Help Beginning Chinese or Japanese or Korean

 
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Flag of China.
Chinese is handy in China and Singapore.
Where else would Chinese be useful?


From Wikipedia Japanese flag.
Toshihiro Oimatsu from Tokyo, Japan - The sun and the moon Uploaded by Smooth_O

Asian Grammar Summary
Chinese and Japanese picture symbols are the same, like the symbol for no smoking in Europe is a cigarette with a line through it; although the British would read it aloud as NO SMOKING whilst the French and German speaking people would say it in their language.

Duolingo Forums

I am deleting items from my email inbox when I hesitate over a question about something symbolic, Korean or Japanese. I am tempted to just delete it. After all, I cannot read it. However, just in case it is something useful, I must check, so I click on it. I am rewarded with an interesting discussion on question words in Chinese.

Chinese Question Words
Ma (the Chinese word) appears to be the equivalent of which, used in Chinese (Mandarin) when asking a yes / question.

Na appears to be the equivalent of what.

English Questions
What's more, this provokes a discussion about the English translation of which and what which arises further down the forum. What is the difference between which and what is a frequent question, a frequent confusion.

 I am a teacher of English, a home tutor, a trainer, and I do Language Evaluation, sometimes called Grammarian, on the agenda of Toastmasters International speakers' meetings which I attend about six or seven times a week.

Which and What - When Do You Use Them?
The English word which is asking the listener to select from two or more choices, a finite list. For example, 'which country are you from' is correct, because you are often presented with a finite list. There are about 150 countries in the world, offered in click boxes when you fill in your address online.

The word what means the possibilities are endless, and the person asking the question often has no idea of the answer. For example, a restaurant server or event organizer might offer you a set meal and tell you that the main dish choices are meat or fish. She or he asks, which do you want?

If, however, the server asks 'what do you want?', that is an open ended question. You might reply, 'The dish with the fewest calories'.

A questioner might ask, 'what are you doing?' The options are endless. The questioner has no idea of the answer.

So, you now know what to do, which to choose.

But the delights continue.


Symbols For America
The most delightful and surprising discovering is the Asian words for America.
The Korean word for America is 미국 (Mi-guk) which means land of beautiful people.
So, by simply saying that the listener is American, the Korean is paying a compliment!

Translations
Google Translate shows the Chinese pinyin in small text underneath the Chinese characters when translating.

PERSON
人 means person

QUESTION
ma (no tone), is used only for yes/no questions.

TRANSLATIONS INTO PINYIN
Google Translate shows the Chinese pinyin in small text underneath the Chinese characters when translating.

The moral of the story is this, read the forums. They offer fascinating insights into other languages, other cultures, and your own language, and the English language.

Useful Websites
duolingo.com
https://www.yellowbridge.com/chinese/dictionary.php

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. Please share links to your favourite posts.