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Beginner Mandarin Chinese: "Sofas and Shafas" with eChineseLearning

2,245 views · Published 11 May 2018 · 7:07 · Indexed 23 October 2026

Channel: eChineseLearning · 2018 · Education

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Every journey starts with a small first step! Although learning Chinese might seem impossible if you haven't tried, we can assure  you it's not as scary as you think. To begin, join us for a Free Assessment Test and receive some useful study materials for the Chinese HSK examination as a bonus. You can sign up here today: https://goo.gl/JM83dD
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Today, Teacher Ellie's introduces some "loan words" in Mandarin Chinese. When studying Chinese, you might notice that the pronunciation of some words are very similar to their foreign counterparts. For example:

沙发 (shāfā) = sofa

The word "沙发 (shāfā)" is the transliteration of the English word "sofa".
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Another transliteration is the word "巧克力 (qiǎokèlì)", which means the same as English "chocolate".
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Not all the transliterations used today in China come from English. For example, the word "卡拉OK (kǎlā-OK)", which means "karaoke" comes from Japanese. It became popular in Japan during the 1970s and later was used in China during the 1980s. The word "KTV" means "karaoke TV". 
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蹦极 (bèngjí) = bungee jumping
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脱口秀 (tuōkǒu xiù) = talk show

脱口 (tuōkǒu) = the transliteration of "talk", and,
秀 (xiù) = "beautiful" in its usual context, but here is the transliteration of "show"
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