{"id":11407,"date":"2015-08-13T09:00:02","date_gmt":"2015-08-13T13:00:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/?p=11407"},"modified":"2015-08-12T21:22:08","modified_gmt":"2015-08-13T01:22:08","slug":"money-talks-in-chinese","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/money-talks-in-chinese\/","title":{"rendered":"Money Talks (in Chinese)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s been a lot of talk about China&#8217;s currency &#8211; the RMB (renminbi) &#8211; in the past few days, as the People&#8217;s Bank of China allowed it to depreciate by 2% against the dollar. Do a brief search, and you&#8217;ll find tons of articles from financial publications all around the world speculating on the reasons for this move and the resulting effects it will have on not only China&#8217;s, but the entire global\u00a0economy. This video from Bloomberg Business is a good crash course on the situation for those who haven&#8217;t been following:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Yuan Devalued to Combat China Slowdown\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/uuT_IDgddiI?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>As an English teacher, Chinese student, and freelance blogger, I&#8217;m not exactly qualified to be giving precise financial analysis. What I can do for you, however, is teach you how to talk about money in Chinese. Whether we like it or not, money plays a rather important role in our daily\u00a0lives, especially when you move to another country and need to learn a bunch of new words just to complete your day-to-day business. In this post, I&#8217;ll give you the basics about China&#8217;s currency as well as a bunch of words\/phrases you&#8217;ll need to handle daily financial matters in Chinese.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">China&#8217;s Currency<\/h2>\n<div id=\"attachment_8586\" style=\"width: 210px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft post-item__attachment\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8586\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8586\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2013\/03\/rmbbills.jpg\" alt=\"All of the RMB notes in order.\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-8586\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">All of the RMB notes in order.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>As mentioned above, China&#8217;s currency is officially called the <strong><em>renminbi<\/em><\/strong> (\u4eba\u6c11\u5e01 &#8211; r\u00e9n m\u00edn b\u00ec). This word can loosely be translated as the &#8220;people&#8217;s currency&#8221; &#8211; not a surprise in the People&#8217;s Republic of China. While RMB is the symbol you&#8217;ll see on exchange boards and in banks, people don&#8217;t generally use that word in daily life; rather, they say &#8220;<em><strong>yuan&#8221;<\/strong><\/em> (\u5143 &#8211; yu\u00e1n). It&#8217;s kind of like the difference between saying &#8220;USD&#8221; or just &#8220;dollars.&#8221; Another word that&#8217;s often used informally is <em><strong>kuai<\/strong><\/em> (\u5757 &#8211; ku\u00e0i), like how one might say &#8220;bucks&#8221; in the US or &#8220;quid&#8221; in the UK. The Chinese RMB is printed in 100, 50, 20, 10, 5, and 1 notes, all featuring Mao Zedong on the front and various landmarks from around the country on the back.\u00a0For a more detailed explanation of the different notes and their images, <a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/chinese-currency\/\">check out this past post<\/a>.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_11408\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter post-item__attachment\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-11408\" class=\"wp-image-11408\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-1024x682.jpg\" alt=\"Small change in China.\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-350x233.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-11408\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Small change in China.<\/p><\/div>\n<p>There are also notes and coins for <strong><em>jiao<\/em><\/strong> (\u89d2 &#8211; ji\u01ceo). Ten <em>jiao<\/em> make up one <em>yuan<\/em>, so they&#8217;re the Chinese equivalent of a dime. Colloquially, it&#8217;s called <strong><em>mao<\/em><\/strong> (\u6bdb &#8211; m\u00e1o), which is in fact the same character as the Chairman&#8217;s surname, but this word was actually used well before his time. <em>Jiao<\/em> (or <em>mao<\/em>) come in 1 and 5 notes, as well as 1 and 5 coins. Finally, one <em>jiao<\/em> is divided into ten <strong><em>fen<\/em><\/strong> (\u5206 &#8211; f\u0113n), China&#8217;s penny. These only come in 1 coins, making them basically worthless &#8211; you would need 200 of them just to buy a bottle of drinking water.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">Talking About Money<\/h2>\n<p>The general Chinese word for money is <strong><em>qian<\/em><\/strong> (\u94b1 &#8211; qi\u00e1n). Here&#8217;s a common example where you&#8217;ll hear and use this word:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<h3>How much is it? (\u591a\u5c11\u94b1? &#8211; du\u014d sh\u01ceo qi\u00e1n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>15 <em>kuai<\/em>. (\u5341\u4e94\u5757\u94b1 &#8211; sh\u00ed w\u01d4 ku\u00e0i qi\u00e1n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It&#8217;s common to add the word <em>qian<\/em> after <em>kuai<\/em> when discussing prices. Sometimes people simply say <em>kuai<\/em>, but they&#8217;ll never just say <em>qian<\/em>. Following so far?<\/p>\n<p>Prices aren&#8217;t always even, though. Take, for example, an item that costs $5.99 in America. People would never say &#8220;five dollars and ninety-nine cents.&#8221; Similarly, people in China like to simplify things when talking about prices. Here are a few examples of prices and how people would say them:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<h3>10.5 (\u5341\u5757\u4e94\u6bdb &#8211; sh\u00ed ku\u00e0i w\u01d4 m\u00e1o)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>70.3 (\u4e03\u5341\u5757\u4e09\u6bdb &#8211; q\u012b sh\u00ed ku\u00e0i s\u0101n m\u00e1o)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For lower numbers, it&#8217;s even common to drop the <em>mao<\/em> part entirely. The example above would often be stated simply as \u5341\u5757\u4e94 (sh\u00ed ku\u00e0i w\u01d4), especially in places like your local vegetable market.\u00a0Whenever you&#8217;re dealing with <em>jiao<\/em> or <em>fen<\/em>, people often use the phrase &#8220;<strong>small change<\/strong>&#8221; (\u96f6\u94b1 &#8211; l\u00edng qi\u00e1n).<\/p>\n<p>Speaking of\u00a0prices, sometimes you can bargain for items in China. To do this, you&#8217;ll want to know the words for <strong>cheap<\/strong> (\u4fbf\u5b9c &#8211; pi\u00e1n y\u00ed) and <strong>expensive<\/strong> (\u8d35 &#8211; gu\u00ec). Here are a few useful phrases you&#8217;ll want to remember for bargaining:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<h3>Can you make it a little cheaper? (\u53ef\u4ee5\u4fbf\u5b9c\u4e00\u70b9\u5417? &#8211; k\u011b y\u01d0 pi\u00e1n y\u00ed y\u012b di\u01cen ma)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>It&#8217;s a little expensive. (\u6709\u70b9\u8d35 &#8211; y\u01d2u di\u01cen gu\u00ec)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>It&#8217;s too expensive. (\u592a\u8d35\u4e86 &#8211; t\u00e0i gu\u00ec le)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">Vocabulary<\/h2>\n<p>For easy reference, here are all of the vocabulary words taught in this post:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><em>renminbi<\/em><\/strong> (\u4eba\u6c11\u5e01 &#8211; r\u00e9n m\u00edn b\u00ec) = official term for China&#8217;s currency<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>yuan\u00a0<\/strong><\/em>(\u5143 &#8211; yu\u00e1n) = one unit of Chinese currency<\/li>\n<li><em><strong>kuai<\/strong><\/em> (\u5757 &#8211; ku\u00e0i) = colloquial term for <em>yuan<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong><em>jiao<\/em><\/strong> (\u89d2 &#8211; ji\u01ceo) = 1\/10 of one <em>yuan<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong><em>mao<\/em><\/strong> (\u6bdb &#8211; m\u00e1o) = colloquial term for <em>jiao<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong><em>fen<\/em><\/strong> (\u5206 &#8211; f\u0113n) = 1\/100 of one <em>yuan<\/em><\/li>\n<li><strong><em>qian<\/em><\/strong> (\u94b1 &#8211; qi\u00e1n) = money<\/li>\n<li><strong>small change<\/strong>\u00a0(\u96f6\u94b1 &#8211; l\u00edng qi\u00e1n) = small change<\/li>\n<li><strong>cheap<\/strong> (\u4fbf\u5b9c &#8211; pi\u00e1n y\u00ed) = cheap<\/li>\n<li><strong>expensive<\/strong> (\u8d35 &#8211; gu\u00ec) = expensive<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<img width=\"350\" height=\"233\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-350x233.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image tmp-hide-img\" alt=\"Chinese money.\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-350x233.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803-1024x682.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/DSC04803.jpg 1280w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><p>There&#8217;s been a lot of talk about China&#8217;s currency &#8211; the RMB (renminbi) &#8211; in the past few days, as the People&#8217;s Bank of China allowed it to depreciate by 2% against the dollar. Do a brief search, and you&#8217;ll find tons of articles from financial publications all around the world speculating on the reasons&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/money-talks-in-chinese\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":11408,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[378666,378667,36335,272751,378665,272750,36338,36337,36340],"class_list":["post-11407","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-chinese-bills","tag-chinese-coins","tag-chinese-currency","tag-chinese-money","tag-chinese-yuan","tag-kuai","tag-renminbi","tag-rmb","tag-yuan"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11407"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11407\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11412,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11407\/revisions\/11412"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11408"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}