If “learn Chinese” means “know Chinese like a native speaker”, most non-Chinese people will never learn Chinese

Unit Seventeen: 请、吃、饭、喝、水、冰、火、要、抽、烟、河、想

● As you do Unit Seventeen, you might also read through the introduction to the chapter three “Radicals” and browse through the radical glossary.

Characters containing some common radicals.

字 = Zì	拼音 = Pīnyīn	英文 = Yīngwén	radical	radical name and meaning	t
请	qǐng	please	讠	yánpáng = “speech” on the side	請
吃	chī	eat	口	kǒuzìpáng = the character “mouth” on the side
饭	fàn	rice/meal	饣	shízìpáng = the character 食 on the side	飯
喝	hē	drink	口	kǒuzìpáng = above
水	shuǐ	water	水	shuǐzì = the character “water”
渴	kě	thirsty	氵	sāndiǎnshuǐ = three dots water
冰	bīng	ice	冫	liǎngdiǎnshuǐ = two dots water (ice)
火	huǒ	fire	火	huǒzì = the character “fire”
要	yào	want/will	覀	no name, looks like 四
抽	chōu	pull in	扌	tíshǒupáng = “hand” on the side
烟	yān	smoke	火	huǒzìpáng = the character “fire” on the side	煙
河	hě	river	氵	sāndiǎnshuǐ = three dots water
想	xiǎng	would like to	心	xīnzìdǐ = the character “heart” on the bottom

● Here are the same characters. Instead of listing them by radical, they are “dissected” to emphasize show that many characters are composed of a “left-right” element, or a “top-bottom” element.

字 = Zì	拼音 = Pīnyīn	英文 = Yīngwén	left	right	top	bottom	t
请	qǐng	please	讠	青			請
吃	chī	eat	口	乞
饭	fàn	rice/meal	饣	反			飯
喝	hē	drink	口	曷
水	shuǐ	water
渴	kě	thirsty	氵	曷
冰	bīng	ice	冫	水
火	huǒ	fire
要	yào	want/will			覀	要
抽	chōu	pull in	扌	由
烟	yān	smoke	火	因			煙
河	hě	river	氵	可
想	xiǎng	would like to			相	心

词 = cí [phrases]

抽煙

chōuyān

to smoke tobacco

Writing practice Seventeen

17. Qǐng chīfàn. = Please eat.

18. Wǒ kě, xiǎng hē bīng shuǐ. = I’m thirsty and would like to drink ice-water.

19. Qǐng zài huǒshān shang bú yào chōuyān. = Please don’t smoke on the volcano.

20. Wǒ xiǎng qù hé biān = I’d like to go to the river.

Notes

21. Note that 西 resembles 四 = four.

22. Simplified uses讠[yán]on the left, while traditional uses言. Alone, 言 means speech or language in both simplified and traditional. When not written on the left, both simplified and traditional characters use 言 as a component of characters such as 譽 and 警.