ElComadreja Senior Member Philippines bibletranslatio Joined 7240 days ago 683 posts - 757 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Cebuano, French, Tagalog
| Message 1 of 12 27 November 2005 at 3:16pm | IP Logged |
This is a recorded phrase I keep listening to over & over:
ni3 xi1 le san1shi2 nian2 de yan1
to me this sounds like:
ni3 xi1 me san1shi2 nan2 de yan1
So am I deaf or just crazy? :P
recording is here
Edited by ElComadreja on 27 November 2005 at 4:36pm
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ElComadreja Senior Member Philippines bibletranslatio Joined 7240 days ago 683 posts - 757 votes 2 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish, Portuguese, Latin, Ancient Greek, Biblical Hebrew, Cebuano, French, Tagalog
| Message 2 of 12 27 November 2005 at 4:40pm | IP Logged |
Well, I probably would have never figured this out had I not posted it :(
I think I have found the applicable rule here in my quite extensive TYS pronunciation guide, and thus my confusion.
Instead of writing something like:
nian2 de ian1
You write:
nian2 de yan1
because the i changes to y when there's no consonant in front of it.
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hagen Triglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6962 days ago 171 posts - 179 votes 6 sounds Speaks: German*, English, Mandarin Studies: Korean
| Message 3 of 12 28 November 2005 at 3:23am | IP Logged |
The "ian --> yan" rule is just orthography of pinyin, nothing to do with pronunciation.
As for the words you're having trouble recognizing, the "le" is typically unstressed, so it might be harder for you, but I think it's quite clear in the recording. And remember that "yan" and "nan" don't rhyme! That's another thing of pinyin orthography, that "yan" almost rhymes with English "hen" or "when", but "nan" sort of rhymes with English "run". (Sorry, I would write IPA, but I'm not sure if the forum can display it.)
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krtek Groupie United States Joined 7112 days ago 46 posts - 50 votes Speaks: Mandarin* Studies: English, Italian, Cantonese
| Message 4 of 12 28 November 2005 at 4:50pm | IP Logged |
It's quite clear to me that the 3rd syllable is "le" instead of "me".
ElComadreja wrote:
This is a recorded phrase I keep listening to over & over:
ni3 xi1 le san1shi2 nian2 de yan1
to me this sounds like:
ni3 xi1 me san1shi2 nan2 de yan1
So am I deaf or just crazy? :P
recording is here |
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wetnose Groupie United States Joined 6980 days ago 90 posts - 98 votes Studies: Mandarin, English* Studies: Japanese
| Message 5 of 12 30 November 2005 at 11:53am | IP Logged |
forgive me, but can somebody tell me what the recording says in English?
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Cthulhu Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 7225 days ago 139 posts - 235 votes Speaks: French*, English, Mandarin, Russian
| Message 6 of 12 01 December 2005 at 7:59am | IP Logged |
"You've smoked for 30 years."
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Lucky Charms Diglot Senior Member Japan lapacifica.net Joined 6951 days ago 752 posts - 1711 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German, Spanish
| Message 7 of 12 11 December 2005 at 5:49pm | IP Logged |
I can see why you would want to keep listening to it so many times. The background music is pretty catchy. ;)
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solidsnake Diglot Senior Member China Joined 7043 days ago 469 posts - 488 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin
| Message 8 of 12 13 December 2005 at 12:11pm | IP Logged |
isnt there a better way to phrase that statement, grammatically?
Like "wo san shi nian chou yan le."
or "wo shi san shi nian chou de yan" (you've currently quit now but
someone just asked you how long you've smoked for?)
The way its phrased now, semantically implies that you smoked a thirty
year old cigarette.
you can even say "wo chou le yan san shi nian le." (assuming you smoked
for 30 years and are still going/havent quit.
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