右 – You4 – Right

And 左 – Zuo3 – Left.

They look pretty similar. Inside right you can see 口 – Kou3 – Mouth, and in left it is 工 – Gong1 – Work. Not sure if there is any deep meaning there.

個 – Ge4 – (a measure word)

One of the charming features of Chinese is the measure word. If you want to say a quantity of a certain kind of thing in English, you just say

(number) (thing)

Like “one duck” or “five people” or “ten minutes”. Not so in Chinese, instead you have to say

(number) (measure word) (thing)

For example

五隻豬 – Wu3 Zhi1 Zhu1 – Five (measure for pigs and some other kinds of animals) Pigs

There are different measure words for all different categories of objects. 個 is the most common one, and is used for people, and seems to also be used when no other one fits. But there are HUNDREDS more, for all different seemingly random categories of things. Sometimes one measure word is used for multiple unrelated things. Here’s just a few to give you the flavor:

把 – Ba3 – handfuls, things with handles, and some abstract things
顆 – Ke1 – small spheres
棵 – Ke1 – trees, cabbages
口 – Kou3 – population, mouthsful, wells
挂 – Gua4 – string-shaped things, strings of things
班 – Ban1 – crowds, classes, scheduled transport vehicles
臺 – Tai2 – performances, engines
具 – Ju4 – tools, corpses

Yes, even corpses get their own measure word, for all the times you need to refer to great stacks of dead bodies. This whole business is so complicated that Jenny isn’t even 100% sure that 隻 is the right one for pigs. It probably depends on the breed or something like that.

㦤 – Yi2 – Amiable

This is a very obscure word. It might not render well, or at all, in your browser. I had lots of trouble finding it in Unicode, for a while I thought they might not have even made a Unicode character out of it. But, finally, with Jenny’s help I found it. Why?

康㦤 – Kang1 Yi2 – Sharena! She was our secret guest at the Zoo.

Judy named her this way because she wanted her to be healthy (recall 康 – Kang1 – Healthy) and well liked, so the story goes. Her younger sister’s name had a different motive.

The zoo was great! I now like giraffes, but I’m pretty sure they’re not from Earth. Look for a posting with more pictures in the next few days at m.info.

Update: In some browers this character renders as a Korean word. You can tell if your browser is rendering it wrong by clicking here. It should look like the picture under “The Unicode Standard”. If the picture under “Your Browser” is different, then your browser is showing it wrong (for some unknown (to me) reason).

康 – Kang1 – Healthy

康涅狄格 – Kang1 Nie4 Di2 Ge2 – Connecticut. Also shortened to 康州 – Kang1 Zhou1. 州 means State, so is Connecticut the healthy state?

(I used to always overhear people asking Jenny, in Chinese, where we lived. She would reply 康州 – Kang1 Zhou1. I assumed it meant “condo”, only recently did I learn the truth.)

康 also has something to do with our Special Guest for the trip to the Zoo tomorrow. Can you guess what it is?

以 – Yi3 – Use, According To

This word is part of an expression that Jenny gave me as my “expression of whenever she feels like teaching me one” the other day.

以為 – Yi3 Wei2 – Believe, Consider That.

我以為你是豬 – Wo3 Yi3 Wei2 Ni3 Shi4 Zhu1 – I think you’re a pig.

(That is the same 為 that appears in Why and Because.)

動 – Dong4 – Act, Do, Move

物 – Wu4 – Thing, Object

So what is a Thing that Moves? 動物 – Dong4 Wu4 – Animal!

And if you put them in a 園 – Yuan2 – Garden, you have a 動物園 – Dong4 Wu4 Yuan2 – Zoo. Which is where we’re going this weekend!

熱 – Re4 – Hot

It kind of looks like this character is sweating, doesn’t it?

熱鬧 – Re4 Nao5 – Hot Noise — Lively, Bustling

台北很熱鬧 – Tai2 Bei3 Hen3 Re4 Nao5 – Taipei is very lively.

虎 – Hu3 – Tiger

虎 means Tiger by itself, but the more complete way to say it is 老虎 – Lao3 Hu3 – (literally) Old Tiger.

Jenny and I are both Tigers, according to the Chinese zodiac. It goes by years instead of by months. By the western zodiac, I’m Pisces. Tiger-Fish isn’t that cool. But, Jenny’s a Tiger-Lion. Watch out!

中文.com has an interesting expression:

虎頭蛇尾 – Hu3 Tou2 She2 Wei3 – Tiger Head, Snake Tail

It means “impressive start, disappointing finish”.

行 – Xing2 – Do, All Right, Capable

To ask somebody if they can do something you might say 你行不行? – Ni3 Xing2 Bu4 Xing2? – You can or can’t?

行 is tricky, though. You can also pronounce it Hang2. In this case, it means Line, Row, Company, Business, Profession. When 行 is used as Hang2 (and when any word has a second pronunciation) it is called 破音字 – Po4 Yin1 Zi4 – Broken Sound Word.

安 – An1 – Peace, Calm, Quiet, Content

安 is a picture of a woman (女) under a roof. You’ll see this one written on candles in places like Pottery Barn a lot.

早安 – Zao3 An1 – Good Morning
晚安 – Wan3 An1 – Good Night

Good night.

螞 – Ma3 – Ant

Actually you have to say 螞蟻 – Ma3 Yi3 to say Ant.

渴 – Ke3 – Thirsty

渴 by itself means thirsty, but you can also say 口渴. I used to always think this is what Coke was called, but it’s not.

可 – Ke3 – Can, Able To

There’s a million expressions of the form 可-Verb, which usually mean something like Can Verb or Can Be Verbed. For instance:

可以 – Ke3 Yi3 – Can Use — Can, Able To
可愛 – Ke3 Ai4 – Can Love — Cute
可笑 – Ke3 Xiao4 – Can Laugh — Funny, Laughable
可怕 – Ke3 Pa4 – Can Fear — Scary, Dreadful
可口 – Ke3 Kou3 – Can Mouth — Tasty

That last one is part of what Coca-Cola is called in Chinese: 可口可樂 – Ke3 Kou3 Ke3 Le4. It means something like “Tasty and makes you happy”. There apparently is some truth to the story about Coca-Cola being originally transliterated as something meaning “bite the wax tadpole” but I haven’t been able to piece together what that would have been yet.

蠟 – La4 – Wax
蝌 – Ke1 – Tadpole

Maybe it was 口蝌口蠟?

飯 – Fan4 – Cooked Rice

Yesterday’s word only means uncooked rice. Cooked rice is 飯.

Rice is important. At meal time, you say it’s time to 吃飯 – Chi1 Fan4 – Eat Rice, even if you’re not having rice. The three meals are known as 早飯 – Zao3 Fan4 – Morning Rice — Breakfast; 午飯 – Wu3 Fan4 – Midday Rice — Lunch; and 晚飯 – Wan3 Fan4 – Evening Rice — Supper. And a really good job is a 鐵飯碗 – Tie3 Fan4 Wan3 – Iron Rice Bowl.

米 – Mi3 – Rice, Meter

I’ve mentioned 米 before. Not only does it mean Rice, it also means Meter. What else is there? How do you say Gram? Am I going to do another of those dull tables that I get so excited about? No! Somebody beat me to it:

SI Unit and Prefix Names in Chinese

This is the JACKPOT! Meter, Kilogram, Second, Kelvin, Ampere, Mole, Candela, … Micro-, Pico-, Nano-, Kilo-, Mega-, Giga-, even Exa-, Peta-, Femto-, and Atto-! My favorites! They’re all here!

京 – Jing1 – Capital, Ten Quadrillion

京 appears in both 東京 – Dong1 Jing1 – Tokyo (East Capital) and 北京 – Bei3 Jing1 – Beijing (North Capital). But here’s the real reason why it’s the word of the day. I’ve been working on my table of Ridiculously Large Chinese Numbers. Turns out big Chinese numbers have some great names: Inconceivable! Unmeasurable! And BIG NUMBER! The only numbers we have with even halfway interesting names are Googol and Googolplex.

(in case you don’t know, a googol (not misspelled) is

1
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000
0000000000

and a googolplex is a 1 with a googol zeroes after it)

等 – Deng3 – Wait, Class, Rank, Grade

We are now 等待 – Deng3 Dai4 – Waiting to hear back on another offer on a house… It seems like this one will go through. SO SCARY!

Today’s experiment……..?

關 – Guan1 – Close, Shut, Turn Off, Concern, Involve

So open is 開 and close is 關. They look similar. The frame around both is 門 – Men2 – Door.

Inside 開 is 幵 – Jian1 – Even, and inside 關 is something meaningless and confusing, but it seems to have something to do with threads or looms.