Learn the Chinese co-verb that means "to want to," which will come in handy when you want to do something when in China
Now Playing: Lesson Audio
Get a breakdown of the dialogue and translations instantly with the Premium line-by-line Audio. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Get this lesson’s key vocab, their translations and pronunciations. Sign up for your Free Lifetime Account Now and get 7 Days of Premium Access including this feature.
Unlock Lesson Notes and Transcripts for every single lesson. Sign Up for a Free Lifetime Account and Get 7 Days of Premium Access.
| INTRODUCTION |
| Anthony: Welcome to chineseclass101, the fastest, easiest and most fun way to learn Chinese. |
| Echo: Hi! 大家好， 我是Echo。 (Dàjiā hǎo, wǒ shì Echo.) |
| Anthony: And I am Anthony and today, we have our 16th lesson in our second season of our beginner series titled, The Most Expensive DVD in China. |
| Echo: Right. |
| Anthony: You know, one of the interesting things about living in China is the availability of cheap pirated DVDs. |
| Echo: Yeah. You can find DVD shops all over town. |
| Anthony: Or you can also find people selling them from cover boxes on the side of the street in front of shopping malls. |
| Echo: Or restaurants. |
| Anthony: Yeah. |
| Echo: And just like most things in China, you can bargain for the price. |
| Anthony: Yes. So in today’s dialogue, we listen in on a customer bargaining down the price of a DVD. |
| Echo: And we are also going to review numbers from 1 to 10. |
| Anthony: Yes and the great thing about Chinese is if you know 1 through 10, you can pretty much count to infinity. All right, before we go to the dialogue, if you are listening to us on iTunes, come to the website chineseclass101.com; sign up with your email address. Instantly, you will get access to a ton of lessons. You will be studying Chinese faster and learning more. |
| Echo: Right. |
| Anthony: Okay so with that said, let’s go on to the dialogue. |
| DIALOGUE |
| DVD多少钱？ (DVD duō shǎo qián?) |
| 8块。 (Bā kuài.) |
| 8块？太贵了！ (Bā kuài ? Tài guì le!) |
| 你想付多少？ (Nǐ xiǎng fù duōshǎo?) |
| 6块。 (Liù kuài.) |
| 7块怎么样？ (Qī kuài zěnmeyàng?) |
| Anthony: One more time a little bit slower. |
| DVD多少钱？ (DVD duō shǎo qián?) |
| 8块。 (Bā kuài.) |
| 8块？太贵了！ (Bā kuài ? Tài guì le!) |
| 你想付多少？ (Nǐ xiǎng fù duōshǎo?) |
| 6块。 (Liù kuài.) |
| 7块怎么样？ (Qī kuài zěnmeyàng?) |
| Anthony: One more time with English. |
| Echo: DVD多少钱？ (DVD duō shǎo qián?) |
| Anthony: How much for the DVD? |
| Echo: 8块。 (Bā kuài.) |
| Anthony: Eight kuai. |
| Echo: 8块？太贵了！ (Bā kuài ? Tài guì le!) |
| Anthony: Eight kuai? that’s really expensive! |
| Echo: 你想付多少？ (Nǐ xiǎng fù duōshǎo?) |
| Anthony: How much do you want to pay? |
| Echo: 6块。 (Liù kuài.) |
| Anthony: Six kuai. |
| Echo: 7块怎么样？ (Qī kuài zěnmeyàng?) |
| Anthony: How about seven kuai? |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Anthony: Buyer beware. You get what you pay for in China. |
| Echo: Yeah but a lot of times, the quality of the DVDs are not very good like especially for newer DVDs. |
| Anthony: Yeah I had a bad experience buying a recent American movie that was a bootleg from Russia and it didn’t have any English subtitles. |
| Echo: Yeah but luckily, usually you can return this DVD to the store. |
| Anthony: Yes. |
| Echo: To where you bought it and like get a new one but make sure you keep the 发票, the receipt. |
| Anthony: Yeah keep your receipt but if you buy it from the person selling them from cover boxes, you just maybe out of luck. |
| Echo: Yeah. |
| Anthony: But you got to take your risks. So to effectively bargain in China, you need to have your numbers down pat. |
| Echo: Right. |
| Anthony: So in our vocabulary section, we are going to go through a quick review and we are also going to go over some essential bargaining phrases. |
| Echo: That’s right. So let’s go. |
| Anthony: Okay. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Anthony: And now the vocab section. |
| Echo: 多少钱 (duō shǎo qián) |
| Anthony: How much money? |
| Echo: 多少钱, 多少钱. 块 (duō shǎo qián, duō shǎo qián. kuài) |
| Anthony: Measure word for money. |
| Echo: 块, 块. 贵 (kuài, kuài. guì) |
| Anthony: Expensive. |
| Echo: 贵, 贵. 便宜 (guì, guì. piányì) |
| Anthony: Cheap. |
| Echo: 便宜, 便宜. 想 (piányì, piányì. xiǎng) |
| Anthony: To want. |
| Echo: 想, 想. 付 (xiǎng, xiǎng. fù) |
| Anthony: To pay. |
| Echo: 付, 付. (fù, fù.) |
| VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE |
| Anthony: Okay so as promised, we are going to go over the first ten numbers in Chinese. |
| Echo: Yeah. |
| Anthony: In rapid fire succession. |
| Echo: Let’s go 一 (Yī) |
| Anthony: One. |
| Echo: 二 (Èr) |
| Anthony: Two. |
| Echo: 三 (Sān) |
| Anthony: Three |
| Echo: 四 (Sì) |
| Anthony: Four. |
| Echo: 五 (Wǔ) |
| Anthony: Five. |
| Echo: 六 (Liù) |
| Anthony: Six. |
| Echo: 七 (Qī) |
| Anthony: Seven. |
| Echo: 八 (Bā) |
| Anthony: Eight. |
| Echo: 九 (Jiǔ) |
| Anthony: Nine. |
| Echo: 十 (Shí) |
| Anthony: Ten. Okay that was the reverse countdown. Numbers 1 through 10 are done. Now let’s use the numbers in the rest of our vocabulary section. |
| Echo: 多少钱 (duō shǎo qián) |
| Anthony: How much money. |
| Echo: 多少钱 (duō shǎo qián) |
| Anthony: Yeah. |
| Echo: 这个多少钱？ (Zhègè duō shǎo qián ?) |
| Anthony: How much money is this one? |
| Echo: 这个多少钱？块。 (Zhège duō shǎo qián? Kuài.) |
| Anthony: The measure word for money. |
| Echo: 块。 (Kuài.) |
| Anthony: Okay now this is a perfect opportunity to put those numbers to use. |
| Echo: 十块钱。 (Shí kuài qián.) |
| Anthony: $10. |
| Echo: 十块钱。 or 九块钱。 (Shí kuài qián. Or jiǔ kuài qián.) |
| Anthony: $9. |
| Echo: 九块钱。四块钱。 (Jiǔ kuài qián. Sì kuài qián.) |
| Anthony: $4 |
| Echo: 四块钱。 (Sì kuài qián.) |
| Anthony: Now some things, say $100 we would label that as |
| Echo: Yeah 贵 (Guì) |
| Anthony: Expensive. |
| Echo: Yeah 贵。 (Guì.) So 五块不贵。 (Wǔ kuài bù guì.) |
| Anthony: 5 quay is not expensive. |
| Echo: 五块不贵。 (Wǔ kuài bù guì.) |
| Anthony: Yeah but if you get that DVD for 5 quay, don’t be surprised if it’s not the best quality DVD. |
| Echo: Yeah that’s right 便宜 (Piányí) |
| Anthony: Cheap. |
| Echo: 便宜。DVD很便宜。 (Piányí.DVD hěn piányí.) |
| Anthony: Yes the DVD is very cheap. |
| Echo: DVD很便宜。想 (DVD hěn piányí. Xiǎng) |
| Anthony: This is the verb to want. |
| Echo: 想 (Xiǎng) |
| Anthony: For example |
| Echo: 我想要两张。 (Wǒ xiǎng yào liǎng zhāng.) |
| Anthony: I want two DVDs. |
| Echo: 我想要两张。 (Wǒ xiǎng yào liǎng zhāng.) |
| Anthony: So our next vocabulary word. |
| Echo: 付 (fù) |
| Anthony: And this means to pay, it could be money or it could be… |
| Echo: Yeah. |
| Anthony: Any sort of thing that you have to give in exchange for something. |
| Echo: 我付一半。 (Wǒ fù yíbàn.) |
| Anthony: I will pay half. |
| Echo: 我付一半。 (Wǒ fù yíbàn.) |
| Anthony: Or you can say you know, we will split the bill. |
| Echo: Yeah. |
| Anthony: All right. So that does it for our vocab section. We’ve gone over numbers. |
| Echo: Yep. |
| Anthony: We’ve also gone over cheap and expensive |
| Echo: Yeah. Some very important vocabulary when you are bargaining. |
| Anthony: Yes and especially if you come to Beijing and you go to silk market, you want to review this stuff before you go there. |
| Echo: Yes. |
| Anthony: Or else you get eaten alive. All right, so that’s it for our vocab section. Now let’s go on to the grammar point. |
| Echo: Okay. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Anthony: The focus of today’s grammar point is the verb to want. |
| Echo: 想 (Xiǎng) |
| Anthony: And this also functions as a co-verb which means you can put another verb after it. |
| Echo: Right. When 想 (Xiǎng) is followed by another verb, the meaning changes from to want, to want to do something. |
| Anthony: Right. So for instance, in the dialogue, we heard this sentence |
| Echo: 你想付多少？ (Nǐ xiǎng fù duōshǎo?) |
| Anthony: How much do you want to pay? |
| Echo: 你想付多少？ 付 (Nǐ xiǎng fù duōshǎo? Fù) as a verb means to pay. |
| Anthony: Now when we put them together, it becomes |
| Echo: 想付 (Xiǎng fù) |
| Anthony: Yes, “to want to pay”. Let’s take a look at a few more sample sentences. |
| Echo: Okay. 我想去。 (Wǒ xiǎng qù.) |
| Anthony: I want to go. |
| Echo: 我想去。 (Wǒ xiǎng qù.) The verb 去 (Qù) to go directly follows the co-verb 想 (Xiǎng) |
| Anthony: How much do you want? |
| Echo: 你想要多少？ (Nǐ xiǎng yào duōshǎo?) |
| Anthony: And the two verbs here? |
| Echo: 想 (Xiǎng) of course and then it followed by 要 (Yào) |
| Anthony: Yes to want. Just simply to want. |
| Echo: Yeah. |
| Anthony: The next sentence |
| Echo: 他想吃什么？ (Tā xiǎng chī shénme?) |
| Anthony: What does he want to eat? |
| Echo: 他想吃什么？ (Tā xiǎng chī shénme?) |
| Anthony: So Echo, whenever I ask you this question, what do you want to eat, I already know the answer. |
| Echo: 我想吃四川菜。 (Wǒ xiǎng chī sìchuān cài.) |
| Anthony: Yes Echo always wants to eat Szechuan food. |
| Echo: Yeah 我想吃四川菜。 (Wǒ xiǎng chī sìchuān cài.) |
| Anthony: Okay so our next sample sentence. |
| Echo: 他们想看电影。 (Tāmen xiǎng kàn diànyǐng.) |
| Anthony: They want to watch a movie. |
| Echo: 他们想看电影。 (Tāmen xiǎng kàn diànyǐng.) |
| Anthony: Okay and the co-verbs here are |
| Echo: 想看 (Xiǎng kàn) |
| Anthony: To want to watch. |
| Echo: 他们想看电影。 (Tāmen xiǎng kàn diànyǐng.) |
| Anthony: Okay. Our next example. |
| Echo: 你想找谁？ (Nǐ xiǎng zhǎo shéi?) |
| Anthony: Who are you looking for or who do you want to find. |
| Echo: 你想找谁？ (Nǐ xiǎng zhǎo shéi?) This is very useful like no matter you are on the phone with someone. |
| Anthony: Yeah so if somebody comes to your door, you don’t know who they are or what they want, you can ask them this sentence. |
| Echo: Yeah 你想找谁？ (Nǐ xiǎng zhǎo shéi?) |
| Anthony: Who are you looking for? |
| Echo: Or like if you are on the phone with someone you don’t know, you can ask 你想找谁？ (Nǐ xiǎng zhǎo shéi?) |
| Anthony: Yeah who do you want to find, who do you want to talk to. Right, okay and our last sample sentence. |
| Echo: 我想玩电脑。 (Wǒ xiǎng wán diànnǎo.) |
| Anthony: I want to play games on the computer. |
| Echo: Yeah 我想玩电脑。 (Wǒ xiǎng wán diànnǎo.) |
| Anthony: All right great. So let’s go through a quick review. |
| Echo: We know that 想 (Xiǎng) is a co-verb. |
| Anthony: That’s right and when we place a verb after 想, (Xiǎng,) the meaning changes from “to want” to “to want to do something”. |
| Echo: Right and the formula we use is 想 (Xiǎng) plus a simple verb plus an object. |
| Anthony: Right. So Echo, take us through one more sample sentence. |
| Echo: Okay I love to. 我想学中文。 (Wǒ xiǎng xué zhōngwén.) |
| Anthony: I want to study Chinese. |
| Echo: 我想学中文。 (Wǒ xiǎng xué zhōngwén.) |
| Anthony: And if you want to study Chinese, where should you go? |
| Echo: Chineseclass101.com |
| Anthony: That’s right. The best way to learn Chinese. |
| Echo: Yeah. |
| Anthony: There you can find PDF lesson notes, a voice recorder tool, line by line audio and transcripts. You are not going to beat that. |
| Echo: Right. |
Outro |
| Anthony: Okay so with that, from Beijing, I am Anthony |
| Echo: 我是Echo。 (Wǒ shì Echo.) |
| Anthony: Thanks for listening and we will see you next time. |
| Echo: 下次见，(Xià cì jiàn,) Bye bye. |
| Anthony: Bye bye. |
Comments
Hide