User Comments - chris
chris
Posted on: A Complicated Cab Ride
April 17, 2012 at 11:16 PMThat was a few years ago mate! Now the starting fare is 13rmb with an automatic 1rmb petrol surcharge on top, so effectively rmb14. I think when I first arrived it was only 9rmb.....
Posted on: A Complicated Cab Ride
April 17, 2012 at 4:51 AMThanks John for the clarification of when to use 沿 and when to use 跟，I had never realised this distinction before.
Posted on: WithstAnding 和，跟，and 与
April 17, 2012 at 4:41 AMpretz, i think "cru" is some sort of past imperfect (or whatever grammatical term should be used!!) form of the verb "croire". Now I'm really scraping the bottom of the barrel in terms of my French recollection.
Posted on: WithstAnding 和，跟，and 与
April 17, 2012 at 4:01 AMhehe, maybe it was just me, but I actually initially translated the French "cru" in that sentence as the Chinese "以为" rather than the English "thought (mistakenly)"!!
Posted on: WithstAnding 和，跟，and 与
April 17, 2012 at 3:57 AMIt's funny, I also studied French from age 11-16 back in the UK and I swear that my Chinese studies since then have also indirectly improved my French. Not sure how that works - maybe it's thinking about grammar, speech patterns, etc that just trains the brain to think more linguistically! It also helps that French uses similar alphabet to English and many of the words look quite similar to the English equivalents of course, at least when written, so you can make an educated guess at what's being meant.
Also, perhaps bizarrely given UK's proximity to France, but my greatest exposure to spoken French has actually been in Shanghai! A number of my clients are actually Frenchmen. Strange world.
Posted on: ChinesePod Meetup
April 17, 2012 at 3:40 AMIn office at moment, without VPN. Will wait till I get home to take a look. I turned up very late to the Malone's gathering so didn't get a chance to meet that many people. Plan to rectify that this weekend!
Posted on: ChinesePod Meetup
April 17, 2012 at 3:06 AMHi rich, didn't realise you were working at Cpod now! The link doesn't work for me unfortunately. Was this the Malone's meet up? If so, can't believe it was over 2 years ago already...
Posted on: ChinesePod Meetup
April 17, 2012 at 2:40 AMIs there a definite cut-off for the event at 5pm? I'm actually on a biz trip the back end of this week and won't land back in SH until around 1pm on Saturday. I plan to head straight to People Squared, but am slightly worried that it might all be wrapping up by the time I get there, particularly if I experience the obligatory flight delays!
Posted on: Considering a Credit Card
April 17, 2012 at 12:09 AMHi floalvarez, I'm hesitant to reply given my poor track record recently with Connie having to step in to correct me! However, I'll give it a go anyway:-
基本上就是，你要还钱的这种都是奴
I think this must be a "shi/是" because Jenny is saying all these 'paying back money types of things'. But I agree that it sounds more like a 'chi' than a 'shi'. Fingers crossed I'm right this time:)
Posted on: A Complicated Cab Ride
April 18, 2012 at 3:30 AMTotally agree. Was talking with friends about this the other day. I think it's a function of the fast rate of income/wealth growth amongst people living in Shanghai relative to what are still ridiculously low taxi fares (London, NY anyone?!). To put into context, one stop on the Tube in Zone 1 in London costs around £4 these days I think. Even with the very weak Sterling exchange rate against RMB these days, the starting taxi fare of RMB14 translates to about £1.40 and actually gets you a long way before it ticks over to RMB15. Taxi fares, I think, are becoming discretionary expenditure for more and more people in SH that they simply don't need to think/worry about.
In my more selfish moments, when waiting in the rain for what seems like an eternity on a Friday night for a taxi, I do wish the starting fare was more like RMB50-60 so there would be less demand ;-)