#manadarin

Grammar collection article: http://bit.ly/33Ml9nj

Kimono. An inspiration FOR SURE.

Luis Fonsi - Despacito 緩緩 (Mandarin Version/ Audio) ft. JJ Lin

Mandarin: 书是随身携带的花园。/ Shū shì suíshēn xiédài de huāyuán. It means “A book is like a garden carried in the pocket”. I don’t know, it sounds very cute. It makes me think of The Secret Garden for some reason...

Korean:안녕하세요 (ahnyong-ha-say-o) The closest spelling I can give in English is ‘annyeong haseyo’. 'ㅇ' used in part 1,2,3,and 5 of the phrase creates different sounds depending on its placement. In part 1 and 5 it is used at the beginning of the sound. In this placement it shows that the following piece is a vowel sound. I have yet to see an example of a sound that starts with a vowel that is not prefixed by 'ㅇ'. When used at the end of a sound piece(never have I seen it used in the middle), it adds the sound of 'ng' to the vowel sound it precedes it. The vowel sounds. ‘ㅏ’ = ‘a’; ‘ㅕ’ = ‘yeo’; ‘ㅔ’ = ‘e’; and ‘ㅛ’ = ‘yo’ The consonants. ‘ㄴ’ = ‘n’; ‘ㅎ’ = ‘h’;and ‘ㅅ’ = ‘s’ Therefore ’안’ = ‘an’; ‘녕’ = ‘neong’; ‘하’ = ‘ha’; ‘세’ = ‘se’; and ’요’ = ‘yo’. Chinese:你好 Mandarin-Nĭ hăo(knee how) Cantonese-Lei hóu(lay ho) or Néih hóu (ney ho) 你 means ‘you’ 好 means ‘good’ Adding the question particle 吗simplified[嗎tranditional]’ma’(mah) takes the phrase from “Hello” to “How are you?”. Hearing 你好, 你好吗? is pretty common I feel. 您’nin’ can be used to up the respect in your greeting in place of 你, but as far as I’ve seen generally your title is what changes your respect level. Japanese: Japanese is a bit different, depending on the time of day you use different greetings to say hello.-> I’ve set it up so that the word example is kanji -> hiragana only.  お早うございます[ おはようございます] ’Ohayōgozaimasu’ pronounced pretty much exactly as written ‘Oh-ha-yo-go-za-ee-mas’. This is anytime before noon. Basically meaning good morning. The kanji ‘早’ made by ‘はよ’ stems from ‘早い[はやい]’ meaning early. Usually this is written using hiragana alone. ’お’ = ‘o[oh]’; ‘は’ = ‘ha’; ‘よう’ = ‘yō[yooo(if written without ‘う’ [u], then it would have carried a shorter and plain ‘yo’ sound instead of the more drawn out version)]’; ‘ご’ = ‘go’; ‘ざ’ = ‘za’; ‘い’ = ‘i[ee]’; ‘ます’ = ‘masu[mas(generally always pronounced more so as ‘mas’ making the ‘u’ silent)]’. Also a more familiar way to say it would be おは. 今日は[こんにちは] ‘Konnichiwa’ Probably the most commonly heard phrase for hello but it really means Good Afternoon and like it says, use it from noon til the evening time. It is ponounced “Ko’n-nee-chee-wa”. The kanji for it are 今[いま] which means ‘now’ and 日[ひ ‘hi(hee)’] which means ‘sun and is also the counter used for days of the month. When combined it changes how they are prounced, now こん and にち which creates the new word ‘today’. は you saw above pronounced as ‘ha’ is pronounced as ‘wa’ here. Certain situations cause for this change, generally its when you speak は as a particle(where its used as a topic market). As I understand it in older times if you were addressing someone with ‘Good day’ then you would generally be automatically following it with some subject you needed to speak on, therefore you’d say ‘Today は blahblahablha’.Nowadays I generally don’t hear it used in this context, instead I tend to hear 今日[きょう ‘Kyō(key-ooo)’](today/this day) followed by は. 本日[ほんじつ ‘honjitsu(hon-jee’tsu)’] also means today and is very common but I have not really seen it followed by は. So, ‘こん’ = ’ ko and n so “kon” ‘; ‘に’ = ‘ni(nee)’; ‘ち’ = ‘chi(chee)’; ‘は’ = ‘ha(wa in this example. differs from above)’ 今晩は[こんばんは] ‘Konbanwa’ Good Evening. It is pronounced exactly like it looks. 今 you saw above for meaning ‘now’, 晩[ばん(ban)] means night so put them together and you have ‘Tonight’. は has the same way of pronouncing and reason for being as in こんにちは. I have rarely seen any of these being written in kanji form, generally only in hiragana. Though writing it in Kanji form is not wrong! Its been my experience that many Japanese tend to know the word ‘hello’ if nothing else and don’t seem to mind it being used. Besides おはようございます, since its ending is ございます, your politeness will change depending on the title your give to the the person your speaking with. Thai:สวัสดี(sa-wat-dee) Since I’m a woman I would say สวัสดีค่ะ(sawat dee kha), males say สวัสดีครับ(sawat dee khrap). In Thai your greetings change depending on your gender. Pronunciation: Thais a bit trickier in my book. ส is the consonant ‘s’. ว the consonant ‘w’ and with the vowel sound ั above it it becomes ‘wa’. The second ส is actually the end of the word and being the last letter(like in Korean) can change your sound. At the end of the word it changes to the consonant ‘t’ and becomes silent when spoken as far as I know. ด is the consonant ‘d’ and has the vowel sound ีattached which makes it ‘di(dee)’. So in the end you get basically “s’wa(t) di” Now for the male and female endings. ค่ะ is the consonant ค[Kh] connected to the vowel ะ[a] and holding the tone mark ’ ่ ’ which makes it either a low tone or falling tone…honestly haven’t figured out which yet. For the male ending; ครับ it begins with the same consonant ค[kh] but with no vowels or tones attached. The sound is then followed by ร which in this instance since its following a another consonant and not at the end of the word is ‘r’, but its also attached to vowel sound ั[a] making it ‘ra’. The word is finished with บ[b] but since its finishing it off changes to ‘p’ and I believe is silent when spoken. My thai is still very shaky so I may come back with updates changing things over time. Vietnamese:Chào (chow) Chào is the most blatant way of saying hello in Vietnamese but being the very respectful nation it is, their are many ‘endings’ depending on whom your speaking towards. Chào ông: towards a man Chào bà: towards a woman Chào cô: towards a young woman Chào anh: towards a man your friendly with Chào chị: towards a woman your friendly with Chào em: towards a child I’m sure their are more focussing on higher levels of respect. I love how even the word ‘hello’ can show the extreme differences and few similarities between these languages.

So, it's been a while. Strangely, I got nervous about writing. As my understanding of this place (slightly) increases, I'm getting less comfortable with the sweeping generalisations that are pretty necessary when it comes to writing about life in a new, batshit-insane country. That said, I've just been re-reading a bunch of older posts, and I think by and large I stand by them, so it's probably more a case of over-thinking things again (and having less spare time to do so). I'm a bit disappointed with some aspects of integration here - my mandarin still sucks, which is a trap I promised myself I wouldn't fall into, but *man* is it difficult and in Shanghai it's too damn easy to just get by with the basics. No-one even speaks it around my area - everyone is Shanghainese and the local dialect bears little resemblance to anything else. That's no excuse, though. For a man with vague intentions around understanding the nature of this place, it's something that needs to change. I'm slowly making a few friends who've less of an international background, which is interesting, but by definition those who can speak English have something of a different outlook. I'm glad people read this thing, and I'm glad some noticed it was gone. For today, I'm not too worried about being the stereotypical foreigner and am going to support an international institution - Record Store Day. I think there's one in the whole of Shanghai, so am more than happy to play along: http://slinkrat.tumblr.com/post/48343092731/set-times-for-uptowns-record-store-day-in-shanghai