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What are some interesting things you understand about China while learning Chinese?
在你学习中文时，你了解到了哪些有关中国的有趣事实？（下）
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Ben Wu, American-born Chinese
So I’ve been able to speak Chinese almost-fluently (meaning I can form and understand sentences, but sometimes have trouble with phrasing) since I was very young. My family generally speaks a mix of Chinese and English at home, you see. So I can’t really talk about learning interesting things from learning to speak Chinese.
However, two years ago, partially out of curiosity and partially because I had the time, I took a year of Chinese. It seems that there are some curious things you really miss out on if you don’t learn to read and write, which I’d like to share below:
Saying sorry. Every beginner Chinese student knows this; it’s “duibuqi”. Actually it’s “dui”, “bu”, and “qi”, three characters put together in a single phrase. If you look at each character, they seem to have nothing to do with one another. “Dui” means “correct or right”; “bu” is a negative often used in contexts of disapproval, or desire to the contrary; “qi” is the first character in “qilai”, which means “to get up, or rise”. At least that’s what I thought originally. But when you start learning to form sentences, you might realize that this phrase is actually quite deep. The character for “dui” can be used, in casual form, as a legitimate and understandable response to any yes/no question. And “qi” can also be used in some contexts to indicate a sense of beginning (e.g. “I started my car up” or “I am too tired to start my work”). Putting these three characters together, then, literally means “I am unable to even begin an explanation that shows that I am right”. Extravagant way to say sorry right? Edit: refer to https://www./What-are-s... for a correction to my answer.
在我很小的时候，我的中文已经算是流利的了，我可以拼凑和理解句子，但是有时候措辞上有点困难。我的家人在家里说中文和英文。所以我很难说明在学习中文的过程中会遇到什么有趣的事情。
然而，两年前，由于好奇加上空闲，我上了一年的中文课。貌似在学习中文的阅读和写作过程中你才可能了解到一些古怪的事情，而这正是我要和大家分享的：
比如说抱歉。中文初学者都知道；那就是“对不起”。实际上是三个不同的字组合在一起，分别是对，不，起。你会发现这三个字之间没有任何的关联。对指的是正确；不指的是否定，通常用在否定句中，或者相反的愿望；起是起来的起。至少刚开始的时候我是这么认为的。当时当你开始学习如何构建句子时，你会发现这个句子实际上相当深刻。比如“对”这个字，可以用来回应是或不是的问题（比如你是不是中国人；对，我是）。“起”在某些语境下可以表示开始的意思。所以将这三个字放在一起，字面意思就是“我甚至没办法开始作出解释来证明自己是对的”。
Gender. Another thing that confuses a lot of foreigners, myself included for a long time, is how anyone can understand each other when the pronouns he/she are exactly the same. After all, they’re both “ta”. In speech, one has to use context, but in literature or poetry, it’s not always possible. So what’s the difference? Both “he” and “she” have the same base character, but the “ta” for females has the “nu” radical for women.
Honor from the heart. Either I never noticed, or no one in America has ever needed to do this with me, but something new I learned was the distinction between “ni” and “nin”. “Ni” means “you”, as does “nin”. However, the latter is reserved for cases in which the speaker needs to pay respect to the addressee. It’s commonly used when greeting customers to a restaurant, for example. Again, the character for “nin” is almost identical to “ni”, except the radical for “xin” or “heart” is present at the bottom of the character. The implication, of course, is that one should honor the addressee from the heart or with sincerity.
I’ll add more if I can think of any more.
性别。另外一个让很多外国人包括我自己感到长期不解的是她和他都发音TA，这要怎么分辨。在说话时，一个人必须得利用背景知识才能知道。所以二者的差别在哪里？女的她是女字旁的。
来自心底的尊敬。我不是我未曾注意，就是美国人从不这么称呼我，我指的是你和您之间的区别。你和您意思是一样的。然而，后者是尊称。比如餐馆欢迎顾客时会说您。二者的区别就是多了一个心。
等我想到更多了，再补充。
Yuan Tian
Actually you misunderstand “duibuqi”. “dui” here has nothing to do with being right or correct. It means to treat (people). Also “qi” here has nothing to do with beginning, the examples you gave to show this meaning of “qi” are also wrong since it should be a different “qi”(启). “qi” here means qualified to some standard. So “duibuqi” literally means “what i did to you was not qualified to the normal standard to which a person should be treated”.
其实你误解了“对不起”。这里的对不是对错的对。是对待他人的对。“起”也和开始没关系，而且你举的例子也错了，应该是“启”。这里的起指的是符合某种标准的意思。所以“对不起”的字面意思是“我的行为不符合一般的待人标准”。
Katie Kim, studied Chinese at Beijing Language and Culture University
Well, I would like to share with you one of my funnies story of me in practicing Chinese. I was on a Chinese restaurant enjoying a typical Chinese noodle called as ”拉面” (La mian)，after finishing the delicious noodle, I was wanted to ask the waiter whether there is any fruit market available around there or not. So, I called her and simply ask her “可以问你吗?” which means that “can I ask you” in English that I instantly translated from a translator app that I frequently use. However, before finishing all my questions, some of the customers were not able to hold themselves to laugh quietly on what I was saying.
我想分享一下我学习中文时遇到的一件趣事。我当时在一家中国餐馆里吃拉面。吃完这碗美味的拉面后，我想问服务员附近有没有水果市场。所以我问那个女服务员“我可以问你吗？”，我先是用英文说的，然后通过一款翻译软件翻译成中文，然后我再问他。然而，在我问完所有问题前，一些顾客已经忍不住大笑起来。
Long after that, I realized that the tone that I was used to pronounce it was totally wrong. In case I was just saying “可以吻你吗？” which means that “can I kiss you” in English. Even though she finally understood what did I mean, the mistakes that I have made would be so meaningful for me in learning better Chinese.
In Chinese, it has four tones and also a neutral tone. All tones have specific meanings. So before you speak Chinese, make sure your tone is correct!
后来，我意识到我那个声调是完全错误的。我可能发音成了“我可以吻你吗？”。虽然最终她理解了我的意思，但是我所犯下的这个错误让我意识到如何更好的学习中文。
在中文里，有四个声调，还有一个轻声。所有的声调都有特定意义。在你将中文说出口之前，要确保你的声调是正确的。
Barron Lee, Studied Chinese characters for years
To me the most interesting part when learning Chinese characters is to trace back how the ancient Chinese thought about the world, kind of etymology. Chinese characters roughly maintain its major structure starting from the “oracle bone script” in about 3500 years ago, although the font styles/forms keep changing. The study helps to understand China’s history, culture, and its current status. Chinese have been using a unified character system for thousands years while they were and have been speaking various different languages or dialects.
我觉得学习汉字最有意思的一点是可以知道中国古人是如何看待这个世界的，有点词源学的味道。汉字大致保持了3500年前甲骨文的主要结构，尽管字形在不断变化着。学习汉字有助于我了解中国历史，文化及其现状。中国人使用统一的文字系统已经几千年，同时说着不同的语言或方言。
Here are some examples. The following one is the oracle bone script for modern character “目 (eye)”:
For “人 (people)”, it was:
And, when a person is seeing, it means “見(see)”, which is a combination of “目” and “人” above. When one stands up opening her eyes, she can see.
The following one is a little more distant from its modern form “豕 (pig)”, but one still can tell the similarity.
This is really fascinating to me. These are the simplest examples though. There are about 4500 oracle bone script characters, while only 1500 have been recognized/deciphered.
以下是几个例子。这个是甲骨文的“目”：
“人”是这样的：
当一个人在看时，就是“見”，就是目和人的结合。当一个人站起来张开双眼时就可以看见了：
下面这个和现代的“豕 （猪）”更加遥远一点，但是依然可以看出相似性：
这对我来说真的很迷人。这些都是一些简单的例子。甲骨文文字有4500个左右，只有1500个得到辨认。
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