Hi everybody, BigBong here and today
I have the pleasure to be with my good old friend Simon
Salut!
So we've known each other for about 20 years now
That's right
But I've always wanted to invite him on my channel
because he is so international
Indeed, he is half French, half Brazilian
born in Kinshasa, Congo and the most amazing thing is that
he is going to teach me Mandarin Chinese
That's right!
Why don't you introduce yourself
Hi everyone, my name is Simon
I'm French, my mom is Brazilian
I was born in Democratic Republic of Congo
When I was young, I lived 5 years in Beijing
I was in Beijing French School
So I couldn't really speak Chinese at the time
I went back to France in 2006
and I forgot all my Chinese
So I started learning Chinese again at the university
Now I'm still studying Chinese
I'm a 5th year university student
I'm studying for a master's degree
Yeah that's it
Wow man, that's pretty impressive!
So guys, a white boy who can speak fluent Chinese
Almost fluent!
But that was really convincing, from my perspective
I'm not there yet...
Ok but anyway, today you're still going to be teaching me
some Chinese because that's the concept
I'm Japanese, I'm Asian but I don't speak Chinese...
So for those of you who think that all Asian people speak Chinese
Please stop thinking that way because it's not true
If you place a Japanese, a Chinese and a Korean person
in the same room, they won't be able to understand each other
So of course, the Chinese population is huge
So you have more chances of guessing
that an Asian person speaks Chinese
but it's not necessarily the case
And today, we're going to be studying Mandarin Chinese
So I've seen those videos in which
you know, you have a white man or woman who goes
in Beijing or in China, and they surprise the people
because they have a perfect Chinese
Actually, you could do this kind of videos
Yeah, I could try...
Until I get to that level
I'd like to learn a few very useful sentences
Ok, in Chinese?
In Chinese, yes!
For example, if I'm in a bit of a trouble
and I want to ask for help, how would I say that?
How would I say "help"?
Like if you are in the street?
Yeah
First of all, if you want to stop someone in the street
you have to be polite and say [bù hǎoyìsi]
[Bù hǎoyìsi] is like "sorry, excuse me"
And then, "can you help me" would be [nín kěyǐ bāngzhù wǒ ma]
Or if you want to be a bit more casual
you can also say [nín kěyǐ bāng bāng wǒ ma]
or maybe just [bāng wǒ yīxià ma]
[Nín kěyǐ bāng wǒ yīxià ma?]
Though wait, if I'm drowning
like it's the sea, I'm drowning
and I'm asking for someone's help
How would say "help"?
Yeah "save me"!
So it's [jiù wǒ]
I think that's very useful because you know
sometimes on some websites, you'd see like
"words to know in a language: hello, how are you, thank you"
Well I know these words in Chinese
But I think it's always useful to know more
Like if you're in an emergency situation
When it's dangerous, yeah
Now a sentence, everybody should know in any language
it's "where are the toilets?"
Of course, so "toilets" is [cèsuǒ]
So to say " where are the toilets"
it would be [cèsuǒ zài nǎ'er]
You have to be careful with the first [cè]
because in Chinese, there is [ci] and [ce]
So this one is [cè]
C-E with the pinyin
[Cèsuǒ zài nǎ'er]
Or if you want to be more correct
you can say [cèsuǒ zài nǎlǐ]
And maybe another way to say "toilets"
because sometimes you want to hide that you're going to the toilets
just to say that you're going to the "hygiene room"
You can just say [wèishēngjiān]
If you talk fast, usually they can somehow understand
even though you make a few mistakes with the tones
I think Chinese people can still understand you
But I would still want to learn the correct way
Yeah the proper way of saying the right tones
Alright so now, if someone its bugging you
someone is bothering you, in the street, in a restaurant
How would you say "leave me alone!"
I would say [bié fán wǒ]
It's like "don't mess up with me" basically
Is it vulgar?
No no, it's all right: [fán] means like
For example, when someone is annoying you
you can say [a fán sǐle]
You're really annoying
It's annoying to death
[Sǐ] is "death" right?
[Fán] is kinda like "annoying"
So if you want to say "leave me alone", you can say [bié fán wǒ]
like don't annoy me
So yeah, now you're getting yourself in a bit of a fighting situation
And the people don't want to leave you alone
How would you say "what's your problem man?"
"Do you want a piece of this?"
Like "you want to fight with me, or something"?
They would say like [gàn ma nǐ]
It's not like "what's your problem?"
It's more like "what are you doing man?"
Because [gàn] is the sense of "doing" usually in
a somehow, not rude, but colloquial way
[Gàn ma nǐ]: whatcha doin'?"
[Gàn ma nǐ, nǐ yào dǎjià ma]
You wanna fight?
Or they also say [kàn shénme nǐ]
What are you looking at?
Now you understand that you can't possibly contain the situation
how would you say "call the police"
Call the police: [Bàojǐng]
That's it?
Yeah it's pretty short
Or [dǎ diànhuà bàojǐng]
Use your phone to call the police...
Or you can add [kuài] at the beginning
It means "fast": [kuài bàojǐng]
Now let's go into more colloquial sentences
Things we wouldn't necessarily learn or find in text books
So for example, we're having a good time now
and you told me a story that's unbelievable
how would I say "are you kidding me?"
It's [nǐ dòu wǒ ne]
[Ne] is the surprise at the end of the sentence
Or you can say also [nǐ kāiwánxiào ma]
[Kāiwánxiào] means "to crack a joke"
How would you say "I'm going to miss you"
[Wǒ huì xiǎng nǐ]
Say that again
[Wǒ huì xiǎng nǐ]
Bong Sou, I'm going to miss you...
How do you say your name in Chinese actually?
[Xīméng]
[Xīfāng de xī, ménggǔ de méng]
That's how you do it properly
[Xīfāng de xī] means "Xi from the West"
[Ménggǔ] is Mongolia actually
So I'm like "the West Mongolese guy"
It makes no sense...
It was my university teacher who gave it to me
and she gave me [Xīméng]
So you didn't think of changing your name?
No, I'm good with it
It's a funny name
[Dàbàng wǒ huì xiǎng nǐ de]
[Dàbàng], yeah that's my Chinese name
Now you want to express how impressed you are about something
like "oh my god, you speak Chinese, that's awesome!"
How would you say "that's amazing man!"
That's awesome!
In China, I think the most popular way would be [niúbī]
It sounds a bit funny
Actually, it literally means "cows C"
Oh my god ok
He used the C-word, for you guys
Because I don't want to be demonetized by YouTube
No man, I think it's all right, it should be ok
A lot of Chinese people say it, I mean, mostly young people
I'll censor the English part
I don't know why they came up with this
Yeah it does mean "that's awesome"
Or if you want to be maybe more correct in a way
or polite, you can just say [niú]
[Nǐ tài niú]
You're so cow!
You're awesome, basically
Because [bī] is the bad word
Some people, they just take it out
but a lot of words use [bī]
[Dòubī] like "you're a funny guy"
You can say [dòubī]
It doesn't event make sense because [dòu] is the [dòu]
we used before: "are you kidding me?"
[Nǐ zài dòu wǒ ne]
So to say you're a [dòubī], it means you're a funny guy
like a silly, amusing guy kind of
You can find this word in many words basically
Wow oh my god, ok it's good to know
Yeah but if you want maybe another word
it could be [yōuxiù]
It's more for people actually [nǐ hěn yōuxiù]
It means "man, you're awesome!"
Cool!
When you moved back to France from China, from Beijing
You taught me a word which I still remember
It's [hào chī]
"It's delicious", right?
I don't think your brothers speak Chinese, nowadays
They forgot also a lot
Because I'm the only one who started to study again at the university
But I believe they still remember that [hào chī]
Yeah of course, everybody knows that
But let's take it to the next level
how would you say "oh man, this food is so good"
So damn good?
I would say [zhège cài gāisǐ de hào chī]
It's like "it's good that you want to die"
So Simon, these are a lot of expressions I have to work on
but I know you're also pretty active on social media
Where can we find you?
So actually, I'm working for a Chinese company at the moment
And we're also doing Chinese videos
So it's about French culture and Chinese culture
the mix between the two
And so, it's on the Chinese TikTok
It's Douyin and so if you want to follow me
you have to download the Chinese TikTok basically
It's not available on Google Play Store
but you can download it from Google, the web
Yeah, so the name of the account is bbf_life
So if you want to see a white guy speaking in Chinese
You also have Instagram, right?
Yeah I do have Instagram
I don't do anything about languages though
But the company has Instagram as well
Yeah it does but it's not very much active anymore
We just started when I arrived actually, as an internship
Maybe in the future
So what would be your advice to someone who wants to learn Chinese?
I would say: "you've got to go to China man!"
Even though, it's a bit complicated to go with the visa and stuff
but once you get there, it's really an amazing country
It's true, it seems a bit closed, I guess
because of the government and stuff
but once you get there, people are really welcoming
warmhearted and you can really get to know the culture
They'll be really happy to hear you speak Chinese
You can just say [nǐ hǎo] and they'll be like
You speak so good Chinese man!
I don't know if it's because they think I'm Chinese
but when I say [nǐ hǎo] for example
they think I speak Chinese fluently
And they'll be like "bla bla bla"
But maybe for you, because you're white, it's a bit more impressive
Not even man
I just say [nǐ hǎo] and they think I'm fluent in Chinese
and they start to speak super fast
I'm like "slow down man, slow down!"
I'm not a native, it's obvious!
But it's still a good experience to go there
knowing that it's a huge country, so I guess
there are many places to go
Different dialects too
In the South, they speak Cantonese
but there is, I don't know, probably more than 50 dialects
There is a lot of minorities
The majority is Han people
but I think there is more than 50 ethnicities in the country
So it's a very diverse country, depending on where you go
So yeah super interesting, the food is super good
There is a lot of good stuff there
Anyway, thank you very much for accepting my invitation
My pleasure!
We've learned many expressions today
I hope you enjoyed it
See you!