Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
David: Welcome to chineseclass101.com, I am David.
Echo: 嗨,大家好,我是 (Hāi, dàjiā hǎo, wǒ shì) Echo.
David: And we are here with elementary season 1, lesson 22.
Echo: The Chinese Mystery Meet.
David: Right and we are not talking about meeting people. We are talking about restaurant.
Echo: Yeah…肉。(Ròu.)
David: Meeting…Yes so we’ve got a dialogue that takes place in a Chinese restaurant. It could be anywhere.
Echo: Yeah.
David: It could be near you. And we’ve got two people who’ve just ordered dinner and they are starting to sit down and eat.
Echo: Exactly.
David: Okay. So we are going to take you to the dialogue in a sec. Before we do, we want to remind you
Echo: If you are having trouble understanding
David: Just come to our site and download our transcripts.
Echo: Yes.
David: Because they are going to make everything clear.
Echo: 没错。(Méi cuò.)
David: That being said though, let’s get to the dialogue.
DIALOGUE
A: 我从来没吃过这么好吃的鱼。(Wǒ cónglái méi chīguò zhème hǎochī de yú.)
B: 鱼?这不是鱼。(Yú? Zhè bù shì yú.)
A: 我们点的不是鱼吗?(Wǒmen diǎn de bù shì yú ma?)
B: 不是,是鸡肉和猪肉。(Bù shì, shì jīròu hé zhūròu.)
A: 差不多。反正很好吃。(Chàbuduō. Fǎnzhèng hěn hǎochī.)
Once more slowly.
A: 我从来没吃过这么好吃的鱼。(Wǒ cónglái méi chīguò zhème hǎochī de yú.)
B: 鱼?这不是鱼。(Yú? Zhè bù shì yú.)
A: 我们点的不是鱼吗?(Wǒmen diǎn de bù shì yú ma?)
B: 不是,是鸡肉和猪肉。(Bù shì, shì jīròu hé zhūròu.)
A: 差不多。反正很好吃。(Chàbuduō. Fǎnzhèng hěn hǎochī.)
Once more, with English translation.
A: 我从来没吃过这么好吃的鱼。(Wǒ cónglái méi chīguò zhème hǎochī de yú.)
A: I have never eaten fish this good.
B: 鱼?这不是鱼。(Yú? Zhè bù shì yú.)
B: Fish? This isn't fish.
A: 我们点的不是鱼吗?(Wǒmen diǎn de bù shì yú ma?)
A: We didn't order fish?
B: 不是,是鸡肉和猪肉。(Bù shì, shì jīròu hé zhūròu.)
B: No. This is chicken and pork.
A: 差不多。反正很好吃。(Chàbuduō. Fǎnzhèng hěn hǎochī.)
A: Same thing. Anyways, this is really good.
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
David: Chinese people do this. They take Pork and disguise it as every other meat. You know what I am talking about.
Echo: Yeah.
David: Yeah.
Echo: Yeah I know.
David: Okay. Anyway we’ve got a vocab section where we are going to cover the names of meats and other kinds of foods.
Echo: Yes.
David: So useful stuff when you are eating out.
VOCAB LIST
Echo: 鱼 (yú)
David: Fish.
Echo: 点 (diǎn)
David: To order.
Echo: 差不多 (chàbuduō)
David: Almost.
Echo: 鸡肉 (jīròu)
David: Chicken.
Echo: 猪肉 (zhūròu)
David: Pork.
Echo: 好吃 (hǎochī)
David: Delicious.
Echo: 香 (xiāng)
David: Fragrant.
Echo: 素食 (sùshí)
David: Vegetarian food
Echo: 素食 (sùshí)
VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE
David: Let’s take a closer look at some of these words and phrases. The big takeaway of this lesson is the kinds of meat.
Echo: Yes.
David: Okay. First we’ve got fish.
Echo: 鱼。(yú.)
David: Fish.
Echo: 鱼。(yú.)
David: Second tone
Echo: 鱼。(yú.)
David: So that’s fish, easy to remember. We’ve also got Pork.
Echo: 猪肉。(zhūròu.)
David: And chicken
Echo: 鸡肉。(jīròu.)
David: And beef.
Echo: 牛肉。(Niúròu.)
David: And in all of these cases, the second character is
Echo: 肉。(Ròu.)
David: Which literally means flesh. So literally for pork, it’s pig flesh.
Echo: 猪肉。(zhūròu.)
David: Chicken is
Echo: 鸡肉。(jīròu.)
David: And beef
Echo: 牛肉。(Niúròu.)
David: So if you go to a restaurant, even if you don’t know what kinds of dishes they have got in particular, you can use these to order food that you are going to like.
Echo: For example 我想吃鸡肉。(Wǒ xiǎng chī jīròu.)
David: That would be, I want to eat chicken.
Echo: 我想吃鸡肉。(Wǒ xiǎng chī jīròu.)
David: And you can swap that in and say I want to eat beef.
Echo: 我想吃牛肉。(Wǒ xiǎng chī niúròu.)
David: Or I want to eat pork.
Echo: 我想吃猪肉。(Wǒ xiǎng chī zhūròu.)
David: Right. If you don’t want to eat any meat at all
Echo: 素食。(Sùshí.)
David: That’s the word for vegetarian food.
Echo: Yes. 素食。(Sùshí.)
David: And if you are vegetarian, it’s said that you would eat vegetarian.
Echo: 吃素。(Chīsù.)
David: Which is to eat vegetables.
Echo: Yeah. So you can say 我吃素。(Wǒ chīsù.)
David: Or you can tell people I don’t eat meat. I am vegetarian.
Echo: 我不吃肉,我吃素。(Wǒ bù chī ròu, wǒ chīsù.)
David: Right. And this brings us to the final word we are going to emphasize which is the word to order.
Echo: 点。(Diǎn.)
David: To order.
Echo: 点。(Diǎn.)
David: This is the same character as the word for dot.
Echo: 点。(Diǎn.)
David: But in this context, it means to order.
Echo: Yeah 比如说,点菜。(Bǐrú shuō, diǎn cài.)
David: To order dishes. And so of course, you can order beef
Echo: 点牛肉。(Diǎn niúròu.)
David: Or chicken.
Echo: 点鸡肉。(Diǎn jīròu.)
David: Or order a vegetarian meal.
Echo: 点素食。(Diǎn sùshí.)
David: And with that, let’s go to our grammar section. It’s grammar time. And actually it’s sort of a bit difficult for elementary but it is so useful.

Lesson focus

Echo: Yeah it is very useful like people can’t debate with you.
David: Yeah if you get into fight with someone or an argument, you are going to use this all the time.
Echo: Yeah.
David: And Echo what is it?
Echo: 反正。(Fǎnzhèng.)
David: Let’s hear that again slowly.
Echo: 反正。(Fǎnzhèng.)
David: In the dialogue, we heard it in this line.
Echo: 反正很好吃。(fǎnzhèng hěn hǎochī.)
David: Right. And that meant, anyway it’s good to eat.
Echo: Yes 反正很好吃。(fǎnzhèng hěn hǎochī.)
David: There are couple of things to note here. First, we are putting this at the start of our sentence.
Echo: Yeah.
David: And you are using it to disagree with what someone else has said.
Echo: 反正我不同意。(Fǎnzhèng wǒ bù tóngyì.)
David: It doesn’t matter, I don’t agree.
Echo: Yeah 反正我不同意。(Fǎnzhèng wǒ bù tóngyì.)
David: Right. So what you’re really saying is you’ve said something…
Echo: Yeah.
David: And it doesn’t matter.
Echo: Right. No matter whatever you say.
David: Yeah my opinion is the opposite of yours.
Echo: 反正我不同意。(Fǎnzhèng wǒ bù tóngyì.)
David: Now since this is an adverb, in addition to putting it right at the start of a sentence, you can also put this in front of verbs.
Echo: Yeah for example 我反正要吃牛肉。(Wǒ fǎnzhèng yào chī niúròu.)
David: I want to eat beef anyway.
Echo: Anyway.
David: Right like someone is saying let’s have chicken, let’s have chicken and Echo comes and says
Echo: 我反正想吃牛肉。(Wǒ fǎnzhèng xiǎng chī niúròu.)
David: I want to eat beef anyway right or someone might be pressing meat on you and you are vegetarian in which case you could say
Echo: 我反正是吃素的。(Wǒ fǎnzhèng shì chīsù de.)
David: I am a vegetarian anyway.
Echo: Yeah.
David: There is nothing that you can say that can convince this person. Okay…
Echo: 反正。(Fǎnzhèng.)
David: And with that, we are at the end of our grammar point and the end of our lesson for today too.

Outro

Echo: Yeah.
David: We hope you’ve enjoyed it. As always, we want to remind you, we have a one on one tutoring service.
Echo: If you are tired of classes that don’t work.
David: Give us a call. We are going to hook you up with one of our teachers for some 1-on-1 lessons.
Echo: Yes.
David: It’s inexpensive and very, very effective. If you have any questions Echo.
Echo: Please write to us at contact us at chineseclass101.com or leave your comments on the site.
David: And we look forward to hearing from you.
Echo: Exactly.
David: From Beijing, I am David.
Echo: 我是 (Wǒ shì) Echo.
David: And we will see you on the site.
Echo: Bye bye.

Grammar

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