The only thing that is completely non-negotiable is the Pleco dictionary app. There’s no real competition. The basic functionality is free, but it also has a bunch of single purchase add-ons that I think are worth it if you’re ~~psychotic like me~~ serious about learning the language.

/r/ChineseLanguage has a bunch of resources in their wiki. I haven’t checked it all out but a lot of it is good. The sub is pretty active as well, and surprisingly free from sinophobia (although there is of course some).

Sorry to be that guy but “radicals” specifically refers to one of many systems for categorizing character components for the purpose of dictionary indexing. A better more generic term is “component”, since components can serve many purposes, usually meaning or sound, but sometimes also iconic or other.

A radical is often a component, but not always, and a character with multiple components can still only have one radical, and radicals usually hint at the meaning, but not always. They’re made up by some guy in history who didn’t have access to good science on character origins.

TL;DR: components can have many functions and radicals are insufficient for learning purposes.

你有爱好吗？喜欢做什么？

It’s the Chinese there/their/they’re, but even worse. There’s also 地

Posting neat Chinese phrases whenever I feel like #37

{因|yīn}{果|guǒ}

Literally: “cause + effect”

Figuratively: “karma; cause and effect”

We’re back! Again! Finally our fans get a follow up to a previous cliffanger post from the stone age.

In my experience Buddhist phrases are usually just transliterated into Chinese, but this word got its own calque, which doesn’t even seem like it’s based literally on the Sanskrit kárman “act”, instead loosely based on the religious meanings hetú, “impulse, cause” and phala “fruit, result” (but also “kernel” 🤯).

So if {果|guǒ} meant “fruit”, surely {因|yīn} means “seed” or something like that? No, why would it? Originally it meant “underwear”, then drifting to “rely on” and “cause” and “inherit”. A far-fetched one, for sure.

@[email protected]

*得

维基百科? more like 危机百科 amirite?

Posting neat Chinese phrases whenever I feel like #36

{马|mǎ}{上|shàng}

Literally: “on horseback”

Figuratively: “right away; soon”

@[email protected]

you could also just use the player hotkeys to cycle through subtitles and secondary subs

felt lazy, might post details later

Yeah I should have explained it a little more in depth, haha. It’s hard to reduce these words to simple translations. All parts are weird enough on their own.

{如|rú} means “follow” more in the sense of “follow orders”, go along, comply, accord, be like, as if, etc. {果|guǒ} means fruit in a very broad sense as the “effect” of a tree or seed, think like “bear fruit”, “fruitless”, “the fruits of one’s labor”, etc. So in combination they mean, what happens if the results of a situation are according to some description.

The other variant I think is a bit simpler. {要|yào} means “ask for”, “demand”, “request”, “want”, “need”, “must”, sort of the inverse of the above {如|rú} here. So a hypothetical demands that a situation {是|shì} be a certain way. It places a restriction on the possible outcomes.

Sorry if this is nonsense, I might post other compounds with {果|guǒ} and delve deeper ... whenever I feel like™ 😎

Posting neat Chinese phrases whenever I feel like #35

{如|rú}{果|guǒ} / {要|yào}{是|shì}

Literally: “follow fruit / need be”

Figuratively: “if”

@[email protected]