Unlike English and some other languages, Chinese doesn’t have a specialized pattern of verb changes to indicate tenses. So how do the Chinese tell the different tenses apart? Well, we…
In Part 1 of Chinese idioms and slangs, we talked about the 龙（dragon） and the 凤（phoenix, two animals that are traditional symbols of Chinese culture. But of course, they are…
Animals have always been an indispensable part of the Chinese people’s daily lives. Naturally, many Chinese words reflect the close relationship between animals and the Chinese people. For example, in…
Socializing in a Chinese business setting can be very stressful, but it's becoming more and more common for international businesses and entrepreneurs to work with Chinese corporations. Many professionals are…
Flowers and trees are closely related to people’s lives. Because of this, for thousands of years, the Chinese people have coined many plant-related words and expressions. For example, Chinese people…
Before we start our topic today on Chinese homophones, let’s first look at the following two sentences: 一朵漂亮的花儿。(Yī duǒ piàoliàng de huār. )他今天花了一百元。(Tā zuátiān huā le yībǎi yuán.) We can…
As with all languages, Chinese has an informal set of slang words which can be quite useful to know and can help one communicate better. Chinese slang usually can’t be…
Here are two facts about Chinese idioms: there are lots and lots of them, and for the most part they are not particularly useful. I’ve been a student of Mandarin…
If you want to say "because" or "so" in Mandarin Chinese, we can help. You might know "because" as "因为" (yīnwèi) and "so" as "所以" (suǒyǐ), but there are other…