What are some Chinese words that sound similar but are very different?
This is Fúzhōu (福州). Fúzhōu is a city in southeastern China, located in the province of Fujian. Fúzhōu is the capital of Fujian. This is Fǔzhōu (抚州). Fǔzhōu is …
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Is the Chinese education the best in the world?
I’m not currently teaching but I hold a degree in education. I did teach for a few years about a decade ago. I taught for …
Why did the ancient Japanese pick the Chinese word “俺” instead of the Chinese word “我” for a person call itself?
I have to disagree with Paul Denlinger. “我” is not a modern word, nor being the pronoun for oneself in 20th century. “我” first appeared …
What is the meaning of the Chinese “鸡你太美”?
鸡你太美 is actually a meme. The original line was 只因你太美（only because you are too beautiful）， which was the first line of a song sang by …
Why does the Chinese word “法” contain 3 drops on the left side?
This is actually a reduced form of the original character, 灋. In addition to the three drops of water, the word is made up of …
What is the best English translation for 缘 (yuan)?
This is very difficult to translate, because the cultural connotations are so different. Literally, 緣 means hem, the hem on a garment, which doesn’t help …
What does “996 (jiǔ jiǔ liù)” mean in Chinese?
It means working from 9 am to 9 pm, 6 days a week. It started to gain popularity when some Chinese company, predominately tech companies …
Can you read classical Chinese? Do you know all 50,000 characters?
These are two very different questions. Classical Chinese is a language, it can be written in either traditional Chinese character fonts or any modern Chinese …
Is Cantonese the second most spoken variety of Chinese after Mandarin?
Definitely not. I am sure Cantonese isn’t that big in China (everything is bigger in China), so I consulted Wiki for a quick look. According …
How useful is Mandarin Chinese outside of China?
The argument that the Chinese language isn’t very useful outside of China make some say 2 things: Duh. Like, a billion people speak it there. …