Wednesday, March 21, 2012

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day

I know I am a bit late but Happy St Patrick’s Day everyone (Sorry I was too busy celebrating myself). Or as you would say in Chinese language:

圣帕特里克节快乐
Shèng pàtèlǐkè jié kuàilè
(To learn other kuai le sentences, please check this post)

St. Patrick’s Day is an Irish cultural and religious holiday. It is celebrated on March 17 each year. The major activities include visiting church, parades, wearing green and drinking alcohol.

Below are some useful St. Patrick’s Day words:

爱尔兰 (Ài'ěrlán): Ireland
三月十七日 (sān yuè shíqī rì): March 17
绿 (lǜ): green
喝酒 (hē jiǔ): drink alcohol

Even though it is an Irish festival, it is celebrated all over the world and China is not an exception. Below is a picture of St. Patrick’s Day parade in Beijing that I found on the internet:

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

It’s been a year…

It’s been a year and I hope there is many more to come. It has definitely been an amazing experience so far. Thank you for reading my blog, leaving comments and sharing it with others. I really appreciate your support.

This is my 72nd post today, so I have written 6 posts a month on average. I have written about Chinese vocabulary, grammar, proverbs, songs, places, food, and places among many others. I have tried to cover as many aspects of Chinese language and Chinese culture as possible. Please let me know if there is anything in particular that you wish I wrote about.

Today I would like to share with you some of the posts I really enjoyed writing, but they somehow failed to make it to the ‘Popular posts’ on the right side.

First, just in case you forgot, here is why I started writing this blog

Why write this blog?

It’s always nice to learn some Chinese grammar, but it’s even better when you are learning about Yao Ming as well

As tall as Yao Ming

America is called the ‘beautiful country’ in Chinese language. But is it because the Chinese think that America beautiful?

Is America beautiful?

We also got a chance to learn how to count in Chinese language. Here is how to count from 1 to 10

Lucky Beijing Olympics

We have learned few Chinese songs, but this song has to be the most popular among all the Chinese language students

Kan Guo Lai

Similarly we learned few Chinese proverbs as well, and this one has always been one of my favorites. And the comic that I found definitely made this one of my favorite posts

Speak of the Chinese devil

Qingdao city may not be as widely known as Shanghai or Beijing, but it is definitely worth a visit. Here is why

Qingdao city, Tsingtao beer

Learning Chinese language is fun, but learning Chinglish is even better

Chinglish

These may not be as bad as Chinglish, but some Chinese people do have some interesting English names. Watch this video

Chinese people, English names

As one of the comments says, I love the ‘extremeness’ of these sentences

I am starving to death

And last but not the least, you haven’t learned Chinese until you know how to say Obama in Chinese language. Maybe not, but here is how you say Obama in Chinese language

How to say Obama in Chinese language?

There were many others I wanted to include, but I had to pick and choose. Which one is your favorite? I would love to know.

Monday, March 5, 2012

Distant water won’t quench your immediate thirst

It’s been a while since we learned a new Chinese proved. So why not do it today? There is a Chinese proverb I would like to share, and this is how it goes:

远水解不了近渴
Yuǎn shuǐ jiě bù liǎo jìn kě
Distant water won’t quench your immediate thirst

远 (yuǎn): far; distant
近 (jìn): near; close

As it is pretty obvious, this proverb implies the need to come up with an immediate solution to a problem. Now let’s see how it can be used:

远水解不了近渴,我今天急需钱。
Yuǎn shuǐ jiě bù liǎo jìn kě, wǒ jīntiān jíxū qián.
Distant water won’t quench immediate thirst, I badly need the money today.