Contents for "The Personal Fix"...
henning
October 04, 2007, 08:28 AM posted in General DiscussionAs some might remember I won a "Personal Fix" in Movie Madness #16 which can include up to 20 items.
I still haven't finished compiling the list yet. At first I wanted to make it a Chengyu-Special-Fix, but then I decided that it is much more useful to do one with function words (connectors, special adverbs,...), that lift me beyond the standard "如果", "居然" and "反正s".
This is how my list looks right now:
何必
宁愿
之所以
总归
莫过于
日益
毫不
仍然
依然
要不然
Notice that this list is by no means "fix".
Any comments on this & other good ideas?
Of course I hope the result will become public some day everyone can benefit from it.
goulnik
October 13, 2007, 12:00 AMThx John (you don't get higher on the MAU list for that one though ;-) I'll definitely stay away from 莫过于 then, and most 成语 to boot until I'm comfortable with all common expressions. Talking of which, I picked up "Popular Chinese Expressions" in a bookshop yesterday 《汉语流行口语》 from Sinolingua, 最新版 by 李杰群 and 李杰明. It comes with a mp3 CD and has 200+ expressions about face 面子 and classified under 给自己面子、给别人面子、 不给自己面子 and 给别人面子. For each expression there are a couple of short 对话 and an explanation of context 语境 (yǔjìng） both in English and Chinese. There's no 拼音 (pīnyīn) other than along the list of expressions in the TOC 目录 (mùlù) which is ok by me. Some of these expressions are common and simple, e.g. 实话实说 （shíhuàshíshuō) to tell the truth, or 看怎么说了 (kàn zěnmeshuō le) that depends. But there's also 酷毙了 (kùbì le) he's very cool, 跟着哄 (gēnzhe hōng) following the crowd or 万万想不到 (wànwàn xiǎngbudào) I can't believe it! I might upload the list if there's interest. BTW, I produced what must have been my first use of 把 returning to the hotel last night when I found out that 我把钥匙忘在房间里, I had forgotten my key in the room.
trevelyan
October 05, 2007, 04:32 AMthis is looking like it'll be a pretty high-class fix....
excuter
October 05, 2007, 05:19 PMlooks like it will be a all night long fix :-)
man2toe
October 05, 2007, 09:06 PMＨｏｗ ａｂｏｕｔ 如何？
man2toe
October 07, 2007, 01:27 AMHow about 難道?
goulnik
October 07, 2007, 02:41 AM反正 (fǎnzheng) anyway 其实 (qíshí) actually, in fact 我无所谓 (wǒ wúsuǒwèi) I don't care
goulnik
October 07, 2007, 03:27 AMHenning, can you confirm how 莫过于 (mòguòyú) is used? The CPod dictionary only says 'not to exceed', Wenlin has 'nothing is more...than'. Here's an example from a google search: 爱情中，最难得的莫过于坚持 - in love, nothing is more important than persisting. So, the structure would go something like : A 的莫过于 B / nothing is more A than B
Kyle
October 07, 2007, 04:56 AMI was going to ask about that as well. I also have a question on the usage of 总归. I was told that it's rare to use just 总归. 总结归纳 is more common. Also, from what my colleague can explain, it sounds very simpliar to 总而言之. The only distinction she could make was that 总结归纳 is used as a verb.
henning
October 07, 2007, 08:11 AMThe way those words are used is exactly what I want to learn with my Fix. I found them in my Vocab tagged with "Function Word" so they must be of CPod origin..
henning
October 05, 2007, 03:40 AMThanks, Kyle. Good ones. Any others?
goulnik
October 11, 2007, 12:38 AMheard today, 一无 (yīwú) not in the least also useful : 尤其 (yóuqí) especially 另一方面 (lìngyīfāngmiàn) / 另方面 on the other hand
John
October 11, 2007, 01:40 AMHenning, You might want to be careful about including too many words with vague translations or with translations with English that overlap. There's no context in a vocabulary Fix, so you don't want to confuse yourself.
TaiPan
October 11, 2007, 02:02 AMHenning, Since you've been to the factory and met the crew, I think you should let them put their own special fix together for you. 20 phrases, tailor-made for you. TaiPan
henning
October 11, 2007, 04:57 AMThanks everybody. Good ones. @ John: you are right. I took out 依然. I am not overly concerned about vague translations, though. Does this Fix includes example sentences ? Maybe even (as this is a lower Intermediate Fix) translations? Here is my list: 01. 何必 (there is no need) 02. 宁愿 (would rather) 03. 之所以 (the reason why) 04. 总归 (after all) 05. 莫过于 (nothing more than) 06. 日益 (day by day, increasingly) 07. 毫不 (hardly) 08. 仍然 (still) 09. 要不然 (otherwise) 10. 总而言之 (to summarize...) 11. 由此可见 (from this we can see...) 12. 无法选择 (as a substitute for 没办法) 13. 另一方面 (on the other hand) 14. 一无 (not in the least) 15. 何況 (much less, let alone) 16. 果然 (sure enough) 17. 起初 (at first) 18. 除非 (unless, only if) 19. 因此 (because of this) 20. 不必 (need not) @John: Do you think this list OK? Do you need it per email also?
trevelyan
October 12, 2007, 01:11 AMWe're fine with it this way, Henning.
John
October 12, 2007, 01:41 AMhenning, I might tweak your translations slightly for you. I'd say some of these words/phrases are of questionable utility, but it won't hurt you to learn them, and figuring out for yourself what's used the most in natural speech is an important part of the acquisition process... :)
John
October 12, 2007, 01:59 AMSputnik, I have to take issue with your translation of 莫过于 (mòguòyú), and Wenlin's, and ours. Let's look at a few other examples of its usage (via Google): 人世间最痛苦的事莫过于穷人购房 Nothing in the world is more painful than a poor person buying a house. 亲情之最莫过于母爱 When it comes to the heights of affection, nothing tops maternal love. 人生最痛苦的事莫过于此。 Nothing in life could be more agonizing than this. Wenlin's definition is on the right track, but the ellipsis (...) is really confusing. I don't understand why it comes in the middle of their definition. Wenlin says:
莫过于[-過於] mòguòyú v.p. nothing is more...thanThis leads me to believe than an ADJECTIVE should go where the ellipsis is, so you could say something like, "nothing is more gratifying than" (but then you still need to finish the phrase). In reality, 莫过于 should be followed by a NOUN. In our examples, we see these words or phrases following it: 穷人购房 (a poor person buying a house), 母爱 (maternal love), 此 (this). Obviously, you can't stick a noun where the ellipsis is in Wenlin's definition. What comes before 莫过于 sets the scope. So I give a thumbs down to Wenlin's definition for being misleading, even though semantically it's on the right track. Oh, and I should mention that 莫过于 is NOT commonly used. You are not likely to hear it in daily conversation at all, although it might pop up in your reading from time to time. It's an expression comes from classical Chinese. I had to research it a bit myself to be sure I was giving the best possible explanation.
henning
October 12, 2007, 04:35 AMCool. The utility of those is extraordinary high compared to the rather topical selections I pondered over at first... :) For understanding written stuff they are definately all helpful.
man2toe
October 07, 2007, 06:50 PMHow about 何況?
Kyle
October 04, 2007, 09:00 AMSome of my personal favorites: 总而言之 (To summarize...) 由此可见 (From this we can see...) 无法选择 (a good substitute for 没办法)