PMT Easy #118: Practicing Calendar Vocabulary
🌀 Pearls of Mandarin: Translation (Easy) #118
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In CGG #118, we explored the traditional Chinese calendar and the vocabulary that comes with it: the lunar months, the special prefix for early days, the zodiac, and the festivals tied to all of them.
Today’s exercises will help you put this vocabulary into real sentences. You’ll practice talking about festival dates, asking about the lunar calendar, and describing zodiac signs the natural way. With a little practice, these calendar words will start feeling like second nature in your Mandarin.
🌱 Today’s Easy Exercises
Translate these English sentences into Mandarin:
Spring Festival is on the first day of the first lunar month, every year the date is different.
Excuse me, is today the 15th of the lunar calendar? I heard tonight’s moon will be especially round.
People born in the Year of the Horse are said to especially love to travel, they don’t like to stay at home.
Dragon Boat Festival is on the fifth day of the fifth lunar month, on this day Chinese people eat zongzi and watch dragon boat races.
Take your time, and remember: practicing will help you sound more natural and confident in your Mandarin conversations. You’ve got this! 💫
🌱 Translation #1
Spring Festival is on the first day of the first lunar month, every year the date is different.
In this sentence, we’re naming when Spring Festival falls and noting that its actual date shifts every year on the regular calendar. The tricky part is the date itself: “the first day of the first lunar month.” The first month has its own special name in Chinese, 正月 (zhēngyuè), reserved exclusively for the first month of the lunar year. And for the first ten days of any lunar month, you can’t simply say “one” or “first”; you must add the prefix 初 (chū) before the number. Put together, 正月初一 is the standard way to express “the first day of the first lunar month.”
Let’s break down the translation step by step:
春节 [春節] (chūnjié) means “Spring Festival.”
春 (chūn) means “spring.”
节 [節] (jié) means “festival.”
是 (shì) means “is.”
正月 (zhēngyuè) means “the first month of the lunar year.”
This is a special name, used only for the lunar new year’s opening month. You wouldn’t say 一月 (yīyuè) here, since that refers to January on the Gregorian calendar.
初一 (chūyī) means “the first day (of a lunar month).”
The prefix 初 (chū) is mandatory for days 1 to 10 of a lunar month.
每 (měi) means “every.”
年 (nián) means “year.”
的 (de) is the possessive particle.
日子 (rìzi) means “day” or “date.”
都 (dōu) means “all.”
不 (bù) means “not.”
一样 [一樣] (yīyàng) means “the same.”
Notes
Don’t say 一月一日 (yīyuè yīrì) here, as that refers to January 1st on the Gregorian calendar, which is New Year’s Day, not Spring Festival.
Don’t drop the 初 (chū) prefix. Saying 正月一 would sound off; the 初 is required for the first ten days of any lunar month.
The 每…都… (měi…dōu…) pattern is very common when you want to stress that something applies to every instance: 每年都不一样 [每年都不一樣] literally reads “every year all not the same,” meaning “every year is different.”
日子 (rìzi) is more conversational than 日期 (rìqī); both can mean “date,” but 日子 also carries the broader sense of “day” in everyday speech.
Recap
春节是正月初一，每年的日子都不一样。
春節是正月初一，每年的日子都不一樣。
春节 / 是 / 正月 / 初一 / ， / 每 / 年 / 的 / 日子 / 都 / 不 / 一样 / 。
chūnjié shì zhēngyuè chūyī, měi nián de rìzi dōu bù yīyàng.
Spring Festival is on the first day of the first lunar month, every year the date is different.
Spring Festival / is / first lunar month / first day / every / year / (possessive particle 的) / date / all / not / the same.
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🌱 Translation #2
Excuse me, is today the 15th of the lunar calendar? I heard tonight’s moon will be especially round.
