Archive for 'Culture'
The Year of the Pig Posted by sasha on Feb 5, 2019
Today is the most important holiday in China – the Spring Festival (春节 – chūn jié). Otherwise known as the Chinese New Year, it’s the start of a 15-day holiday full of interesting customs and traditions. According to the Chinese zodiac (生肖 – shēng xiào), we are now in the Year of the Pig (猪年 –…
Chinese Folk Art: New Year Paintings Posted by Ayana on Feb 4, 2019
Chinese New Year will be celebrated this year on February 5th. Chinese New Year (春节, chūn jié, literally means “spring festival”) has a lot of customs: New Year dinner, firecrackers, spring festival couplets, dumplings, and red envelopes, just to name a few. Among them is also the custom of hanging New Year paintings 年画 (nián…
Top Chinese Songs of 2018 (Part Two) Posted by sasha on Jan 31, 2019
We’re continuing our countdown of the top Chinese songs of 2018 with five more tunes. Go back and check out Part One in case you missed it. Once again, I did my best to find the official music videos, lyrics in simplified Chinese, pinyin, and English, and a KTV-style video for you to sing along…
Top Chinese Songs of 2018 (Part One) Posted by sasha on Jan 14, 2019
Do you like listening to music? (你喜欢听音乐吗? – nǐ xǐ huān tīng yīn yuè ma). Do you like listening to Chinese songs? (你喜欢听中文歌吗? – nǐ xǐ huān tīng zhōng wén gē ma). Listening to music is a great way to enhance your language studies. Even if you don’t understand all of the lyrics, it’s beneficial. Listening…
Top 10 Posts of 2018 Posted by sasha on Dec 19, 2018
It’s hard to believe, but another year is about to finish up. As we look forward to the New Year (新年 – xīn nián), it’s a great time to reflect on the one that’s ending. Here at the Chinese Language Blog, that means looking back on our 100 or so posts from the year and seeing…
Do People Celebrate Christmas in China? Posted by sasha on Dec 5, 2018
When I lived in China, I always got the same question from family and friends around this time of year – “Do people celebrate Christmas in China?” The short answer is “Yes,” but there’s a lot more to it than that. In this post, I’ll try to shed some light on what Christmas is like…
Being Direct in Chinese Posted by sasha on Nov 27, 2018
When you travel or move to China, a little bit of culture shock (文化冲击 – wén huà chōng jí) is inevitable. I know I certainly experienced it when I first moved there, whether it was trying different food (silk worm larvae, anyone?), drinking baijiu (白酒 – bái jiǔ) for the first time (gross), or learning…