{"id":12269,"date":"2016-06-27T09:00:32","date_gmt":"2016-06-27T13:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/?p=12269"},"modified":"2016-06-22T13:30:02","modified_gmt":"2016-06-22T17:30:02","slug":"location-words-chinese-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/location-words-chinese-one\/","title":{"rendered":"Location Words in Chinese (Part One)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Grammar may not be fun, but it sure is important. While I much prefer introducing our readers to beautiful places and giving cultural insights, I&#8217;m also here to help you in your quest to learn Chinese. Thankfully, Chinese grammar is quite simple &#8211; at least compared to many other languages, especially English! Today, we&#8217;re going to look at location words in Chinese and how to use them. To start, let&#8217;s learn a really important character:<\/p>\n<h1 style=\"text-align: center\">\u5728 (z\u00e0i)<\/h1>\n<p>This means &#8220;in&#8221; or &#8220;at,&#8221; or basically &#8220;to be located somewhere.&#8221; It&#8217;s in both the question and answer when asking &#8220;Where is\/are&#8230;?&#8221; Take a look at this example:<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">\u6211\u7684\u94a5\u5319\u5728\u54ea\u91cc?<br \/>\nw\u01d2 de y\u00e0o shi z\u00e0i n\u01ce l\u01d0<br \/>\nWhere are my keys?<\/h3>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">\u5728\u684c\u5b50\u4e0a<br \/>\nz\u00e0i zhu\u014d zi sh\u00e0ng<br \/>\n(They&#8217;re) on the table.<\/h3>\n<div id=\"attachment_12273\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter post-item__attachment\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-12273\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12273\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/06\/1-DSC02253.jpg\" alt=\"Of course!\" width=\"600\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/06\/1-DSC02253.jpg 600w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/06\/1-DSC02253-350x233.jpg 350w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 600px) 100vw, 600px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-12273\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Of course!<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Whenever you&#8217;re asking for the location of something in Chinese, you&#8217;ll ask &#8220;&#8230;\u5728\u54ea\u91cc?&#8221; Now let&#8217;s take a look at how to answer the question and what words to learn.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">Location Words<\/h2>\n<p>Here are the 12 main words that you&#8217;ll want to remember when talking about location:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<h3>on\/above (\u4e0a &#8211; sh\u00e0ng)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>under\/below (\u4e0b &#8211; xi\u00e0)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>in front (\u524d &#8211; qi\u00e1n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>behind (\u540e &#8211; h\u00f2u)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>right (\u53f3 &#8211; y\u00f2u)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>left (\u5de6 &#8211; zu\u01d2)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>in (\u91cc &#8211; l\u01d0)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>out (\u5916 &#8211; w\u00e0i)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>east (\u4e1c &#8211; d\u014dng)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>west (\u897f &#8211; x\u012b)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>north (\u5317 &#8211; b\u011bi)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>south (\u5357 &#8211; n\u00e1n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>If you&#8217;ll look back to the example question above, you&#8217;ll see one of these characters was used in the answer:\u00a0\u5728\u684c\u5b50\u4e0a. Directly translated, this is &#8220;at-table-on,&#8221; meaning &#8220;They&#8217;re on the table.&#8221; Based on that formula, take a guess as to how you&#8217;d answer &#8220;They&#8217;re under the table.&#8221; What do you think it is?<\/p>\n<h3 style=\"text-align: center\">\u5728\u684c\u5b50\u4e0b<br \/>\nz\u00e0i zhu\u014d zi xi\u00e0<\/h3>\n<p>These are very simple examples, but sometimes we have to add another character to the end of the sentence.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">\u8fb9\/\u9762 (bi\u0101n\/mi\u00e0n)<\/h2>\n<p>Oftentimes, one of these two characters is added after a direction word, i.e.:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"text-align: left\">\n<h3>\u524d\u9762 (in front of)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left\">\n<h3>\u5317\u8fb9 (to the north of)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left\">\n<h3>\u5916\u8fb9 (outside)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li style=\"text-align: left\">\n<h3>\u91cc\u9762 (inside)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Basically, you can use either\/or for all of the twelve words above. It&#8217;s not always necessary, though, as I&#8217;ve shown in the previous example. In spoken Chinese it&#8217;s rare to add either of these characters to \u4e0a or \u4e0b. Generally speaking, though, it doesn&#8217;t matter which one you use. People will understand you either way.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">A Few Special Cases<\/h2>\n<p>There are a few other words we can learn here that are special cases:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<h3>beside\/next to (\u65c1\u8fb9 &#8211; p\u00e1ng bi\u0101n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>opposite (\u5bf9\u9762 &#8211; du\u00ec mi\u00e0n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>in the middle (\u4e2d\u95f4 &#8211; zh\u014dng ji\u0101n)<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For the first example, it&#8217;s not alright to use \u9762, while for the second it&#8217;s not alright to use \u8fb9. To say that something is &#8220;in the middle,&#8221; you don&#8217;t use either, but rather use \u95f4 instead. I&#8217;m sure that seems confusing, but it&#8217;s not too hard to remember.<\/p>\n<h2 style=\"text-align: center\">Practice<\/h2>\n<p>We&#8217;ll get into some more detailed grammar in the second post, but for now that&#8217;s enough to study.\u00a0To practice what&#8217;s been covered in this post, try translating these into Chinese. Remember, there&#8217;s usually two different ways to answer.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<h3>Where&#8217;s my book? On the sofa.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>Where are they? In the car.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>Where&#8217;s the post office? Next to the bank.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>Where&#8217;s the dog? Outside.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<h3>Where&#8217;s Tianjin? South of Beijing.<\/h3>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>I&#8217;ll give answers as well as some more grammar instruction in the next post, so check back in a few days.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<img width=\"350\" height=\"233\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/06\/1-DSC02253-350x233.jpg\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image tmp-hide-img\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/06\/1-DSC02253-350x233.jpg 350w, https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2016\/06\/1-DSC02253.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 350px) 100vw, 350px\" \/><p>Grammar may not be fun, but it sure is important. While I much prefer introducing our readers to beautiful places and giving cultural insights, I&#8217;m also here to help you in your quest to learn Chinese. Thankfully, Chinese grammar is quite simple &#8211; at least compared to many other languages, especially English! Today, we&#8217;re going&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/location-words-chinese-one\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":12273,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[272723,8894,69375,451894,451896,13464,69374,451895,451893,127571,127248],"class_list":["post-12269","post","type-post","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-beginner-chinese","tag-chinese","tag-chinese-grammar","tag-chinese-location-words","tag-describing-location-in-chinese","tag-easy-chinese","tag-learn-chinese","tag-location-in-chinese","tag-location-words-in-chinese","tag-mandarin","tag-speak-chinese"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12269","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=12269"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12269\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12277,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12269\/revisions\/12277"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12273"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12269"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12269"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/chinese\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12269"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}