Letter to Grandma

[Pegasus]

Hello Chinese-forums.com community, 

 

I am writing a letter to my grandmother. I was wondering if I could run this by you guys for a quick check of my writing. 

 

Note: Names have been changed for privacy. I'll use the names Joe/李偉 as an alias for me and Jane/張秀英 as an alias for my wife. 

 

Here's what I want to communicate: 

 

June 6, 2016

 

Dear Grandmother, 

 

Hello Grandma. It's been a while. We wanted to say hello. We're very happy to exchange letters with you. Jane and I have been married for almost a year now. Tomorrow is our anniversary. I was very happy to see you at our wedding last year. 

 

How have you been? We have enclosed two sheets of paper and a self-addressed stamped envelope for your convenience in writing back. 

 

We love you very much, Grandma. Please take care. 

 

Wishing you good health, vitality, peace, safety, and happiness. 

 

Sincerely, 

Joe and Jane

 

Here's what I wrote in Chinese: 

 

尊敬的祖母∶

 

奶奶您好。好久不見。李偉和張秀英向您問好。我們好開心跟奶奶交換封信。李偉和張秀英夫妻結婚快到一年了。明天是結婚紀念日。去年在我們的婚禮我非常高興見奶奶。最近奶奶好嗎？我們隨信附上兩張白紙和一個回郵信封與奶奶方便回復。愛奶奶好多。請奶奶保重身體。祝您身體健康、龍馬精神、平平安安、快樂幸福。

 

此致

敬禮

 

李偉和張秀英

西曆二零一六年六月六日

 

 

 

Thank you in advance. I appreciate your feedback. 

 

~Pegasus

 

 

[889]

It depends on your relationship. Such an exceedingly formal letter makes me think your Grandmother is 88 and living in Taiwan. That is, it's the sort of letter you'd expect Song Meiling's great-grand-nephews to have written while trembling. If not, you might try a less formal and therefore somewhat warmer tone.

 

Your letter also seems a bit cold and impersonal because there's not a shred of real news in there. Say something about yourselves and your lives. (Of course all she really wants to know is when she'll have a grandson.)

[Pegasus]

Hello 889, 

 

Thank you for your feedback. 

 

My problem is that my Chinese is quite limited. There's a lot that I don't know how to say. However, I like your idea of adding some real news of some sort. How about if I add some personal information to the letter? Would that help make it less cold? 

 

After  "How have you been?" /「最近奶奶好嗎？」, I am thinking of adding: "We finished moving to Cincinatti, Ohio earlier this year. We're renting (living in) an apartment."  

 

But, I am not sure how to say "earlier this year" in Chinese. And, I'm not sure what the right word and measure word are for "an apartment". Here's my attempt: 李偉和張秀英今年搬家完到俄亥俄州辛辛那提市。我們現在租房子住。 I didn't know how to say "earlier this year", so I just wrote "this year" in Chinese. How would I say "earlier this year" instead? And, do you have any suggestions for "We're renting an apartment."? 

 

I appreciate all your help. Thank you very much.

 

Sincerely,

Pegasus 

[Pegasus]

@ 889

 

PS. -- I just looked up who Song Meiling is. LoL. I didn't realize my letter sounded that old and stuffy. I guess I've always been a relatively formal person in how I like to communicate, but is it that bad? Thanks again. 

[Pegasus]

@ 889

 

P.S.S. -- If you're curious, you're right that my grandmother is in her 80s (in age), but she doesn't live in Taiwan. She lives in San Francisco. 

[Lu]

One trick is talking around what you don't know how to say. Don't know how to say 'earlier this year'? Just write 'in February' (or whenever it was). (Or ask here, of course.)

 

One of the things that make your letter look very formal is the extensive use of the third person. This is very nice, but best used in moderation. Keep it to one or two instances and just write 我/我们/您 the other times.

 

And I agree with the other poster, write more news! How's your job, how's Jane's job, how's Cincinatti, how's the apartment, have you found the Chinese supermarket there yet (or something else that grandma can relate to), something you miss about her since it sounds like you haven't seen her in a while. And if you can, ask her about something in her life as well: how is her neighbour/songbird/bad leg/swimming club doing/going? People here will be happy to help (including me, although I won't be of much use as my written Chinese is not that great either).

 

Good luck, I'm sure your grandmother will be delighted with this letter, whatever you end up writing!

[li3wei1]

Or, you could throw in some English. As long as the sentences that really matter (we'd love to hear from you, we're doing fine) are in Chinese, the rest she can look up, ask a friend, or just ignore. That's what happens in oral conversations. If she's living in SF, I'm sure she can find someone who can help her understand the letter. Then she might feel more able to write back. She might be thinking, 'if I write in Chinese, they won't understand, and if I write in English, they'll see how stupid I am'.

[Pegasus]

@Lu: Thank you for your suggestions. I think I'll say 今年二月 to say February of this year instead. However, for my own knowledge, how do you say "earlier this year" anyway? Regarding my extensive use of the third person to refer to myself and my wife in Chinese, yes, I see what you're saying. Funny. I'm so used to it when talking with my Grandma. When I was very young, my grandma took care of me while my parents worked. Unfortunately, I only picked up very basic Chinese Taishan dialect from this time. I mostly remember phrases my grandma would use to tell me to wash my hands, come eat dinner, take a bath, etc. I didn't learn more Chinese until I took some Chinese classes in college/university. The funny thing is this: During my whole childhood, I didn't really know the personal pronouns like I/you/he/she/we/they etc. in Chinese. When I talked to my grandma while I was younger, I always referred to myself in the third person! It's funny thinking back on it. My Chinese (Taishan dialect) was so rudimentary at the time. In retrospect, I now realize that I didn't even know how to say the demonstrative determiners/adjectives/pronouns this, that, and these. Very strangely, I only knew how to say "those" in Chinese. Imagine using the word "those" in every case where what you should really use is "this" or "that" or "these"! LoL.

 

Also @Lu: Goodness, I wish I could easily write about all those things you suggested. It's taken me so long already to compose the letter I've got so far. At least this effort really is helping me practice and hopefully improve my Chinese. I think I will keep those topics in mind for future letters. I hope this letter is the first of many more letters to come in the future. Thanks for your ideas. 

 

@li3wei1: Thank you for your suggestions too. I'll think about throwing in some English. I can see how that might make the letter come across more friendly and less cold. 

 

Cheers, 

Pegasus 

 

(made minor edit to post to fix a repeated word typo.)

[anonymoose]

(Of course all she really wants to know is when she'll have a grandson.)

 

I'm guessing she probably knows that already.

[li3wei1]

Also, pictures. Send lots of pictures, with labels in English. Just do whatever you can to communicate, and as she's family, she may not understand, but she won't be offended. And you may get back something that takes hours to decipher. What fun!

 

Tell her we all said Hi