Where is the apple?

[drp9341]

你好!


I started studying chinese independently very recently, and I was wondering how you said the word Where!


As in...

Where is the apple
Zhèlǐ shì píngguǒ

or where is the house
Nǎlǐ de fángzi


why does the word for where change... or maybe I'm not making proper sense of this


谢谢!

 

[kenjoluma]

这里 means 'here'. 这里有苹果 means 'there is an apple here'.

哪里 or 哪儿, sometimes 什么地方 means 'where'.

 

[viajero_canjeado]

Hi drp and best of luck in your Chinese studies.

I would translate your sentences so:
Where is the apple? 蘋果在哪裡?
Where is the house? 房子在哪裡?

Cheers!

 

[SuperXW]

你好!


I started studying chinese independently very recently, and I was wondering how you said the word Where!


As in...

Where is the apple
Zhèlǐ shì píngguǒ

or where is the house
Nǎlǐ de fángzi


why does the word for where change... or maybe I'm not making proper sense of this


谢谢!

Actually... the two sentences you showed us were not quite right. I don't know where you got them.

Like Kenjoluma mentioned: Zhèlǐ(orally zhèi li) 这里 means "here". Nàlǐ (orally nèi li)那里 means "there". I guess you are not familiar with the characters yet. So we discuss Pinyin first.

1. Notice the TONE is differed. Nàlǐ (4th tone) means "there", it can be read as nèili(still 4th) in spoken Chinese. But Nǎlǐ (3rd tone) means "where", it reads Náli (2nd tone) when speaking.

2. Let's break them down into basic characters. Zhè这 means "this", and Nà(4) means "that". Nà(3) means "where/which" by it self. Don't get confuse .

3. "Where is the apple?" Best way in Chinese should be "píng2guǒ3 zài4 nǎ3lǐ3 (or ná2lǐ3)" zai4 indicates location. Meaning's similar to "at". na3 often comes after zai4.
Yours "Zhèlǐ shì píngguǒ" really means "Here the apple is."

4. "Where is the house?" shoud be "Fáng2zi0 zài4 nǎ3lǐ3 (or ná2lǐ3) ?"
Yours "Nǎlǐ de fángzi" is not a complete sentence, since "de" in the middle only means "of". You got "Nǎlǐ" right though.

5. Also, in spoken Chinese, people prefer use the suffix "r" after Zhè Nà4 and Nà3 instead of the character "lǐ" to indicate locations. They become "zher4", "nar4" and "nar3", means "here", "there", and "where". This usage is called 儿化音or儿化韵.
In your case, it's become "píng2guǒ3 zài4 nǎr3" and "Fáng2zi0 zài4 nǎr3".

That's pretty enough for "here", "there", and "where"... I don't want to bother talking about the usage of "shi4"-is "you3"-have and so on. Just try to remember "where" is "na3/na3li3/na2li3/nar3" for now.

 

[movelee]

Hello
where is for asking.
but in your translation Zhèlǐ and Nǎlǐ is use for statement.
so where is the apple? should be "píngguǒ zai Nǎlǐ?"
where is the house? should be "fángzi zai Nǎlǐ"

 

[irenebell]

We Chinese often greet with each other by : Where are you going to ?