Chinese Greeting: 怎么样 - Is it correct?

[benotnobody]

When I meet friends I usually say 怎么样 (zen3 me yang4).

This literally means something like "how" but it's a kind of colloquial greeting I picked up from some place or another. Can anyone please tell me if this is correct/common or not?

[roddy]

Yeah, it's fine. Kind of similar to 'how's it going' in English, I guess. Friendly, informal, casual.

Roddy

[shibo77]

最近怎么样?

Zui4 jin4 zen3 me5 yang4?

Similar to "How are you? How is it going?..."

roddy

Site Admin

Joined: 24 May 2003

Posts: 888

Location: Beijing

888 good number!

-Shibo

[BeijingSlacker]

Extremely casual and only used between acquaintance and friends.

[sfr@rcn.com]

and what's the answer to zenme yang?

[confucius]

You can reply with the same question: "zenme yang?"

Example:

Confucius: "Yo! Yao Ming! Zenme yang?"

Yao Ming: "Hei! Confucius! Zenme yang?"

So, what do you think of my answer? (zenme yang?)

[sfr@rcn.com]

hao. Hen hao.

[trevelyan]

>> and what's the answer to zenme yang?

不怎么样 translates as "nothing much"

[Haoqide]

From what I'm told, this is a more common greeting among younger people. I've been told that often older people won't know how to respond to this greeting, and they'll respond with something like, "What do you mean?"

I've actually had this happen to me once, but I'm not sure if it's a widespread thing.

[39degN]

just simply saying "zen me yang?" is a little bit weird, we usually say "最近(过得)怎么样?"

for example:

-嘿, 最近怎么样?

-还行/还成/还好/马马虎虎吧, 你怎么样?

[Disenchant]

The most common response, as far as me and my circle would use, would be [还好]. If somebody replied [还成], I would immediately label them as a out of province [外地] person. I'm guessing it's a [东北] Northeast thing.

[Quest]

还成, 成不?

[roddy]

成 is quite often used here in Beijng as a substitute for 行. Where in China are you, Disenchant?

Roddy

[Disenchant]

Hubei, Wuhan and sometimes Sichuan too, because that's my mother's side. [成] is used an awful lot in wuxia and 古装电视剧. It just shows how Beijing-centric things are.