Text

请喝茶

Notes

1. “王老师, 您好!” — “Hello, Mr. Wang.”

   In Chinese, the surname precedes instead of following any form of address.

   E.g.: “王大夫” — “doctor Wang”, “丁先生” — “Mr. Ding.”

   “您” is the polite form of the pronoun for the second person singular “你”. It is normally used to address one’s elders and betters, as in “您好” For the sake of politeness or courtesy it is also used to address someone of one’s own age, especially when meeting him or her for the first time.

2. “你吸烟吗?” — “Do you smoke?”

3. “请进!” — “Come in, please.”

   “请...” is an expression of polite request.

4. “不客气。” — “You’re welcome”, “Be our guest”, “Make yourselves at home”.

Pronunciation drills and conversation practice

Initials	(j) q x
Finals	in ian uan

1. The four tones

   qīng	qíng	qǐng	qìng	}	qǐng jìn
   jīn	jín	jǐn	jìn
   xiē	xié	xiě	xiè	—	xièxie
   xī	xí	xǐ	xì	}	xī yān
   yān	yán	yǎn	yàn
   kē	ké	kě	kè	}	kèqi
   qī	qí	qǐ	qì
   huān	huán	huǎn	huàn	}	huānyíng
   yīng	yíng	yǐng	yìng

2. Combinations of tones

   “˚” in the “Combinations of tones” of this lesson and the later lessons stands for the neutral tone. “˚” выступает в качестве показателя легкого тона.

   “ˉ” + “ˉ”
   xī yān
   kāfēi

   “ˉ” + “´”
   Zhōngguó
   huānyíng

   “ˉ” + “˚”
   tāmen
   xiānsheng

   “ˉ” + “˘”
   qiānbǐ (penci)
   tīngxiě (to have dictation)

   “ˉ” + “`”
   jīqì (machine)
   jīngjù (Beijing opera)

   “´” + “`”
   bú shì	bú kèqi	bú xiè	bú niàn	bú kàn

3. Tone changes — half 3^rd tone

   qǐng jìn
   qǐng xī yān

   qǐng hē shuǐ
   qǐng hē jiǔ

   qǐng hē chá

4. Read out the following disyllabic words and expressions:

   kànjiàn
   xiūxi
   niánqīng
   qǐ chuáng
   xǐhuan
   shíxí
   diànyǐng
   duànliàn
   yínháng
   jīnnián

   (to see)
   (to rest)
   (young)
   (to get up)
   (to like)
   (to practise)
   (film, movie)
   (to take exercise)
   (bank)
   (this year)

5. Try to pronounce the following polysyllables in quick succession:

   Wǒ niàn.
   Nǐmen tīng.
   Gēn wǒ niàn.
   Qǐng nǐ niàn.
   Hěn hǎo.

   (I read.)
   (You listen.)
   (Read it after me.)
   (You, please, read it.)
   (Very good.)

Entertaining a guest

1.

2.

3.

4.

5.

Phonetics

How to pronounce these initials

Initial q [tɕ‘]

The initial “q [tɕ‘]” is the correspondent aspirated to the unaspirated “j”.

Initial х [ɕ]

The initial “х [ɕ]” is produced by raising the front of the tongue to (but not touching) the hard palate leaving a narrow opening through which the air escapes causing audible friction. The vocal cords do not vibrate in producing this sound.

Rules of phonetic spelling: “in”, “ing”

When forming syllables by themselves, “in” and “ing” are written as “yin” and “ying” respectively.

Situational tasks

1. Translate the following interrogative sentences into Chinese and give a negative answer:
   а) Do you smoke?
   
   б) Will you drink tea?
   
   в) Will you drink coffee?
   
   г) Will you drink milk?
   
   Make these interrogative sentences imperative.

2. Invite to come in, sit and drink water or tea:
   а) a teacher with a surname of Wang (Wáng);
   
   б) a teacher with a surname of Ding (Dīng);
   
   в) Mr. Ma (Мǎ).
   

Listen to the following words and word combinations. Write them in transcription pinyin. Lay tone marks:

气；几；西；心；性；墙；想；先；脸；辆；侵；
请；前；天；选；全；去；需；言；样；
去年; 必需; 香烟；研究；首先；迎接; 请求。

Write the following sentences in Chinese characters adding tone marks above them:

1. Dàifu, nǐ hǎo!
2. Bàba bù xī yān, māma yě bù xī yān.
3. Lǎoshī, qǐng jìn，qǐng hē chá.
4. Zhè shì Zhōngguó chá.
5. Huānyíng, huānyíng, qǐng xī yān.
6. Xièxie nǐde shū. — Bú kèqi.
7. Nǐ hē shénme? Hē chá ma?
8. Zhōngguó chá hěn hǎo (hē).

Write the following word combinations and sentences in Chinese characters and pinyin, lay tone marks:

hē咖啡；北京啤酒；王太太；日本啤酒；hē牛奶； 德国啤酒；王先生；美国咖啡；先生们。

1. Qǐng hē 咖啡。— Xièxie, wǒ bù hē.
2. Nǐ hē shénme? — Wǒ hē 日本啤酒.
3. 王先生hē德国啤酒、王太太hē Zhōngguó chá.
4. Zhè shì 咖啡, nà shì 牛奶, qǐng nǐmen hē.
5. Qǐng xī yān. — Zhè shì shénme yān? — Shì 美国 yān.

Translate the following sentences from English into Chinese (in a copybook {recommended} or in the input forms below). Use the polite form.

1. — Hello, master Wang!
   — Hello. Welcome, come in, please.
   
2. How are you? — I’m fine.
   
3. Come in, please. Will you drink tea?
   
4. This is Chinese tea. Chinese tea is very good.
   
5. Please, drink beer. What kind of beer will you drink? — I’ll drink German beer. German beer is very good.
   
6. Please, smoke. — I don’t smoke.
   
7. Will you drink coffee? — Thank you. — You are welcome.
   



8. What will you drink? — I’ll have tea. Thanks.
   
9. Chinese drink tea, Russians also drink tea. Americans drink coffee.
   
10. He is a Chinese. Chinese don’t drink milk.
    
11. Hello. Who are you? What country are you from?
    
12. Mrs. Wang, come in, please. Please, make yourselves at home.
    
13. This is Mr. Ma’s book. He is a Chinese teacher.
    
14. All the doctors are busy. I am not busy.
    
15. Whose map is this? — This is my friend’s map.
    

Do you know?

The Complex and Simplified forms of Chinese characters

The ultimate aim of the reform being carried out in the Chinese writing system is to gradually replace the ideograms with a phonetic writing system. Before this can be done, the characters should first of all be simplified and the number of strokes of the characters reduced so as to relieve much of the burden of both users and learners of Chinese. The simplification of Chinese characters is twofold: reduction of the number of the characters (mainly through the elimination of the complex variants) and reduction of the number of the strokes of which a complex character is composed (by the popularization of the simplified characters).

This simplification conforms entirely to the general tendency of development of the Chinese characters towards greater simplicity. The simplified forms, as compared with their complex equivalents, are much easier to learn, to memorize, to read and to write. A very few examples will help to show the advantages of the simplified over the complex forms: “们（們）”，“妈（媽）”，“欢（歡）” and “进（進）”. The simplified forms used in this book are all among those published by the Government of the People’s Republic of China.

A note: For the readers’ convenience, the original complex eduivalents of the simplified characters are also given in the book.