More Cool Things That Are Slightly Easier To Say In Mandarin

Following on from the first list, although I am a native English speaker, sometimes it can be a bit easier to use Chinese to quickly express some concepts. Here are a couple more Chinese phrases that can be a bit easier to say in Mandarin.

4.

辛苦了!
xin1ku3le

Literally: ‘Tiring/painful!’.

Closest English equivalents: ’Thanks a lot’/‘Appreciate it/Wow’.

Why it’s good: this phrase literally means ‘tiring/painful’ but really means something like ‘thanks’ or ‘I appreciate it’. The advantage of this phrase is that 辛苦了 shows you appreciate the difficulty of something at the same time as it expresses your gratitude, giving it an advantage over a phrase like ‘I appreciate it’. You can also use it more broadly to thank people not for helping only you, but for ‘contributing’ somehow to the betterment of society as a whole - for example, you could say ‘辛苦了’ to some firefighters walking past, whereas saying ‘I appreciate your work’, in English, might sound a bit odd.

Example sentence: ‘I also got you some donuts as well on my way back.’
‘辛苦了! 辛苦了!’

5.

水
shui3

Literally: ‘Water’.

Closest English equivalents: ‘To do something dodgy/To cut corners/To be ridiculous’.

Why it’s good: in Chinese ‘water’ can also symbolise ‘dodgy-ness’ or unreliability. So, for example, saying that you’re adding ‘water’ to your work means that you’re half-assing it, not doing a proper job for your employer. If you say an issue has a lot of water, it means that there are dodgy people involved and/or deceptions, so it’s hard to accurately judge the situation. While the word ‘dodgy’ in English is quite good, it’s not always as versatile as using ‘water’.

Example sentence: ‘I don’t dare do online buying and selling, the 水 is too deep’.
‘I have a feeling Joe from Accounting is putting a bit of 水 on it.’

3 Expressions Better Said in Chinese

Even though I am a native English speaker, sometimes I actually prefer to use Chinese to express some things. Here are three Chinese phrases where I find it easier to use the Chinese expression rather than say it in English (assuming the other person knows Chinese!)

1.

天作孽犹可违 自己作孽不可活
tian1zuo4nie4you2ke3wei2 zi4ji3zuo4nie4bu4ke3huo2

Literally: ‘If heaven does something against you, you may escape, but if you do something against yourself, you are done for.’

Closest English expression: ‘Sometimes, a person is their own worst enemy.’

Example sentence:

‘My co-workers are angry at me cos I didn’t send my work to them on time, but it wasn’t my fault, because we lost power.’
‘Oh, that’s fine then. As long as it’s not your fault, you can survive anything. 天作孽犹可违自己作孽不可活.’

2. 

塞翁失马焉知非福?
sai4weng1shi1ma3yan1zhi1fei1fu2

Literally: ‘(Like) Sai Weng losing his horse, how do you know this is not a blessing in disguise?’

Closest English expression: ’This whole thing might have a silver lining.’

Context: In ancient China, the story goes, there was a man named Sai Weng. His horse ran away, and horses weren’t exactly cheap then. So he felt terrible. But then it returned later and not only that, it had a mate! So Sai Weng had gained another horse and was quite chipper about it. Unfortunately, his son broke his leg later while riding one of the horses, and so Sai Weng’s supposed ‘good luck’ led to his son now being crippled. However, soon afterwards, the Emperor called up every available man to fight in a war, and his son was obviously not required to fight due to his broken leg. Nearly everyone died in the ensuing battle, hence the broken leg had probably saved his son’s life, and so misfortune was once again turned into joy.

Example sentence:

‘I failed my university course. It looks like I’ll have to stay back another semester.’
‘塞翁失马焉知非福? Who knows, maybe you can use your extra free time to develop one of your business ideas…’

3.

触到(someone)的底线
chu4dao4(someone)dedi3xian4
or
底线
di3xian4

Literally: ‘To touch (someone’s) bottom line.’

Closest English expression: “to be more than what (someone) can accept/to be past the pale/to be unacceptable”.

Context: In English the word ‘bottom line’ is unfortunately already taken - usually it means the fundamental status of a person’s financial situation or a company’s financial situation, and so this expression cannot be literally translated.

The reason why this expression is so useful is that ‘触到…的底线’ expresses more clearly than the above English expressions that the reason why some act is not acceptable is because it infringes on a person’s basic principles, which is a bit more descriptive than the English expression ‘I can’t accept this’. It seems to leave open more room for negotiation in an argument, because you’re indicating it’s not necessarily the case you can’t accept some kind of compromise, but that this particular action, expressed in this way, will go against your fundamental principles.

Example sentence: 

‘How strictly are employees evaluated here?’
‘Basically if you don’t do anything to 触到(our)底线, such as not come to work on time, use company time to surf Facebook, or miss deadlines, there shouldn’t be any reason for an employee to need to leave.’

We do Chinese to English translation!

Facebook: www.facebook.com/chinese2english
Website: www.willfanyi.com

Blog beginning

Will: After doing several months of work directly for a translation and subtitling company, we have decided to branch out and offer our services on the Internet. We are fortunate in that we live in Sabah, Malaysia, where the cost of living is quite low if one is paid 'Western' wages!

We plan to use this blog to post our thoughts on the translation business and give people a window into our experience of it and perhaps even life in Sabah.

It's an exciting step.

Constance: It is true what they say about food in Malaysia. I've missed it all these years being overseas. It's good to be back again. I hope I can offer my language skills as a service. Exciting times ahead.