Learning : Time Words
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Pooshybooshy

Chinese Mandarin :Chinese Mandarin Level
Registered on : 2007-10-09
Language : None
Posts : 12
Responses : 28
Comments : 44
 Pooshybooshy hotmail.com 
2007-10-22 / 02:33AM

Ni ming tian zuo shen me?

How would you say now in Chinese? Also, if you were to say “what are you doing now?” would now simply replace ming tian in this sentence, or would it be put somewhere else? Ni [now] zuo shen me?

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editorbenny

Chinese Mandarin :Chinese Mandarin Level
Registered on : 2007-07-25
Language : None
Posts : 0
Responses : 2
Comments : 128
 Benny bennysland.com 
2007-10-22 / 10:05AM

‘Now’ is ‘Xian zai’ in Mandarin.

You’re correct. You can say ‘ni xian zai zuo shen me’. And you can also put time words at the beginning of a sentence: ‘xian zai ni zuo shen me’. Both are correct.

But you cannot put time words at the end of a sentence, like ‘ni zuo shen me xian zai’, though it makes sense. It’a difference between English and Mandarin.

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Pooshybooshy

Chinese Mandarin :Chinese Mandarin Level
Registered on : 2007-10-09
Language : None
Posts : 12
Responses : 28
Comments : 44
 Pooshybooshy hotmail.com 
2007-10-23 / 12:19AM

Xie xie ni, Benny. Xian zai wo zuo shen me…

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