowel sounds), you can get away with other pronunciation oddities, such as mixing zh/ch/sh with j/q/x (which is common), since the former can only be followed by "u" and the latter only by "ü", listeners will still know what you're trying to say even if you pronounce e.g. "zh" and "j" the same way.

While I'm at it, I should also mention that all "un" that aren't preceded by j/q/x are actually "uen", which makes the pronunciation even more distinct from "jun/qun/xun" (which is just [yn]). How pronounced that "e" is depends on the syllable, the tone and the speaker. It seems to be most prominent for third tones where it's very easy to hear and least prominent in fourth tones.

Regarding different dialects or regional accents, I'm afraid someone else will have to step in. What I have written above is the standard, but there might be places where people don't pronounce things like that. However, I've lived in Taiwan for many years and have spoken with lots of people from Beijing, and I have not observed the north/south difference you mention. Take this as a personal observation; I haven't done much research into locally accented Mandarin (except the Taiwanese variety, which isn't relevant here).


Gender and age neutral word for partner (not married) in Mandarin?

恋人 perfectly fits your need, its gender and age neutral, and can be used in formal settings.

情人 somehow fits your need, but is not as good, because it could also mean an extramarital lover, which may cause misunderstanding.

爱人 is also gender neutral, but usually refers to partner in marriage.


Empathy and Sympathy use same characters in Chinese 同情?

From Wiki

  Empathy is the capacity to understand or feel what another person is experiencing from within their frame of reference, that is, the capacity to place oneself in another's position.

~

  Sympathy is the perception, understanding, and reaction to the distress or need of another life form. This empathic concern is driven by a switch in viewpoint, from a personal perspective to the perspective of another group or individual who is in need

Base on the definitions, translate 'sympathy' to 同情 is correct, but the meaning of 'empathy' should be 體諒

"同情" means "pity" or "sympathy"

"體諒" means "considerate/ understanding" , notice the components of "體諒" are 體(experience) + 諒(understand)-- To 體諒 means "you put yourself in another's position and understand how the other feels"

"體諒" is not the same as "同情"

"同情" someone, means you are pitying, feeling sorry for that someone
When you say you have empathy (體諒) for someone, it doesn't necessary mean you feel sorry for that someone.

For example:

我能[體諒]美國一部分白人要保自己的特權階級地位而投川普的票，但我並[不同情]他們

I can [have empathy] for those white Americans who wanted to protect their privileged class status and voted for Trump, but I [have no sympathy] for them.

Of course if you have empathy for someone, you are much more likely to have sympathy toward that someone as well


It is very vague, but looks like 满洲里 to  me:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manzhouli


The full sentence goes like this:"去到长安，东北转角，逢着天门，便有下落", comes from Zhuge Shenshu Verse No.355. If you feel it doesn't make sense, then you get the point. This book was used to do Fortune-telling, so it meant to confuse the readers, so the  Fortune-tellers can pick up from here, use their knowledge (verbal tricks) to explain your destiny.
A word to word translation: "Go to Chang An (The Capital City), north east corner, Meet Tianmen (Can be explained into a certain place or a certain time), then you find it."


I am Chinese and I don't think 青色 is the same as 绿色 or 蓝色. For me, 青色 is more of a kind of blue. Personally, blue and 蓝色 also cover different shades of blue color.

This is a very common proverb:

  青,出于蓝,而胜于蓝

literally it means 青色 and comes from blue, but better than blue. Or more straightforward, 青色 is extracted from the blue plant(indigo), but is bluer than the plant. The next part is "冰，水为之，而寒于水"(ice comes from water but is colder than water). This proverb is often used to describe how students can achieve more than their teachers, or the younger ones can eventually do better. I think that is why 青 occurs in words other than color, like 青春，青涩，青年, to describe a young, inexperienced stage just like the green used in "green hand".

There is a common color name in Chinese, 靛青，which is a kind of dark blue.

check the wikipedia link about the color.
青色 is the colors like Lapis lazuli, Salvia blue, Wedgwood blue or Slate blue. The screenshot below from wiki describes the difference between 青色 and 蓝色.

For other use of "青" besides color and the implicit meaning of young， I don't know.


"He's the guy who just employed a person who doesn't even know how to work."

we translate to 他就是雇用了那個連工作都不知道如何做的人的人(傢伙)。

the girlfriend of the guy from the shop whose dad was a plumber.

we translate to 店裡那傢伙的女友的爸爸是水管工

How many 的 am I allowed to put in ?
You can put whatever you want but the sentence need to to reasonable.

What are the 的 I can remove ? ()means can omit

他(的)哥哥的新(的)手機的價錢是多少?

How come I never see this sort of thing in Chinese ?
This sort of thing is lengthy.we say 他哥新手機的價錢是多少? is same as previous answer.

Do you have any advice to cope with this sort of grammatical conundrum in the future ?
It is not a big problem for you to communicate with other because people like simple.


Distinguish between 眼睛 (Yǎnjīng) eyes and 眼镜(Yǎnjìng) glasses

In different city or province people have very different pronunciations, we call it "方言"(dialect),so I don't know the situation in other cities, I'm a beijinger,I can tell how beijingers distinguish these  two words.眼睛 the last word 睛 will be light reading, but 眼镜 the last word 镜 will be normal reading, otherwise,beijingers used to add a "er" pronunce in some specific words ,such as眼镜er,but 眼睛 has no 'er' pronunce.


Differentiating the words 阿姨 親阿姨 and 姨 correctly

You mandarin teacher just too ignorant to tell about different region Chinese language usage custom, and fail on learning the importance of presenting language in explicitly ways. Perhaps I will say , "for the sake of correcting to correct".

You can write it, but please don't use "我姨" in speaking, unless you are comfortable to the regions custom that use that(perhaps Beijing?).

Mandarin depends heavily in vocal rhythm changes, many verbs shared the same vocal rhythm. It is bad in vocal saying "我姨", because the vocal "姨" shared with different meaning vocals(like 已，咦， 宜, 疑,etc）

So Chinese already invented the sharp vocal "Ar" as people calling reference, thus when you speak  "我阿姨”， all Chinese in different region will understand you. You will get a blank face when you say "我姨", even native mandarin speaker will have trouble fetch the meaning.

Now, back to "我親阿姨", it is quite redundant in Chinese speaking custom. Normally, just say/write "我阿姨" is enough. Chinese always treat 阿姨 as close relative.

When come to 阿姨, Chinese only explicitly define ladies who is NOT your relative, for example, the housekeeper 管家阿姨, the lady stay at the floor below you 楼下的阿姨。


Do '不很 + adj' and '很不 + adj' have the same meaning?

很不 reinforces the (negated) adjective. 不很 indicates that the subject is "not really" as the adjectives says.

很不聪明 - very unintelligent.
不很聪明 - not too intelligent, not really intelligent.


Use:

我也是很高興認識你。
請多多指教。(I'm not really sure how to translate this phrase.)
能夠認識到你是我的榮幸。 (It's my honour / It's my pleasure to meet you here.) / (I'm delighted to meet you here.)

There's a lot of response for this. Just comment below if you have further problem.


"吹" roughly means "blow" here, as in "the wind blows". However, as the subject in this sentence is "She", not the cold wind ('冷风'), "吹" can be translated into "to be blown" in a more accurate sense. Similarly, "吹风" can mean either "to blow air" ("disclose information" in extension), or "to be blown by wind", depending on the context.
My translation of "她在冷风中吹了好一会儿” would be "She was exposed in the cold wind for quite a while."


Is there a generic way to say "weekday" without the concept of "work/business/school day"?

In fact we usually say 平日 as weekday, but more frequent we just say 周一到周五. Maybe it is because we just distinguish weekend is 周末,and every weekday is regarded as a normal day.

During the holiday, children usually have no sense of days(LOL,at least me), so they just know today is 周几,like 周一 or 周五.

I'm new here, hope my answer can help you.


Brief Answer

Q1. The Wiktionary list of characters with the 冫 radical contains the following two characters: 冬, 冭. Where in these characters is the 冫? Are the two lines at the bottom supposed to be the ice radical?

Answer: You're right. That's true.

Q2. When I look at the entry for 永 in the Chinese dictionary app on my phone (Pleco), then it says that it's radical is 水 and that it has 冫 as a component. This makes no sense to me. If 水 was the radical, shouldn't it be written as 氵? And where is the 冫? I see that 永 differs from 水 by two lines at the top, but is this really supposed to be the ice "radical" 冫?

Answer: The radical of 永 is 水, but it doesn't have the radical 冫. The top of 永 has nothing to do with 冫.

Q3. In the Wiktionary entry for 冫 , it says that 冫 is a radical that has been simplified from 氷. What character is 氷? It doesn't seem to be a Chinese character. Is this some ancient form of 冰?

Answer: 氷 was the vulgar form of 冰 in ancient China. It's obsolete in China but adopted in Japan nowadays. As @AngelLeliel has pointed out,  冫 is not a radical simplified from 氷, but 仌.

Detailed Answer
This is a very good question, yet, as a native speaker I understand some of the "truth" are controversial. Anyway the facts will be listed here, but you don't have to agree with my subjective opinion :)

Fact 1. 次, 习 have the "ice radical"? No, it's not fine with experts in mainland China or people who use traditional Chinese.

In 现代汉语词典 (Modern Chinese Dictionary, which is considered as one of the most popular authoritative dictionary in mainland China), 次 is indexed under the radical 冫 and the radical 欠. However in 中華民國教育部重編國語辭典修訂本 (Chinese Dictionary Revised Edition, the authoritative one in Taiwan), it is indexed only under 欠.
The reason for Chinese Dictionary Revised Edition not listing 次 under radical 冫 is 次 has nothing to do with 冰. The ancient character forms of 次 are
from Shuowen, from bamboo scripts of Qin, from oracle scripts. It is clear that after later oracle scripts, 二 defines the main meaning of 次 as "the second". 说文段注 Duan's Annotation to Shuowen in Qing Dynasty said "當作从二，从欠。从二故爲次。" (次 should have radicals 二 and 欠. Having the radical 二 thus it's the second.) It is interesting that all major dictionaries haven't put 次 under the 二 radical. Personally I think that's because they all follow the convention of Shuowen.
The simplified character 习 is under the radicals  (乙) and 冫 in the Modern Chinese Dictionary. However the corresponding traditional character 習 has the radical 羽 (feather of birds). It's clear:
from Shuowen, from oracle scripts, from bamboo scripts of Chu. However note that Shuowen's "从羽从白" (having the radicals 羽 and 白) theory is not true -- there're material evidence from oracle and bamboo scripts proving the bottom part is not 白 but 日. The character just illustrated "birds study flying on a sunny day", so it meant "study" (opinion from Guo Moruo's 卜辭通纂考釋).
Now you may feel dissatisfied for the way that dictionaries of simplified Chinese classify 次 and 习. However, if you forget the whole story above, it may be the only way you can find it in a dictionary for the simplified character forms. 二 in 次 or feather in 习 have been written as 冫 for a long history as it's more convenient (OK I think some experts may insist my referring to Taiwan's standard glyphs 國字標準字體 here but let's not go so far if you're not learning traditional Chinese). So if you don't care about the etymology, keep considering 冫 is the radical of 次 and 习 can be a self-consistent theory in your mind. I guess that's what the experts think when they compile the dictionaries for simplified Chinese.

Fact 2. A not-so-exact-but-easy theory "两点冰，三点水，四点火" -- two points denote "ice"; three points denote "water"; four points denote "fire".

Let's see the original character 仌 for 冰:
from bronze scripts, from Shuowen.
It illustrated the texture on ice, and became two horizontal strokes when coming to clerical scripts:
 => ,  => .
Thus when it came to regular scripts, the "two points" under 冬 and 冭 were written as two "down point", and the "two points" on the left of 冰 were written as 冫, possibly for the aesthetic reason.
Similarly, 氵 came from what 水 was written in bamboo scripts of Qin:
河注沙
It is a rarely known fact that 氵 appeared in Qin state before the seal scripts became the standard in the early Qin Dynasty:
河注沙, the left component is 水 in seal scripts.
Thus, as 氵 and 水 stand for the same thing, water, they often shared the same entry of indices in ancient Chinese dictionaries like Kangxi Dictionary.
Similarly again, 灬 often stands for 火, fire. 灬 and 火 shared the same entry of indices in Kangxi Dictionary.

Fact 3. 永 has several versions of explanation, but none of them is related to "冫ice".

《說文》：“永，長也，象水巠理之長。《詩》曰：‘江之永矣’。”高鴻縉《中國字例》：“按：此‘永’字，即潛行水中之‘泳’字之初文。原从人在水中行，由文人彳生意，故託以寄游泳之意……後人借用為長永，久而為借意所專，乃加水旁作‘泳’以還其原。”《說文新證》：“从｀彳’表示水行，｀卜’形象水巠理，全字象河水流行，巠理衍長之貌。｀卜’形或訛為人形，於是其旁又增象水形的曲筆。＂
Shuowen: "永, long, illustrates the length of a river. Classic of Poetry says 'The length of the Jiang (river), cannot be navigated with a raft'"
Gao Hongjin's 中國字例 Examples of Chinese Characters: "Note: this character 永 is the original character of 泳 that denotes diving and swimming in the water. In the beginning its semantic element is people swimming in the water, the 人 and 彳 parts, so it's borrowed to mean swimming ... later it's borrowed to mean 長永 (permanent, with the same sound), and stuck to this meaning for a long time, so 水 was added making it 泳 to denote the original meaning swimming."
說文新證: "彳 denotes moving, 卜 illustrates a river. The whole character illustrates a running river, meaning the view of a long river. The shape of 卜 might be wrongly written as the shape of people 人, so curves are added to illustrate the shape of water."


For magazines or books, how much does "text volume" differ when comparing Chinese to English or German?

Judging from my personal experience (I do translation for a living), the English and Chinese versions of a text have a word count ratio of about 2:3. That is, if the English version has 1000 words, the Chinese version will usually have about 1500 characters.

However, the Chinese version usually takes up less space. In Microsoft Word, with the same font size and style, the Chinese version is usually one third shorter than the English version. If the Chinese version has 10 pages, the English version will usually have 15 pages.

This may seem to be a paradox, but please note that Chinese texts are counted in characters, not words. Each Chinese character consumes the space of about two English letters, while an English word is five letters long on average.

Of course, these numbers vary every time, depending on what and how you translate. They are just very rough numbers to give you a general idea. :)


What happens when you use the individual characters in 姓氏 and 名字?

From my answer to this question What does this symbol mean? I explained 姓氏 It may be a good reference to your question

From my answer to this question Why is there such a difference between "first name" and "last name"? I explained 姓 and 名字

  In the past, most people in high society would have a 姓(family name), a 名 (given name) and a 字 (Courtesy name)

Example of using individual characters in 姓氏 and 名字:

他姓曹 = his last name is 曹
曹氏一族 = the clan of 曹 family
他姓曹，名操，字孟德 = his last name is 曹, first name is 操 and his courtesy name is 孟德


Is it correct ot use 以前 in sentence with meaning of future plans 我以前打算去北京?

Is it correct to use 以前 in sentence with meaning of future plans 我以前打算去北京?

The simple answer for your question is "YES, it's correct". You can use 以前 in sentence with meaning of future plans.

However, your English translation below is not that right. 'Before' is not needed because 'was' already connotes the past tense (which 以前 here stands for).

  我以前打算去北京 - 'Before' I was going to go to Beijing

So the correct translation should be:

  我以前打算去北京 - I was going to go to Beijing


In your first sentence, the 4th comma is indeed unnecessary. This is what I would write:

在当当网，“创新”是全方位，而俞渝就像心脏一样，源源不断地把创新的血液输送到企业每一个环节。

Your second sentence is grammatically correct, but using the 把 construction is much more natural.


What is the difference between 几乎 and 差点儿?

差点儿 is more emotional.

我差点儿迟到了。 implies that I feel lucky I was not late and I would feel bad if I were late.
我几乎迟到了。  states a fact and sounds like it's not a big deal even if I was late.

Visualize such a scenario. I run across the road and a car nearly hits me. My girlfriend says 你差点儿就被撞了！ It's a blame but I can feel she's really worried and feels grateful I was not hit by the car. I would be really sad if she says 你几乎就被撞了。


Is the meaning of this symbol "longevity"?

This is just a variant of 壽.

If you suspect a character is a variant you can always go to the wiktionary entry and refer to the Unihan data which will show common variants or use the service I linked above if it is something more obscure.


Like this. 像这样。 xiang4 zhe4yang4.
Like that. 像那样。 xiang4 na4yang4.
Not like that. 不像那样。 bu2 xiang4 na4yang4.
Don't do it like that; do it like this. 别那么做；这么做。 bie2 na4me zuo4; zhe4me zuo4.
We don't say it in Taiwan like they do in China. 我们台湾人说话和中国人说话不一样。 wo3men Tai2wan1ren2 shuo1hua4 he2 zhong1guo2ren2 shuo1hua4 bu4 yi2yang4.
We say it in Taiwan like they do in China. 我们台湾人像中国人一样这么说。 Wo3men Tai2wan1ren2 xiang4 Zhong1guo2ren2 yi2yang4 zhe4me shuo1.
Sally is like her mother. Sally像她母亲。 Sally xiang4 ta1 mu3qin.

Comment: I think when learning languages that have very different origins, at some point, you'd have to give up trying to pair the words one-to-one to another language... Such a strict correspondence usually does not exist. You need to learn the language itself, not just such correspondences.


First of all,
“吃午饭了” is usually used for "someone" to ask "someone" to have a lunch. Besides, it also can be meant that you already ate the lunch.

While "吃了午饭 ” just mean that you already ate the lunch.

Plus, there is no such thing like "吃了午饭没有“ It should be "你吃午饭了吗？” The "吗” is used for asking something.


感动 can both be passive and active. For completeness' sake this is the first meaning: "受外界事物影响而引起内心激动" and this is the second "使感动" in 现代汉语规范词典. The meaning will typically be clear from the context.

Some examples:

他的话感动了在座的人: His speech touched the people who where present. (here it is active)
他很容易被感动: He's very easily moved. (here 感动 is made passive by adding the 被)
看了电影《上甘岭》，我感动得流下了眼泪: after seeing the movie 上甘岭, he was so touched that he cried. (here is it passive, but without 被, 受 or another verb to make it passive)

Although  not mentioned in most dictionaries, it can also be used as an adjective. Actually in your example (using the modifier 很) it is used as an adjective (according to Chinese grammar, in the translation it can be translation using a verb instead). As an adjective in also be in both directions (used when you move somebody else, or when you are moved by something or somebody. For example:

这部很感动的电影是去年拍的: this very touching movie was filmed last year
听了你的话，我很感动: I'm very touched by what he said.


现在几岁 sounds really weird. People usually say 今年几岁 or just 几岁 to mean the age as of right now. Come to think of it, I think this might be because there's a different notation of age which increases every lunar new year.
Edit: as pointed out by the comments below, 现在几岁 doesn't sound really weird in general. It's definitely less common than 今年几岁, but maybe it sounding really weird to me is a dialect thing.


How to say "increase the food price" in Chinese?

Word by word, the translation is:

increase(提高/增加 ti gao / zeng jia);

the food(食物shi wu);

的(pinyin: de, meaning the food'S price, or price OF the food.  The character is added to express that the price is the food's);

price (价格jia ge)

So the whole sentence would be, 提高食物的价格

Although in short, you can simply say 涨价(zhang jia) meaning to increase price as @user-487 answered above.


It's "鉄鋳". It means "It's made of metal."  鉄 means metal.

They are another kind of (simplified) traditional Chinese characters(铁铸). some people may say they are Japanese kanji, but you know kanji(汉字) are from China.

Chinese characters have different shape in different period, in different area, such as Hongkong and Taiwan.


看起来提问者懂中文，那我就先中文答吧：这是在香港，台湾地区口语用的比较多的间接宾语后置用法，普通话一般没有这样的用法

this kind of usage is common in Cantonese, but not in mandarin(common usage in the  Mainkind China ). “请回复我结果” is the same as "请把结果告诉我", that is "please tell me the result" in English. I think it is a kind of postposition of indirect object in cantonese, Putonghua doesn't have this


What language is this tattoo? what does it mean?

安琪儿 which doesn't mean anything except being a name. You can treat it as "Angel" since the pronunciation of 安琪儿 (ān qí ér / ān qí r) is similar to the English word "Angel"


The answers are: (in both simplified and traditional)

 1. 国泰民安 國泰民安   2. 才子佳人 才子佳人  3. 乱世出英雄 亂世出英雄  4. 才高八斗 才高八斗  5. 不以成败论英雄 不以成敗論英雄  6. 有教无类 有教無類  7. 英雄所见略同 英雄所見略同  8. 无名英雄 無名英雄  9. 止戈为武 止戈為武 10. 大智若愚 大智若愚 11. 大恩大德 大恩大德 12. 天荒地老 天荒地老 13. 自投罗网 自投羅網 14. 横财就手 横财就手 15. 一山更比一山高 一山更比一山高 16. 正人君子 正人君子 17. 知法犯法 知法犯法 18. 顶天立地 頂天立地 A. 文武全才 文武全才 B. 路不拾遗 路不拾遺 C. 投鞭断流 投鞭斷流 D. 佳偶天成 佳偶天成 E. 心如止水 心如止水 F. 悲天悯人 悲天憫人 G. 天网恢恢疏而不漏 天網恢恢疏而不漏 H. 英雄无用武之地 英雄無用武之地 I. 悬壶济世 懸壺濟世 J. 英雄本色 英雄本色 K. 识英雄重英雄 識英雄重英雄 L. 就地正法 就地正法 M. 大展身手 大展身手 N. 见仁见智 見仁見智 O. 雄才大略 雄才大略 P. 愚公移山 愚公移山 Q. 泰山北斗 泰山北斗 R. 一柱擎天 一柱擎天 S. 恩重如山 恩重如山 T. 举世无双 舉世無雙

As a secondary hint, there are a lot of

 英雄


From my personal observations from living in Taiwan for years, I found that it really varies, depends on what people are used to in that particular town or area, depends on the level of formality or familiarity, the person's who is calling the name personality and what the named person introduces themselves as.

Calling each other by full 3-character name seems common in some circles even among close friends (my girlfriend often even calls her parents and brother by full name casually, and most of her friends from school exclusively by full name in an affectionate way), completely nonexistent in other circles and in others yet only certain people are called by the full 3 characters, while others are not.

Using the 2-character given name seems to me to be the most common form of address between informal casual acquaintances, ,schoolmates, university students, members of a club, etc., where everyone is roughly of same age or rank and nobody is long-term friends with anyone.

In groups with long-standing relationships I would say most people have a nickname and expect to be addressed by it over their name. Sometimes, especially down south, the nickname is a character of their name prefixed with 阿, such as Awei, Ajie, Ajou, Amin, etc. Sometimes it would be 阿+another random name or word that is unrelated to their real name. The above also applies to using 小 instead of 阿. 小 is often also used with just their surname. Other nicknames seem to be completely random words that people are called (and call themselves) that translate to things like cucumber, chicken, bucket head, whatever. Totally random.

English names are also quite common as nicknames that they are know by over their real names. This is in my experience more common up north, in metropolitan areas and groups where people tend to speak more English, especially the entertainment industry where colleagues wouldn't even know the Chinese name of someone who calls themselves by an English name. Something like 大家好我是Cindy is very common to hear as an introduction, even on the radio.

Edit: Forgot to include another very common nickname type which is used pretty much exclusively by girls: reduplication. Taking one character of their name and doubling it, making that their nickname. Like NingNing, TianTian, JiaJia, HuaHua, etc.


以 here means

  用在方位词前，表明时间、方位、方向或数量的界限：以前。以内。（from 在线新华字典）

In a way it is similar to -wards suffix, as in backwards, in English.

往 means past.

以往 literally means before this point of time, 'past-wards'.


Do any Chinese languages or dialects contain a rolled/trilled R?

According to this map there are some Chinese languages in which the trill r is present.


What does 放 mean in contexts such as 你给我放聪明点 or 你给我放老实点?

放老实点 means put in a honest way. Similarly, 放聪明点 means put in a wise way.

放肆 means your behavior cross the line people just can not tolerate. it's kind of talk-down.

放 is such a common word that it can be used in lots of circumstances. There will be a lot of meaning you will get from a dictionary.

For example, 放鞭炮，放牛，放纵，放荡，绽放， 放 in these phrases means differently.


How do I say "I held my head in my hands"

If you are referring to "put my head in my hands and cried",
My suggestion would be「抱頭痛哭」

抱: Holding / 頭: Head /  痛哭: Cry badly

In case you don't stick with "Crying", you can still use it this way:

I hold my head in my hands as i read his article
在讀這篇文章的時候，我以手抱頭。


After [...] a consonant, iou, uei, and uen are simplified as iu, ui, and un, which do not represent the actual pronunciation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinyin#Letters

This spelling seems to have been inherited from the earlier Latinxua Sin Wenz, itself following the use in Wade-Giles. Such simplifications were likely used since [wi] is an allophone of [wei]:

In SC [wi] is a variant of [wəi]... SC does not make use of such contrasts as [wi] vs. [wəi], or [ji] vs. [i], which English does (consider we vs. way, and yeast vs. east).

A Phonology of Standard Chinese

Related questions:

Then we also have sounds that are there but simply left out, such as -ui actually being pronounced -uei (水, 对, 贵) and -iu actually being pronounced -iou (六，休，牛).

Is pinyin an accurate pronunciation guide?
Why is it written LIU in Pinyin, when there's clearly an O sound?
Are there rules about the differences between pinyin spelling and pronunciation?


……在既不能证实，也不能证伪的时候，存疑。这就是科学精神。……


What is this 喜迎十九大 event all over the recent Chinese news?

喜迎 → Welcome (with fond)
十九大 is an abbreviation for 中国共产党第十九次全国代表大会. The 19th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.

It's an upcoming event starting on October 18, 2017. As a bad custom, Chinese news media have started propagation about such important events since a few months ago. It'd be absolutely normal to see a truckload of these spams.


Using 滿喜由 as a male name in Mainland China

I guess 喜由 is some kind of transcription of Dio in Dionisio. As pointed out by @TangHo, this transcription very unfortunately sounds like a sex drug.

The standard transcription of Greek (and derived Latin) Dio- is「狄奧」:

Dio of Alexandria: 亞歷山卓的狄奧
Cassius Dio: 卡西烏斯・狄奧

Dionysus has the alternative 狄俄倪索斯.

This transcription matches the Greek, Latin, and Spanish ways of pronouncing Dio-. The (alternative) English way of pronouncing Dio- sounds something like Dye-oh, which should be rendered as 戴歐.

In modern transcription practice,「狄」tends to be avoided in favour of「迪」, because「狄」is more commonly associated with barbarians occupying the northern borders in Ancient China. I would render your name as 迪奧 or 迪歐.


Is there a list of simplified Chinese radicals?

I think there's quite a few around.  My favorite is Search by Radical at chinese-tools.com.

Here's a screenshot:

(Stack Exchange version of the image.)


就是掌握用那种语言去交流的能力

The speaker's pronunciation is not perfect. The pronunciation of "那" (the intended pronunciation should be nei4 here) is not good.

那 is often pronounced as nei4 in speech.


糊里糊涂: 形容人行事極為迷糊或不明道理 (describes people acting extremely confused or unreasonable)
唏哩花啦: 1. 形容物體滾落、撞擊的聲音 (describe the sound of objects rolling down and hitting)  2. 比喻破敗難堪的情境 (metaphor of dilapidated and embarrassing situation)
稀里糊涂 sounds like the combination of the two (confused and embarrassing)
唏哩花啦 has no meaning on their own in the idiom, they are sound effect characters


How to express "same shit, different names" in Mandarin?

Two set phrases come up to my mind:

炒冷饭 (heat leftover meal/rice)
新瓶装旧酒 (the same wine in a different bottle). 旧药换新瓶 is a less common variation.

They're both applicable to your context. Their literal meaning is almost never used.

Example:

  大多数电子游戏的续作都是新瓶装旧酒。A lot of video game sequels are just rehash of the previous installation.


Friend was given a guitar with what looks like Chinese handwriting on it (Characters identified: 茶杏銅鑼)

They are written in traditional Chinese: 茶杏銅鑼, which translated verbatim to Tea, Apricot, Copper, Gong.The four words together do not resemble anything meaningful. I did a google search with the exact four words but cannot find anything related.


I think it's 炒双冬. 双 here means two. One 冬 is 冬菇, also known as 香菇, a kind of mushroom, lentinus edodes. The other 冬 refers to 冬笋, bamboo shoots.


What is the difference between 听到、听过 and 听说?

听到 means : you are listening to something right now.
听过 means: you have heard about it.
听说 means: you heard someone's something from anther people, and you are talking to this people about this thing.


What is the Chinese equivalent of the English morpheme 'e-' indicating "digitalization"?

As far as I know, there's no exception for translating "e-" to "电子" unless it doesn't indicate "digital" electronic.