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Niehao, wan yu zhou ting si xin hai yu.
Welcome to Take away Chinese.
I'm Yeo -Heun Lin, and joining me today is Steve Hatherley.
Hello, Steve! Niehao, hi.
Thanks for having me back.
Always a pleasure having you in the studio talking about interesting issues.
to end in this show learning some Chinese.
Every show, actually.
Actually, yes. What have been some new phrases or just one thing that's constantly changing our world is the fact that the way we consume knowledge, we consume information, we acquire entertainment, is different, isn't it, these days?
It's totally different.
I mean, the way that we consume content is now completely different from the way that it used to be.
I remember when I was a kid my sisters used to have watch parties for that's something that people do and I think they still do it in the West when their favorite show comes out on TV they'll invite their friends over to their house and they'll have some dinner or some drinks or whatever and then they'll watch their favorite show and I remember when I was a kid my sisters had their favorite show and it was on once a week, uh, and they would invite their friends over every single week and they would have their watch party.
My point is, now oftentimes shows get released a season at a time.
You don't have to wait a whole week to see episode two or episode three or episode four because episode one, two, three, four, five, all the way to the end of season gets released at the same time.
And then when that started, the idea of binge -watching came about where you'd finish a whole season and maybe a weekend or two, maybe, depending on your time.
There's that. Then there's short -form videos where our attention span has gotten so short that we can't really sit through anything longer than a few minutes.
So yeah, the way that we consume content, and there's a million more examples, But it's completely different now.
It's completely different, and in the meantime, they started to actually, with the development of technology, and, to be more precise, with the development of internet, and also, the fact that everybody can be a content generator, a quite new, quite different form of entertainment would be live streaming.
Because think about it.
I mean, live shows definitely have their perks, have their special attractions.
You love live shows because it's full of excitement, it's full of possibilities and it's the real reaction and everything.
But one thing about live show, today's live streams, is that the one, the person who is doing the live stream, they can actually constantly interact with the commenter.
With whoever's watching, sending a comment, there is the possibility that this person would talk to you directly, reply to your comment or answer your questions, and that is definitely something that's building the engagement and intensify the closeness between the live streamer and the watcher.
years ago I hosted my own show and I said to my producer let's do a Saturday caller show I'll come to work on Saturdays we'll do it live and we'll just take collars we'll start the show with a question and we'll keep that question going for the whole show and he said to me what if no one calls and I I said, I don't know.
Let's find out. Let's find out.
He said, this is really dangerous.
I said, let's find out.
We kept that show going for a year.
Wow. Yeah, we just depended, we'd started the show with one question and then just waited for the phone to ring and it rang consistently and that's what the show was.
Taking calls, talking to callers about what they thought about the question that we were posing that day.
And I love that about live interactions, live shows.
Of course you're gonna have mistakes sometimes.
That's what makes a live show a live show, but in my opinion, it's the best way to be.
Yes, and one of the sub -category of these live shows, these live interactions, especially those that are not made by a certain, for example, media group, but by individual who are starting a online chat with other internet users, other netizens watching the show, is this sub -category is selling product via live streaming.
And the perk is definitely out there.
You get to ask questions about the certain product that you're interested in.
You can have the person try it on.
It's kind of like, you know, TV shopping shows.
Yes. It's like home shopping, but you're there, kind of.
And that is one of the, So I feel like it's one of the most popular programs on especially social media platforms.
Of course there are certain for example brand doing these kind of live stream shows, introducing their product.
There are celebrities, they would share some of the product that they have tried and they liked and they would start a deal with the brand and start selling the product and there There would be occasions of this person is just, you know, doing advertising or different forms.
I mean, where there is a deal, you cannot expect the deal to be perfectly 100 % genuine from the good heart of the seller.
You know what I mean?
The point is there are these different forms and live stream shopping started to be one of the most popular ways of making these deals happen for both the shopper and the seller.
it's definitely mutually beneficial nowadays.
One hundred percent it is.
The obvious benefit for the seller is that you can answer those questions live, taking care of any concerns that your potential customer may have, and visa versa.
That's the benefit for the potential customer as well, is that they can have any questions they have about the product answered.
And it's just such a natural way to sell things and buy things these days, considering the technology that we have available to us at our fingertips, why wouldn't people do it?
And livestream shopping in Chinese actually would be, perfect.
So means direct, or without any delay, in the sense, boring is broadcast.
So, 桘經 would be broadcast directly, where whatever you do, it's been broadcasted.
So, it's live streaming.
So there is also, for example, 桘經 being 桘經 would be recorded.
So, a recorded show would be 桘經.
But to be honest, I don't think the concept of 桘經, or the using of the word 桘經 to 桘經 is quite that common in today's everyday life, except for example, in the media sector.
People do not use that quite so much.
Yeah, exactly. No, you're right because live streaming is something that's commonly done through social media apps but recorded streams on social media apps, you can watch again.
You can you can rewatch.
You can watch the playback.
We call it hui fang.
Hui fang. So hui being come back to, return to, and fang is boh fang.
So you'll go back to the beginning and you play that will beICK that means to replay to watch the playback yes I see do you know what we call that in English for a TV show a rerun yes to run it again and you don't hear that word very much anymore no see that's the thing so anyways chippewa being live stream and I used the word my whoa so sell product my whoa yes whoa whoa up here whoa whoa that's the product or the good and mai means sell but in fact a much much more common way of saying this is dai huo, so dai means bring, so the reason is that at the very beginning when live streaming was not for the purpose
of selling product or introducing product it was just a live show it can be a live show or any kind of show.
And the show, when you're watching the show, you feel like, wow, that lady looks amazing in that outfit.
I would love to get a dress like that.
And you get to see that the Jibo or the content or the program in itself, it does not hold the purpose of setting anything.
Yet it brings the beauty, the greatness of the product right into your eyes, making you want to buy it.
So instead of making advertisement, What they do is that they accidentally make you want to have the same copy, the same version, the same style of thing that the celebrity or whoever's in the show is using.
There was an app. I don't know if they still have the app but there was an app where you could search what a celebrity or an actor, I should say, was wearing in a particular scene in a particular show and I watched some television series and in one particular scene the actor was wearing this really cool pair of sunglasses.
So I thought how am I gonna find those?
I don't know the brand and he's not talking about the sunglasses he's just wearing them in the scene.
Anyway I searched it on the internet and it led me to this app and you can type in the app this scene from this show and the actor's name and there were the sunglasses right there, and I ordered them online immediately.
See, you see the beauty of watching a show, watching a program, and finding something that you just meet your eye and you want to get it.
And that was the very beginning of using live streaming as a way to advertise something.
It was done much more subtly, it was done much more On purposely, that was the first stage and later on, people realized, hey, we're doing live streaming.
We can talk to shoppers directly.
We can answer their questions, take care of their concerns.
That is a good way to sell our product.
They started to actually sell the product with the live stream, but people are still using dye hu instead of my huang more commonly.
So the content creator, they have the show here and they bring the product along with the show.
so that becomes the most common way of saying live streaming shopping so live streaming shopping mostly you would hear people say Zhi Bo Dai Huo Ah you say it together yes so Zhi Bo is live streaming Dai Huo together but if in any common sense you would not see Dai Huo being the common Chinese used for selling product only in Zhi Bo Dai Huo they are seeing got it, got it, got it and I don't need any more places or any more reasons to shop for anything else online, it's just too good and it's too convenient and it's too convincing as well.
Yes, today we're going to introduce to you some of the keywords, expressions, different ways to express things under the theme of online or livestream shopping.
For our dear listeners, if you're interested in Chinese culture and you want to get a grip on the Chinese language, then this is the show for you.
Stick with us for 30 minutes and you'll soon see the rewards!
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We've already talked about zhübuo being livestream?
do you know what is a live -streaming studio?
A Jesuit studio. That's basically right, because when we talk about studio, we're basically talking about a room.
So a room is a fengjian.
Which makes live -stream studio a zhubujian.
You cut off part of the word.
Zhubujian. Because in the word fàng jiàn, fàng is kind of like a house, and jiàn is a room, and together fàng jiàn means a room.
And jiàn carries the meaning of room already.
This is the kind of phenomenon that you will see constantly a lot in the Chinese language.
That is, when there are two words and you're putting them together, you kind of want to shorten them in different ways by omitting certain characters, and you put them together.
Okay, interesting. Yeah, so it's actually quite useful.
Can you think of another example of that?
It's actually very common.
The only problem is that there's no rule of which character to omit, so you're gonna have to remember each and every example.
For example, yeah, you're from I'm from Canada, I'm from China.
So if we're talking about 中国, China, 中做, Canada, 中国, so relationship.
So the relationship between China and Canada, in Chinese, you can shorten it to 中做, 中做, that's China, 中做, China, Canada, 中做, relationship.
You're taking the first syllable from each of the two country names, putting them together.
Okay. but there's no rule for that.
You can't apply that to other examples.
For example, the first syllable of this word combined with the first syllable of the next word, sometimes it's the second syllable.
Okay, so it's just example by example.
Example by example.
And also, when it comes to this one, actually, 笓口豕 in itself is already a word.
It's kind of like a set phrase word word, but it's a word, and for 笓口豕, This one is actually quite, you can kind of say it's a tiny little Ru here.
That is, if you're talking about a certain room, you always use Jian using Fang Jian The Jian as the room character in the word.
We have Zhibo Jian for a livestream studio.
We also have, for example, Xixioxian meaning washing hands.
So, the room that you wash your hands in, that'll be a bathroom.
Yeah, Xixi now you know, that's Xixioxian.
Or if you're thinking about doing make -up, then make -up is huà zhòng.
huà zhòng Uh -huh. And huà zhòngjian would be the make -up room.
huà zhòngjian huà zhòngjian huà zhòngjian Perfect.
See, that's a tiny little rule here.
Mmm. There must be a million examples of that.
Yes, actually there are.
I got it. So that's something that you just don't worry about trying to learn all of them at the same time.
Just learn them as they come to you I guess.
Yes, and remember them.
And gradually, you would figure out the non -rule rule.
That is, you kind of have a feeling of how to put these things together and omitting certain characters.
Got it. When you get more of a feel for the language.
Yes, in Chinese we say yu gan.
Ah, this is also a good one, yu yan, language.
Gan gan ju feeling.
Gan ju, eh? Gan ju is the Chinese word for feeling.
Ok. For example, if you say, I feel cold.
扛員有就問贗 interchange, I feel cold.
扛員有就問贗, I feel, 你員有就問贗, I feel, 你員有就問贗, I feel, 你員有就問贗, a little bit, 你員有就問贗, cold.
扛員有就問贗, so 扛員有就問贗 is feel.
It can be a verb and also, can be used as a noun.
So ,è yu kan yu yan de gan chu, the feeling of the language." Ah -ha!
Goodness me, this is a little above my level.
It's okay, you're gonna get yu kan a bit later.
I feel, but I do understand what you mean.
So that's going to be in the back of my mind when these examples come to me for sure.
Yes, and also, when your yu kan gets better, your feeling for the Chinese language gets better, it kind of feels like you know how to do it.
You cannot explain it 100%.
But you know how to do it, you feel which one is right.
And you're mostly right.
Then it says something about your yu kan, it means your yu kan is really good.
I understand. And once you're in a jjubojian, you're in a live stream studio that is designated for product selling, you're very likely to shia dan plays an order.
Ah, xia, dan… So xia carries the meaning of down, so put down an order.
It means like you put it down, you make place.
Like place, precisely.
And dan is a table or a sheet or an order, in this sense.
Dan can sometimes be understood as also a measure word.
Itan is one order. Lian dan, two order.
But in itself, I always understand it as a piece of paper carrying out all the information about the purchase you're making.
You put it down, you place the order and that's it.
Okay, understood. For dan, i dan, for example, one order, you can use that in any situation when you're asking for something.
For example, can you ask that at a restaurant please, meaning like one serving?
Well, not really, but it is used in a restaurant setting when you want to pay the bill.
You say May Dan, May Dan.
Yes. That in my memory, or in my head, I usually understand it as Cai Dan, so Cai Dan is a menu.
So if you're buying, or paying for the orders you select from the menu, you create basically you created your own little menu for this dinner.
Your own order sheet.
Your own order sheet.
And your mài, then you are buying the sheet, you're paying the bill.
So, dàn could be used in this scenario in this way.
But you see, the meaning of dàn are always, the meanings are always associated with each other a little bit.
But I understand why you're saying this.
You can xià dàn in online purchasing situations much more often.
because this is still a relatively official word.
And if you're making a procurement for example, you're someone who's making, you're placing a really huge order with a plant, with a factory, then xia Dan is the right word.
But if you're going into a real - Ice cream shop?
Yes. Then the word xia Dan is a bit strange.
Okay. So in that case you in English you could say can I get one vanilla ice cream please?
But you would not say plays an order for Yeah, same idea.
Yeah, okay It's it would be weird.
It would be a little bit weird The person working would totally understand what you said, but they might think wow.
You're being very official about this ice cream purchase Yes.
Yeah, so the thing is, if you're doing online shopping, even if you're only paying for two yuan for two pencils, you can still use Xiao Dan.
Got it. So that's Xiao Dan and another thing about online shopping, about these forms of purchasing that I really enjoy is that there's always a discount.
One way or another, And we say Yù huì, yù huì, yes, so Yù meaning good or excel at certain things.
In Chinese primary school, I think secondary school, we do not do that any more.
But in primary schools, when the teachers are grading your papers or your homework, they sometimes would use Yù liáng zhùng chà, these four Chinese characters.
In English you can use ABCD.
In Chinese, yō means excel.
Perfect. Really good.
Liao means above average.
Good. Liao hǎo is really good but not A level good.
It's kinda like B+.
Zhèng means middle or medium.
Zhèng and chà means bad.
You don't really get chào.
Not in primary school.
No, you don't get bad when you're doing a bad job.
What's the connection then between your in the meaning of discount because you just described it to mean something that's very good Yes, that is a really good question because way carries the meaning of benefit certain kind of benefit so Excellent benefit exactly good benefit.
That means you are getting a discount.
I understand so when you are out shopping and you want to ask for a decreased prize can you simply say qing you Hui?
actually you can or you can say you know your Hui Ma uh -huh so do you have any kind of deal that I can take advantage of?
remember at the very first several episodes we talked about that actual So that was the, you know, quote unquote, official way of saying discount for asking for asking for like 10 % and is 20%, yes.
Yes. Yohua is a bit different.
Yohua it can be a discount, it can be I am sending you one with the right price, with the exact same price, yet I'm giving you one for free.
So technically speaking, you're having a 50 % discount, yet I didn't say it's a 50 % discount is just a kumbal cell kind of mechanism and it can also be I'm giving you product B as a gift if you're buying product A so different ways of giving discounts or giving you a preferential policy with regard to this purchase so if you say yo re mao that means like do you have any specials?
Yes, do you have any kind of plan, any kind of specials.
For example, another way of giving you a discount or giving you again a would be yes.
That actually means free shipping or free delivery is quite common these days in China.
Yes. So Beau cares the meaning of I'm covering this cover it YO is the shipping fee so I would cover the shipping fee for you then you do not have to pay for it or if you want to ask are you covering the shipping fee then you just put ma at the end yoma quite easy so these are some expressions of course we'll also have my eats on yeast so buy one get one for free my being by you want them huh and I'll tell you why you cannot ask people my it's on you mark you're giving me one for free.
Listen, you can. Really?
There's the bread shop.
Well, they probably don't like me, but the bread shop that I go to, it's outside the supermarket, right?
So after we leave the supermarket, we always walk by the bread store.
And one night, they did have a buy one, get one free.
So we stopped at the bread shop, and we bought it.
So then, every time after we walk by there, I ask them every single time, I like they see me and they're like, oh, no.
Every time I ask them, is it buy one get one free.
But I always do like hold up two fingers, like one plus one and they're like, no.
Now you know how to say that in Chinese.
So this might work to my advantage.
If I show them, I've learned how to say this in Chinese.
See, you want me, you want to give you something for free.
How do I say that? Okay.
My ㅗ 솑 일 My ㅗ 솑 Ahhh that's that difficult pronunciation, isn't it?
It's between the J and the Z sound.
But it's halfway between.
See this is a tough one for English speakers.
솑 솑 Yes. 솑 일 솑 일 Yes.
If you really don't want to use 솑 because it's a bit hard to pronounce yet I have to tell you.
This is relatively more sophisticated way and common way of saying it.
But you can use the alternative that is less common, but song means give.
Or stand for free, something.
So also works. Mayith, but I want to learn it this way.
Song. Actually, your pronunciation is a little between 소 and 소.
Yeah. You can hear the tiny difference, right?
It's a bit hard for you to pronounce.
Yet, you can hear the difference.
Okay. 소. 소. With this pronunciation, where does my tongue go?
Where is my tongue located?
The tip of your tongue is hold against, right against to your teeth.
The back of my teeth?
Yes. Upper teeth or lower teeth?
Lower teeth. Ah, lower teeth.
소. 소. Smile a little bit.
Tsong! Yes, perfect!
Now, this is fascinating because I can't think of any example in English, pronunciation example, where your tongue goes against the bottom of your teeth, the back of your bottom teeth.
We do have letter pronunciations or word pronunciations where your tongue goes against the back of your upper teeth.
That's why I asked you for clarification, and when I was trying to practice before, I was putting it against the back of my my upper teeth because that's natural for me.
And when it comes to...
So when you're pronouncing it, put it against the back of your lower teeth.
And when you are finishing it, take it back.
Yes. That's tough. Because you're retraining..
The way you use the muscle of your teeth.
Of your mouth. Yeah, of your tongue.
Of your tongue. Oh, wow.
Uh -huh. And when it comes to song song song song it's steel against your lower teeth But you're tilting your tongue a little bit Okay And when you're pronouncing it you could get it back a little bit So when you're finishing it you withdraw it a little so this one is not too difficult for english speakers Maybe because it just sounds like a very soft s yes song song song song song 정 서 영.
이. 좘이. 집이 서 이. Okay, I'm going to the bread shop after the show today.
And that is how to say these different things in Chinese.
You're listening to Take away Chinese with myself, Ilhanli, and Steve.
We would love to hear from you send us your thoughts via email to learnchinese at cri .com .cn Coming up next let's continue talking about live stream shopping in China, don't go away.
So you will take some Chinese away Welcome back so take away Chinese, I'm Yeohong Lin, teacher, I have a question.
Yes how do you say we are in Chinese?
It depends. Okay cuz I was thinking during that little break that we, you and I, we are kind of like Māi Tsong Hey on TakeAway Chinese we're one plus one.
Except that no one's paying for the show you get it we're just you know free of charge all together I'm the plus one.
No one's paying one getting one for free they're just paying nothing and getting two.
I don't think there's an expression for that nothing get to pay nothing get to now we do have free of charge that's mian fe mian fe so me and miss exempt and faith is a fee so free of charge in total so oh so if I want to ask is this free then I can say minfema yes I can say that but if you need to ask that I'm pretty sure it's not I can't think of a place I cannot use that at the bread shop no don't use it in a bread shop but but if you want a good deal you can go online, and see whether or not you can get a bread online with a cheaper price, because usually you can.
Because these days in China, the e -commerce industry is just booming, it's becoming an important force.
Actually in driving domestic consumption and promoting international trade, for example, in 2023, China's online retail sales exceeded 15 trillion yuan, that is over 2 trillion US dollars.
And among them, China's live streaming e -commerce has developed rapidly.
In 2023, the market size of live streaming e -commerce reached 4 .9 trillion yuan.
That is around 690 billion US dollars.
And you know, the year on year growth rate, over 35%.
Wow. Do you go grocery shopping?
All the time. You go to the store.
I do, I do still go to the store, But I also do online shopping all the time.
It's now a days, it's getting more and more convenient and the convenience actually affects the price in grocery stores like brick and mortar stores as well here in China, not only can you get sometimes a better deal depending on the exact product you're looking for the kind of discount the store is promoting at that time.
Um, it's just you do, if you are really price -sensitive, you do have to make the comparison between the break -and -mortar stores and the online stores, because previously, like several years ago, online stores would definitely give you a better deal.
But it's getting changed a little bit.
It shows the development, actually, I feel like.
Yeah, and it shows the popularity, too.
I have a strategy. So heavy stuff, I buy online.
Yeah and light stuff.
I just go to the grocery store because I still enjoy the experience of actually going to a grocery store and seeing the the colors and the smells and the vibrant atmosphere.
I still enjoy it but I divide what I purchase between online and grocery store.
Heavy versus light.
I don't have a rule because now I feel like online shopping and shopping in a real brick and mortar store are just two parts of the purchasing activity in my life.
Previously, one would go for an online store for a better price.
Now I think it's for a variety of goods, for the delivery.
For example, there's also one way that we call in Chinese, Oratson's when algebra that's doing online shopping or e -commerce the selling place where the merchants are in the rural area, meaning that they're selling certain kind of agricultural product.
The product are hard to find in brick and mortar stores for different reasons.
For example, the store does not import these goods into their store.
Yeah, you can get them online.
And if you're interested in a certain kind of grapefruit that you don't get in this door, right next door, you can get it online.
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
It's become so easy, right?
It's become so easy.
So nowadays, online shopping is becoming a more and more important part of our life.
And we have even shopping frenzy and shopping festivals here in China for the Double 11.
Have you heard of the shadowing?
So what I've heard is that is the biggest one of the biggest, one of the biggest of the year.
Yes. Yes. OK, so tell me about this, and tell me the strategy.
For example, if I guess we can you're a Canadian, you cannot work the strategy.
I cannot even work the strategy.
It's really complicated.
Well, it's not complicated.
It just takes time for you to find the perfect deal because there are just so many different deals and different discounts.
Well, I was going to ask for a more basic strategy.
So if you're interested in buying, I don't know, some home appliance or something like a TV.
Wait, till this period of time.
Okay, right. Make the purchase.
Okay, so if you're living in China and you're gonna make a big purchase, maybe a new computer or new phone or something like that, or some house furniture, and you're thinking about it like two months before, then just wait.
What kind of discounts are we talking about?
We're talking about real, the ones that you would definitely find attractive.
But I cannot give you a number because there are just so many different strategies.
For example some platforms some online shopping platforms would allow you to Exempt 30 when you reach the threshold of 300 Okay, so if you spend 300 then you get you know a certain discount.
Yes okay, and also sometimes is one you spend 5 ,000 you get a certain discount and And that kind of discount can plus the discount that's provided by the brand or by the shop on the platform.
And sometimes when you're buying stuff from different shops on the same platform that shares a same discount, you can calculate the sum amount of money you're going to spend collectively and using the discount.
So it's kind of complicated.
Yet, I think at the end of the day, whether or not you would love to do the math or not.
It's still a sure thing that around this time of the year you can get the best discount.
Yes, okay. And when does that exactly kick off?
1111, Double 11 Festival that is Zhuang Shi Double 11.
So it's the 11th of November, but usually in these years you can see the discount basically specifically, the end of October and the first half of November you'll be able to enjoy that.
Oh, I see. Companies try to get ahead of the game a little bit.
Oh, it must be a really exciting time in China.
Enjoy it and try to use the phrase we've learned today.
And that brings us to the end of today's Takeaway Chinese.
I'm Yeon -ho Lee with Steve here in the studio.
For more episodes of the show, you can visit our website at Radio .cgtn .com and go to the column podcast.
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