Language

Dinner at a Chinese friend’s place. Eight dishes crowd the table, steam curls off a whole fish, and your host waves at all of it and says 没什么菜 (méi shénme cài), it’s nothing much. It’s a polite little fib, and a lot of hosts tell it. Your job is to disagree, preferably with your mouth

The wedding card is open, the pen is in your hand, and the couple’s names are already at the top. Now for the part you actually wanted to write: congratulations, in Chinese. The everyday Mandarin expression is gongxi, congratulations. For a wedding, xinhun kuaile, wishing you a happy marriage, makes the occasion clear. You don’t

Halfway through a Chinese lesson, the teacher puts down her marker and asks the class: 有问题吗 (yǒu wèntí ma)? She might mean any questions, or she might mean is something wrong. Chinese uses one word, wenti, for both, so one cheerful reply covers it all: mei wenti. No questions, no problems, all good. It’s also

One June, a boy in Xi’an put on a red qipao, the fitted, high-collared Chinese dress, for his older sister’s big day. She was taking the gaokao, China’s university entrance exam. The qipao had been meant for their dad. Dad was too shy to put it on, so he paid his son 10 yuan to

You’re at the back of a packed subway car in Shanghai. Your stop is next. Between you and the door stand a dozen commuters, three backpacks and one very large bag of oranges. You take a breath and say the phrase you practiced: qingwen. Two people turn around and look at you, politely. They’re waiting

If thank you is the magic word, then please is the other one. English speakers get it drilled in early, usually by a parent holding a cookie just out of reach and waiting. In Mandarin Chinese, please is qing (请), and its partner is xiexie (谢谢), the everyday way to say thank you. Qing is

In many Chinese families, the first birthday wishes arrive before the birthday person is awake. An aunt posts in the family WeChat group early in the morning, and by breakfast the chat is a stack of cake emojis, the same four characters from every cousin, and a red packet or two waiting to be grabbed.

Got a business dinner in China coming up, or a first meal with a Chinese partner’s family? Somewhere between the cold dishes and the fish, there’s a good chance someone will stand, lift a small glass and say ganbei. Then the questions hit. Do you have to drink it all? Is a sip rude? What

You tell a new Chinese friend her English is amazing. She laughs, waves a hand, and says, “Nali nali.” If you’ve just started learning Mandarin, you know nali means where, so it sounds as if she’s looking for something under the table. She isn’t. Doubled up after a compliment, nali is a modest way of

A coworker asks if you’re coming to hotpot on Friday. A friend wants to grab bubble tea after class. A shop assistant hovers with a basket of samples. In English, not this time covers all three. Chinese usually picks a different phrase for each, depending on what you’re saying no to and how much you