What is the character for "Here you are" used in Pimsleur

[singularity2]

In the Pimsleur audio lessons, they use something that sounds like "no4" for "here you are", when you hand something to someone. Anyone know what the character might be? My native Mandarin speaking girlfriend says there isn't such a character, and it's just a verbal expression. I believe her but I just wanted to see what everyone else thought.

thanks!

[roddy]

Even if it's just a verbal expression, there should be a character used for when transcribing dialogues, most likely with the mouth radical - like 哇 or 哈.

Roddy

[atitarev]

I think you guys mean a non-verbal expression.

Here's another example of a non-verbal exclamation with various readings matching somewhat your description.

Character dictionary

嗯 [ń] [ň] [ǹ] [ńg] [ňg] [ǹg] (a non-verbal exclamation)

Word dictionary:

嗯 ńg* intj. What?; Huh?

嗯 ňg intj. How come?; Why?

嗯 ǹg intj. O.K.; Agreed!

[Roee]

I've seen this characeter displayed on TV subtitles once for a shanghainese show.

[楚留香]

I usually say 拿 (na2) "Take it" when I hand something to someone.

[wai ming]

Cantonese apparently uses 嗱 (na4 - mid falling tone).

[Gary Soup]

My wife and inlaws (Shanghainese) also say it with something close to the 4th tone.

[cwmccabe]

Does anyone know the parts of China in this sound might be used? I've never heard anyone use it in Beijing.

[atitarev]

There are a lot of posts but no confirmation what was actually pronounced on the discs. Maybe Singularity2 should get another native speaker to listen to that portion and say how it (that interjection or word) should be written in characters.

In my previous post I didn't make any assumption about what was said, just that non-verbal expressions can and should also be expressed in characters, which is normally the case.

Because Chinese is not phonetical, onomatopoeia is difficult but there still must be quite a few characters to express different emotions - sighs, regrets, reprimands, etc, even if they don't match 100% what people actually utter.

[singularity2]

It's possible that the word is from Beijing, since the Pimsleur CDs have a Beijing accent, (they use retroflex endings). And, many of the places that the characters visit are around Beijing.

BTW, one context that the word is used is: "Suppose that you were handing someone some money to pay for a purchase. What word would you use to accompany the gesture of handing the money to them?"

Also, the instructor says that the word is spoken with a 'high falling tone'.

I'll try to get some native Mandarin speaking co-workers to listen to it, and see what they think. I've seen a few transcriptions of Pimsleur, and none have been able to define this word.

[singularity2]

Could this be 纳 ?

The contexts are:

"Here you are, 10 American dollars"

"Here you are, one beer"

"Here you are, 13 Renminbi"

[skylee]

I think it is 喏 (nuò). Take a look -> http://www.iciba.com/search?s=%E5%96%8F

喏

nuò

〈叹〉

[方]∶使人注意自己所指事物 [look]。如:喏,这不是我上周丢的钱包吗?

[雅各]

The original post does accurately describe the pronunciation of the word.

I remember being completely perplexed at the time when I heard it. I asked about it to a couple (one from Zhejiang, the other from Beijing) and they seemed to think it was 那．

However, I've just checked another source, and that says that it's 内 with the 言 radical to the left (simplified). Wenlin lists this as ne4.

There's also na4 呐，which can also be ne0. See William McNaughton's Reading & Writing Chinese p124 - I quote:

Particle indicating two closely related questions, a paurs ("as for..."), a mild warning, a continuing state ("still"), an antagonistic retort ("Whadda ya mean, ...?"), "as much as ...," "really, even" [A] (McNaughton's wordlist) See Chao's Grammar, pp801-803 ...着呐 "Oh, yes, ... is true." (See Chao's Grammar, pp.809-810.)

[taryn]

Judging by the current responses, I guess it would be safe to assume that 讷 is not the right character.

There goes my transcripts....

[atitarev]

I like Skylee's suggestion and it matches your description. You can never be 100% with exclamations, so "close enough is good enough", in other words, instead of skipping the character for the exclamation put in the best matching character.

[Gary Soup]

Singularity2 may have the answer.

I found this in Wenlin:

989 纳(F納) [nà] receive; accept; enjoy; pay; sew

[Josh-J]

Whatever it is, judging by peoples' replies it doesn't seem to be used alot - so I wonder why its in Pimsleur...

[wai ming]

Whatever it is, judging by peoples' replies it doesn't seem to be used alot - so I wonder why its in Pimsleur...

I think it would be more correct to say that it isn't written a lot... which does not mean it is not commonly said.

[Roee]

Skylee got it right. "喏 [nuò] hey, look"

[singularity2]

My girlfriend just translated Skylee's link for me, and she also thinks that must be it: 喏 (nuò)

And I was hoping we were going to be able to create a new character for this expression

So Taryn - maybe you can use this in your docs.

By the way, if anyone hasn't seen - Taryn has created some great Pimsleur transcripts. (there are a few of them, so just search for "pimsleur" in these forums if you're interested).

Thanks for everyone's help!