Learn Chinese phrases, sentence – learn Mandarin – How to say “My uncle loves collecting stuff; he has one house, ten marbles, one hundred stamps, and one thousand bottle caps” in Chinese: 我叔叔喜欢收集东西。他有一间房子，十个弹珠，一百张邮票和一千个瓶盖。Wo3 shu2 shu5 xi3 huan1 shou1 ji2 dong1 xi5. Ta1 you3 yi4 jian1 fang2 zi5, shi2 ge4 dan4 zhu1, yi4 bai3 zhang1 you2 piao4 he2 yi4 qian1 ge4 ping2 gai4.
Wo3 (我 wo3 is wo3 de5 for short, means my) shu2 shu5 (叔叔 uncle) xi3 huan1 (喜欢 verb, means like) shou1 ji2 (收集 verb, collect) dong1 xi5 (东西 noun, stuff). Ta1 (他 he) you3 (有 has) yi4 (一 one) jian1 (间 measure word for house) fang2 zi5 (房子 fang2 means house, zi5 is a suffix word that habitually got put after certain nouns), shi2 (十 ten) ge4 (个 a general measure word for many things) dan4 zhu1 (弹珠 marbles), yi4 bai3 (一百 100) zhang1 (张 measure word for paper) you2 piao4 (邮票 stamps) he2 (和 and) yi4 qian1 (一千 1000) ge4 (个 a general measure word) ping2 (瓶 bottle) gai4 (盖 cap or lid).
There are two types of uncles: 叔叔 shu2 shu5 is the one from paternal side, while 舅舅 jiu4 jiu5 is from maternal side.
The tone change rule for 一 （one yi1, yi2, yi4)
When doing the counting numbers, we say: yi1, er4, san3 (一 1, 二 2, 三 3 ), the yi1 is first tone.
When 一 （yi， one) is put in front of a fourth tone word, it is pronounced as yi2, second tone. For example, yi2 ge4 ren2 (一个人 one person), yi2 liang4 che1 (一辆车 one car).
When 一 (yi, one) is put in front of first tone, second tone or third tone words, it is pronounced as yi4, fourth tone. For example, yi4 zhang1 zhi3 (one piece of paper), yi4 tiao2 gou3 (one dog), and yi4 wan3 fan4 (one bowl of cooked rice)
For a complete list of measure words and the most common measure words list, please do a search at your upper right side column. Or you can go to categories, I have a post about measure word under the Chinese grammar categories. Watch this measure word video to refresh your measure words knowledge, it is very good 🙂