User Comments - amber
amber
Posted on: Traffic
September 1, 2008 at 8:50 AMhi dongni,
There are 3 commonly used terms for 'bus':
The most commonly used is 公交车 (gōngjiāochē）
公共汽车 (gōnggòng qìchē) is sometimes used
公车 (gōngchē) is used mainly in Taiwan.
Posted on: What size?
August 29, 2008 at 2:04 AMhi pinkjeans,
Yes, 没关系 (méi guānxi) is more polite-sounding for sure.
Posted on: Taxi Destination
August 29, 2008 at 2:00 AMhi macallus88,
All of those (哪里 and 哪儿, 那里 and 那儿, 这里 and 这儿) are totally interchangeable. Often it's a matter of whether you are from the north or south of China, which one you tend to use.
As for 这 (zhè) and 这个(zhège), if there is a noun following the 这 (zhè), you need a measure word. So you would use 这个(zhège) or 这 (zhè) plus the appropriate measure word.
Posted on: Fortunate Cookies
August 29, 2008 at 1:55 AMhi whymiamor,
I just checked, and the English and Pinyin are there.
Posted on: The Cocktail Party
August 29, 2008 at 1:38 AMhi vikesfaninchina,
In Chinese, the 如果 (rúguǒ) is often omitted. It is the context that tells you if it's an 'if' question or not.
Posted on: Moscow
August 29, 2008 at 1:25 AMhi chris,
你很厉害 (Nǐ hěn lìhai) in either a good or bad way is the same characters, same pronunciation. It's all context, whether people will know which you mean.
Posted on: The 80/20 Rule
August 28, 2008 at 7:04 AMhey henning,
Here are a few example sentences to further demonstrate the difference between 成本 (chéngběn) and 费用 (fèiyong):
开一家饭店需要多少成本？
Kāi yījiā fàndiàn xūyào duōshao chéngběn？
这种表的成本高，所以价格也高。
Zhèzhǒng biǎo de chéngběn gāo，suǒyǐ jiàgé yě gāo.
出国旅行费用很高。
Chūguó lǚxíng fèiyong hěn gāo.
这个服务的费用是多少？
Zhège fúwù de fèiyong shì duōshao？
Posted on: The 80/20 Rule
August 28, 2008 at 6:59 AMhi mikenotinjubei,
You can also say:
二十八十定律 (Èrshí bāshí dìnglǜ), but you know the Chinese love to shorten things!
Posted on: What size?
August 28, 2008 at 6:56 AMhi billglover,
It's to give more information about the noun. In this case, how big of a shoe.
Posted on: Traffic
September 2, 2008 at 1:33 AMYes! The 面包车 (miànbāochē) is called such because it's shaped like a loaf of bread... kinda.