Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Notes

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Brendan: Hi. And welcome to Chineseclass101.com. I’m Brendan.
Echo: 嗨,大家好,我是Echo. (Hāi, dàjiā hǎo, wǒ shì Echo.)
Brendan: And we’re coming t you today with Lower Intermediate Series, Season 1, Lesson 3 – “Bike theft in Beijing”. In this lesson you’re going to learn what it’s really like to ride a bike in China.
Echo: Right. This conversation takes place in a bike parking lot.
Brendan: It’s between a security guard and the cyclist. We met them last lesson.
Echo: Right. And the speakers are speaking casual mandarin, as always.
Brendan: Now, we’re going to take you to the dialogue, but before we do that, a reminder. We have a full transcript of this dialogue and everything else in our premium PDF.
Echo: 没错。 (Méi cuò.)
Brendan: It is highly, highly recommended.
DIALOGUE
A:保安! (Bǎoān!)
B:是你啊,你的自行车呢? (Shì nǐā, nǐde zìxíngchēne?)
A:你说呢。丢了!被偷了! (Nǐshuōne. Diūle ! Bèi tōu le!)
B:不可能,我刚把它挪那儿。 (Bù kěnéng, wǒgāng bǎtānuó nàr.)
A:在哪儿呢? (Zài nǎr ne?)
B:我发誓,它刚还……我猜它被偷了。 (Wǒfāshì, tāgāng huán... Wǒcāi tābèi tōu le.)
Brendan: Once more, slowly.
A:保安! (Bǎoān!)
B:是你啊,你的自行车呢? (Shì nǐā, nǐde zìxíngchēne?)
A:你说呢。丢了!被偷了! (Nǐshuōne. Diūle ! Bèi tōu le!)
B:不可能,我刚把它挪那儿。 (Bù kěnéng, wǒgāng bǎtānuó nàr.)
A:在哪儿呢? (Zài nǎr ne?)
B:我发誓,它刚还……我猜它被偷了。 (Wǒfāshì, tāgāng huán... Wǒcāi tābèi tōu le.)
Brendan: And now, with English translation.
A:保安! (Bǎoān!)
A: Hey Security Guard!
B:是你啊,你的自行车呢? (Shì nǐā, nǐde zìxíngchēne?)
B: Oh, you. Where's your bike?
A:你说呢。丢了!被偷了! (Nǐshuōne. Diūle ! Bèi tōu le!)
A: You tell me, it's missing. It's been stolen!
B:不可能,我刚把它挪那儿。 (Bù kěnéng, wǒgāng bǎtānuó nàr.)
B: That’s impossible. I just moved it over there.
A:在哪儿呢? (Zài nǎr ne?)
A: Where?
B:我发誓,它刚还……我猜它被偷了。 (Wǒfāshì, tāgāng huán... Wǒcāi tābèi tōu le.)
B: I couldn’t swore...I guess it was stolen.
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Echo: 每个人都丢过车。 (Měi gèrén dōu diūguò chē.)
Brendan: Yes, everybody’s had a bike stolen here. I actually, I know people who’ve had their bike stolen at home.
Echo: 谁呀? (Shéi ya?)
Brendan: Jim, The police actually came by on their off hours and started stealing bikes and its compound.
Echo: 我的天呐! (Wǒ de tiān nà!)
Brendan: Yes. It does, it makes a difference what type of lock you have though. The U locks are harder to drill than the ones most people have.
Echo: Yes, it seems to be.
Brendan: Anyway, our vocabulary for this lesson is all about security and loss. Let’s start taking a look at the vocabulary for this lesson.
VOCAB LIST
Echo: 保安 (bǎoān)
Brendan: “Security guard”
Echo: 制服 (zhìfú)
Brendan: “Uniform”
Echo: 偷 (tōu)
Brendan: “To steal”
Echo: 相信 (xiāngxìn)
Brendan: “To trust”
Echo: 停车位 (tíngchē wèi)
Brendan: “Parking space”
Echo: 值班 (zhíbān)
Brendan: “To be on duty”
Echo: 丢 (diū)
Brendan: “To lose”
Echo: 挪 (nuó)
Brendan: “To move something”
Echo: 挪 (nuó)
VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE
Brendan: Well, let’s take a closer look at how some of these words and phrases are used.
Echo: 第一个词,停车位。 (Dì yī gè cí, tíngchē wèi.)
Brendan: Right. “Parking space”
Echo: 停车位 (Tíngchē wèi)
Brendan: “Parking space”
Echo: In our first lesson, in this series, we learned 位置. (Wèizhì.)
Brendan: “Position”
Echo: 位置 (Wèizhì)
Brendan: That was in the lesson about the concert. But here, when we are talking about position, we mean one for your car, not one for you to sit or stand.
Echo: Yes. 停车。 (Tíngchē.)
Brendan: That’s right. It’s a place to park the car.
Echo: 停车位,在北京找个停车位可不容易。 (Tíngchē wèi, zài běijīng zhǎo gè tíngchē wèi kěbù róngyì.)
Brendan: Yes, in Beijing it is not easy to find a parking space.
Echo: 在北京找个停车位可不容易。 (Zài běijīng zhǎo gè tíngchē wèi kěbù róngyì.)
Brendan: The next word we want to point out is?
Echo: 保安 (Bǎo'ān)
Brendan: “Security guard”
Echo: 保安 (Bǎo'ān)
Brendan: “Security guard”
Echo: Right. 他们不是警察。 (Tāmen bùshì jǐngchá.)
Brendan: Yes, they dress like police, but they’re not.
Echo: 你来中国的时候被骗了吗? (Nǐ lái zhōngguó de shíhòu bèi piànle ma?)
Brendan: No, no, because I, they’re often very young looking. They look about 14 years old and they’re too small for the uniform.
Echo: Yes. That’s true.
Brendan: But, it is confusing. I think people do get confused at the start.
Echo: 那很好。 (Nà hěn hǎo.)
Brendan: Yes.
Echo: 如果小偷 (Rúguǒ xiǎotōu) get confused.
Brendan: If only. Anyway, we’ve got one more word for you, speaking of 小偷 (Xiǎotōu) and that is?
Echo: 丢 (Diū)
Brendan: “To lose”
Echo: 丢 (Diū)
Brendan: Now, that’s to lose like, you know, “I lost my keys.”?
Echo: Yes. 丢钥匙 (Diū yàoshi)
Brendan: Right. “Lose your keys”. Now, what else can you lose?
Echo: 丢手表 (Diū shǒubiǎo)
Brendan: Right. “Lose a watch.”
Echo: 丢手机 (Diū shǒujī)
Brendan: “Lose a cell phone.” And, we know somebody who does a lot of that.
Echo: Yes.
Brendan: Now, there’s something interesting about this. 丢 (Diū) means both “to lose” and “to be lost”.
Echo: 对。 (Duì.)
Brendan: So, you can put the object, right, the thing that you lost, first.
Echo: 我的手机丢了。(Wǒ de shǒujī diūle.)
Brendan: “My cell phone has been lost.”
Echo: 我的手机丢了or 你的钥匙丢了吗? (Wǒ de shǒujī diūle or nǐ de yàoshi diūle ma?)
Brendan: “You lost your keys?”
Echo: 你的钥匙丢了吗? (Nǐ de yàoshi diūle ma?)
Brendan: Now, we can also have a subject in this kind of sentence.
Echo: Yes, like 我丢了我的钥匙。 (Wǒ diūle wǒ de yàoshi.)
Brendan: So, both of these sentences mean “I lost my keys.”, right?
Echo: Yes. 我丢了我的钥匙 and 我的钥匙丢了。 (Wǒ diūle wǒ de yàoshi and wǒ de yàoshi diūle.)
Brendan: Yes. Right. Now pairing that in mind, let’s go on to the grammar section.

Lesson focus

Brendan: Our focus today is on the passive marker.
Echo: 被 (Bèi). In this dialogue we heard this 你说呢?丢了,被偷了。(Nǐ shuō ne? Diūle, bèi tōule.)
Brendan: “You tell me. It’s missing. It’s been stolen.”
Echo: Important thing is 被偷了。(Bèi tōule.)
Brendan: Right. “It’s been stolen”
Echo: 被偷了。 (Bèi tōule.)
Brendan: Now, as we’ve taught you before, 被 (Bèi)is used to create passive sentences in Chinese.
Echo: 比如说:自行车被他放在了路边。(Bǐrú shuō: Zìxíngchē bèi tā fàng zàile lù biān.)
Brendan: “The bike was put beside the road by him.”
Echo: 自行车被他放在了路边 or 自行车被他锁上了。(Zìxíngchē bèi tā fàng zàile lù biān or zìxíngchē bèi tā suǒ shàngle.)
Brendan: “The bike was locked by him.”
Echo: 自行车被他锁上了。 (Zìxíngchē bèi tā suǒ shàngle.)
Brendan: Now, what’s new today is that we’re taking a sentence like that and we’re omitting both the subject and the object.
Echo: Yes, we just say 被偷了。 (Bèi tōule.)
Brendan: Now, that means “It was stolen.”. But, we don’t know what exactly was stolen or who stole it.
Echo: Yes. 被偷了。 (Bèi tōule.)
Brendan: As long as it’s clear in context, you can do this in Chinese.
Echo: As long as it’s clear, you can leave out either the object or subject, actually.
Brendan: Right. Let’s have an example of that.
Echo: 小偷被抓到了。 (Xiǎotōu bèi zhuā dàole.)
Brendan: “The thief was caught.”
Echo: 小偷被抓到了。 (Xiǎotōu bèi zhuā dàole.)
Brendan: “The thief was caught.” Presumably by the police.
Echo: Yes. 应该是警察抓到的。 (Yīnggāi shì jǐngchá zhuā dào de.)
Brendan: Yes. Though I’ve lost enough bikes, that I might wish it was the guys with Harley motorcycles and baseball bats who caught them instead. Anyway, be aware that some passive sentences will also omit “they”.
Echo: Yes, that’s tricky.
Brendan: Lower dropping things. It’s very tricky. It’s very tricky. Now, one example of that would be “The book was thrown away.”
Echo: 书扔了。 (Shū rēngle.)
Brendan: Or “The homework is finished.”
Echo: 作业完成了。(Zuòyè wánchéngle.)
Brendan: In both of those cases, the only clue that we’re dealing with the passive voice is the context.
Echo: Yes. Let’s hear them again. 书扔了。(Shū rēngle.)
Brendan: “The book was thrown away.”
Echo: 作业完成了。 (Zuòyè wánchéngle.)
Brendan: “The homework is finished.”. Now, we know that these are passive sentences because?
Echo: Neither books, nor homework finish themselves.
Brendan: Yes, regrettably. It’s a tricky structure, and that’s why we’ve gone into a lot of detail on it in our PDF transcript for this lesson.
Echo: 没错。 (Méi cuò.)

Outro

Brendan: Which, once again, we totally recommend to you. So, that’s it for this grammar point. It’s a tricky one. It’s complicated…
Echo: Yes.
Brendan: And, it’s the kind of thing that can be hard to get the hang of on your own. But, you don’t have to do it alone.
Echo: Yes.
Brendan: We have got one on one tutors who are just dying to hear from you.
Echo: 没错. 他们都是 professional. (Méi cuò. Tāmen dōu shì professional.)
Brendan: Yes, they’re really good, get in touch with them and they will walk you through this and any other questions you might have.

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