Random new word of the day

[muyongshi]

钛 Titanium

[roddy]

飞沙走石 fēishāzǒushí, nice way to refer to a sandstorm

没齿不忘, mòchǐbùwàng, "I'll remember it even when I've lost my teeth"

[imron]

尅 - kēi - hit, beat (as in punch). Not really a new word as such, I just never knew the character for it until I saw it popup when watching 落地请开手机 just now.

[roddy]

用膳, yòngshàn - to eat a meal - I think referring to the emperor, or perhaps just in the palace, I'm not sure. The other difference between that and 吃饭 beyond the fact that if you send me 用膳 in an SMS I spend 5 minutes on a bumpy bus trying to write 膳 into Pleco, whereas if you use 吃饭 I know what you mean. It's my own fault for sending text messages using vocabulary acquired while watching Di Renjie though . . .

[Kimosabe]

一口京片子, yi1kou3jing1pian4zi0 to speak with impeccable Beijing dialect. Weird its not called 一口儿京片儿 though...

[monto]

蚊子 - mosquito

As a word referring to a kind of insect, almost every one knows it.

I heard it this moring on TV programme about things in Taiwan.

蚊子机场 —— meant to refer an airport of little use

蚊子馆 —— a studium or museum where few people go to.

I think it is only Taiwanese way, but believe it is acceptable in Putonghua.

[Lu]

We really have run out of new words!

[randall_flagg]

new word of the day (my first one, as i just stumbled across the thread)

干物女 girl who has given up on finding a boyfriend (and spends her time watching DVD's in at home). Source: Depressed friend.

http://baike.baidu.com/view/1009921.htm

[roddy]

假日时几乎都在家里睡觉，穿着高中时代的体育服装，歪斜躺在家里喝啤酒看棒球转播、DVD等

Anyone else just fallen in love with Randall's friend or is just me?

王化, wánghuà, civilizing influence. Again from Di Renjie.

[randall_flagg]

炙zhi4 to bake or to roast (meat)

As seen in the subtitles of the Korean movie 食客。

Never seen this character d before...and never tasted anything fresh out of the oven of over here, either.

[monto]

火星文：

A set of jargons Chinese youngsters use on the net, a mixture of letters, numbers, symbols, and characters or parts of characters of Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

[roddy]

I came across that one recently too, in 炙手可热.

[atitarev]

I have to say this.

Perhaps you know the "Chinese" soup called 罗宋汤, beetroot and cabbage are some of the main ingredients. It sounds like [Luósòng tāng], which is "Russian soup" or "borshch".

The normal word for Russia is 俄罗斯 [Éluósī] but in this particular case, it's a transliteration from the English (音译) "Russian". The Russian words for Russian and Russia are quite different: русский (russky) ("u" as in "put", not "but"!), Россия (Rossiya).

There is a Chinese word borrowed from Russian: хлеб (khleb or khlyeb) -> 列巴 (lièbā) - "bread". It's used in Harbin, Dalian and some other North-Eastern Chinese cities.

[rob07]

佞人 (ning4ren2), sycophant.

[rob07]

I like this one - 丘八 qiu1ba1, soldier. Individually the characters mean "hillock" and "eight", but together they mean soldier because together they look like 兵.

[imron]

It's worth noting though that this is a derogatory term for solider.

[Lu]

Here they say 阿兵哥 a1bing1ge1 for soldier (not derogatory as far as I can tell).

New word I came across yesterday: what is 九兆萬 (also written 九萬兆)? I started counting zeroes, but it does not mean 90 quadrillion. No, some journalist was too creative, and coined this word for Ma Yingjiu, his vice-president Xiao Wanchang, and his premier Liu Zhaoxuan.

[roddy]

荷尔蒙, héěrméng, loan word for hormone, which is more often 激素

[rob07]

笄之年 (ji1 zhi1 nian2) - an old term for the time at which a girl comes of age. The 笄 was a type of hairpin which was used to tie up an adult woman's hair and started to be used at the earlier of her turning 15 or getting engaged to be married.

[randall_flagg]

so what is the difference between 炙 and 燔 both mentioned in this thread.

鱼饵 yu2er3, fishing bait (the stuff you put on the hook)