h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

*cheers Cat on because she's done very well doing all this teaching, and teachers need encouragement*

Here's a song we leart to help us learn the numbers 1 -7.

Of course you can't hear the tune, but still...

Yi er san si wu liu qi
wo de pengyou zai nali?
zai zhe li (x2)
Wo de pengyou zai zhe li.

+=+=+=+

Roughly translated, that is:

one two three four five six seven
My friend ( something that sorta means)where?

... something about where are they or something

My friend (...) here or something.


I don't know, it's called Wode Pengyou (my friend) and the gist of it is where is my friend?

And the textbook is no help... Mostly it's just all about where is my friend.

(and for the shocking translation, there's only 3 words there I don't know... unfortunately they come up a lot...)

Cat

OK, time to learn how to say How old are you?

The annoying thing about doing this on the net is to ask this question you've sorta already gotta know how old they are, but since no one here is under 12 I think we'll be all good. I'll still teach you the under 12 one, but mostly we'll be using the over 12 one

Ok, for people under 12 years old we say:

Ni ji sui le? - nee jer (with a faint d sorta sound at the start... that ones hard to right how you say it) sway le (like in italian or french)

For people over 12 years old we say:

Ni duo da le - nee dwar dar le (like in italian or french)

If you want to be respectful when you say it, you use:

Nin duo da la - nin dwar dar le

Side note: nin is a respectful version of ni. So, if you were going to be respectful and say hello you would say nin hao rather that ni hao. Same for asking how old someone is.

OK, to answer you say:

wo ___ sui le - whoa (also it sorta sounds a bit like war) ___ sway le. (the ___ is where you say the number)

Or, you can say this:

wo kuai ___ sui le - war kway ___ sway le (Kuai means nearly)

So, I say to myself:
C1: Ni duo da le
C2: Wo kuai shi wu sui le

+=+=+

C1: How old are you?
C2: I am nearly 15 years old


Cat

(ignore the links, I forgot they'd do that...)

Oh, yeah, I'd better teach you how to say How about you.

How about you - ni ne - nee ner

Or, if you're being polite:

nin ne - nin ner - how about you? (politely)


Cat

OK, so, when you ask Ni hao ma? (how are you?) so far all you can say is good...

Ok, so say I'm not good you say:

Wo bu hao - whoa boo how

Also, if the conversation has gone something like this:

1: How are you?
2: I am good, how about you?

In stead of person 1 saying "I am good" they can say "I am also fine" or "I am fine too" (same thing, just different English translation)

ye ting hao de - yeah ting how der - I am fine too / I am also fine

(I'm going to have to find the bit that says something else, I can't find it right now and I've gotta go...)


Cat

Right, here's some more greetings etc and what you say to them:

1. Ni hao -- Ni hao
Hello

2. [name] zao -- [name] zao
zao - zow
means morning. In this context it would mean [name] Goodmorning!

3. zai jian -- zai jian
Goodbye

4. Ming tian jian -- ming tian jian
ming tee-an G-an
Tian means day. Ming tian is tomorrow. Ming tian jian means see you tomorrow

5. Ni hao ma? -- Hen hao -or- Ting hao -or- Bu hen hao -or- bu ting hao
(literal trans) You good {question particle}? Meaning, (in good English) How are you? Hen hao means very good, ting hao means quie good and if you add bu (no/not) to them than it's Not very good and Not quite good.



...And I have to go now, I'll continue this later...

Cat

http://140.111.1.43/?open
online mandarin dictionary
but hard to understand

Hi, guys.
I'm the Head of the German Department and just wanted to ask whether there's still anyone here.
Did you notice that Kat, the boss of the Language Thing, hasn't been here for ages anymore? I just checked, she wasn't online since October 2005. Which means she'll probably not come again and there will be no page updates anymore.

What shall we do now?

I think I can take over my department, but I'm not sure about the whole place - not sure how much work it really is. And it also depends on you all.

For now I want to see how many people we still are.

(this message will go to all departments)