It’s time for our first Mandarin Secret!
Every once in a while,
I will share with you some secret about the Mandarin language that will make the learning even more fun.
The hint of this secret is
Legos!
Why Legos?
Well,
lego blocks come in all shapes and sizes and colors
yet they are not very interesting when there is only ONE piece.
But… when we put them together,
we can build some pretty amazing things.
The same is true for the Chinese language.
Each Chinese character is a different block.
Sometimes you can use them by themselves
but often times,
it’s much more interesting
when you can combine them to build more words.
Speaking of singing, we’re ready for our second Mandarin Secret.
The hint for this secret is
Musical notes!
As it turns out,
speaking Mandarin is a lot like singing
because Chinese words have tones
just like musical notes.
Sometimes a word stay flat
like mā...
sometimes they go up
like má...
sometimes they go down and then up
like mǎ...
and other times they fall down
like mà
So, every time you and I speak Mandarin,
we are making music!
The hint of this secret is...
a box?
Ah! Chinese characters are meant to fit neatly inside a square box.
This is because the Chinese people believe in balance and harmony.
Having the characters fit inside a box
also makes it much easier to read.
Now you can ask your friends how old they are
and tell them how old you are.
You just have to pick the right number from
yī、èr、sān、sì、wǔ
liù、qī、bā、jiǔ、shí
But wait
That might work for you,
but I need a number much much bigger than ten.
Fortunately,
there is a Mandarin Secret to help me out
with bigger numbers.
The hint for this secret is
Math!!
To make bigger numbers in Chinese,
all we need is some basic math.
You see, here I have ten pencils.
yī、èr、sān、sì、wǔ
liù、qī、bā、jiǔ、shí
But wait, I’ve got more.
What’s ten plus one?
Eleven!
Since eleven is one more than ten,
in Chinese, we just put ten
and one together to make eleven.
shí yī
We do the same for twelve so it’s ten plus two.
shí èr
We follow the same pattern for
shí sān
shí sì
shí wǔ
shí liù
shí qī
shí bā
shí jiǔ
What’s the number that comes after nineteen?
Twenty!
If we put my hands and toes together,
we get twenty.
In other words,
twenty is just two sets of 10s
so in Chinese, we call twenty
èr shí
For thirty, which is three sets of 10s,
we call it sān shí
We call forty, which is four sets of 10s,
sì shí
Just like that,
you have mastered Chinese numbers.
Let’s try counting from one to twenty together.
yī、èr、sān、sì、wǔ
liù、qī、bā、jiǔ、shí
shí yī、shí èr、shí sān、shí sì、shí wǔ
shí liù、shí qī、shí bā、shí jiǔ、èr shí
nǐ zhēn bàng！
Now we can meet people who are older than ten years old!