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一 起 交 通 事 故. Why is it 事 故 called accident?
When you turn these two words round, 事 故 then
becomes 故 事. Interest, though, isn’t it?

Can you call 事 故 also 意外？

[Reply]

Min Min Reply:
September 1st, 2010 at 3:43 am

Hi Βωων Κυαν,
Yes. You can replace 事 故 also 意 外。
一 起 交 通 意 外。
But if you say: 一 起 交 通 故 事。It has different meaning.
故 事 is story, while 事 故 is accident.

[Reply]

Ni hao Βωων Κυαν,

Yes that is a interesting story 事 故!
I have noticed that 故 on its own can mean incident and 事 on its own accident. story almost always talls you something about a happening a “accident” so to speak, maybe that is the connection.
But Minmin 敏敏 can maybe tell you more.

What I forgot to tell you is that Chinese characters are based on roughly 254 radicals, which makes it a lot easier to memorize Chinese characters, matters of the heart have the heart 心 xīn radical in it [pà 怕 scarred, litterally white heart ] , things made of wood have the tree radical 木 mù in it [chuáng 床 bed]and so on ..

I somtimes make my own stories or mnemonics to memorize Chinese chracters, for example mào zi 帽 子 hat, a peace of cloth -巾 jīn- to protect your eye -目 mù – from the sun – 日 rì -. By the way 子 (meaning child or son on its own) has no meaning here, Chinese use it to make the words longer so it is the listener has more time to catch the meaning.

Well succes with your study

zhù nǐ xué xí shùn lì
祝 你 学 习 顺 利

陆蓝克

[Reply]

Hello Βωων Κυαν [文 光]

Allow me to anwer your question, 茅 盾 is just a name, but 矛 盾 means contradiction (the first mao has a gras radical). as in:
máo dùn xiān shēng shuō máo dùn biǎo miàn huà le
茅 盾 先 生 说： 矛 盾 表 面 化 了
Sir MaoDun said, The contradiction has become appeared
máo 矛 is a spear dùn 盾 is a shield. The story goes that in ancient times a marked salesmen sold spears saying his spears penetrated everything on earth, nothing could stop them. The next morning he was selling his shields saying they were so hard nothing could penetrate them, a astute buyer who was present the day before when he was selling spears, said “But what about your spears then”. The marked salesman was dumbfounded and left.
Hence the meaning of 矛 盾 spear-shield meaning contradiction.
Hope this explains your question.

万事如意

陆蓝克

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