Chinese Lesson: Drinking Tea

So previously, we discussed how to use Chinese to reference beverages of an…alcoholic nature.  Well if that’s not your thing, then we’ve got the next best one, at least in China. Tea.  Natch.  

喝茶

Pinyin (i.e. the transcription of the Chinese words into Latin script): he1 cha2 The numbers indicate what tone each word is said in. Click below for a pronunciation link. (If I haven’t mentioned it before, click the link below, and you’ll find a “Listen” button right underneath the word at the top of the new page. Click it, and you’ll hear a funny lady and an even funnier dude say the word. But try your best to keep the laughter in check long enough to get a sense of the tones!).  Pronunciation: “h-uh” and “cha” (like…cha cha cha! Sort of). Translation: to drink tea Notice that the first character is the same as the one from an earlier post. That character itself means “to drink.”  It’s all coming together.