I keep hearing non-native Chinese speakers greet a native Chinese with a friendly "Ni Hao Ma?" (你好吗?）. It's time to set this straight: "Ni Hao Ma" is not native Chinese. It sounds so artificial that a native speaker immediately envisions a foreigner speaking with a big smile but drifting tones. I'm not certain as to why this 3-character greeting is not used by the Chinese but mostly used by foreigners. I think it has to do with a direct translation of "How are you?" What else could be a better translation of this 3-word English phrase?
So what's the native Chinese greeting? It's a simple "Ni Hao!" (你好!）. Why do the Chinese people not like to append a "Ma" (吗)? I don't know. Whoever invented "Ni Hao", perhaps during the Vernacular Chinese Movement 100 years ago, probably didn't like to make this frequent greeting phrase any longer than necessary.
If you do need to ask the question as if saying How's your situation?, "Ni Hao Ma?" certainly makes sense. But "Ni Hai Hao Ma?" (你还好吗？) or "Ni Zuijin Zenme Yang?" (你最近怎么样？) may be just as or even more common. Similarly, you ask the plural "you" with "Ni Men Hai Hao Ma?" (你们还好吗？) or "Ni Men Dou Hai Hao Ma?" (你们都还好吗？).
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2 comments:
I can tell you: Ni Hao = Hello.
And: Ni Hao Ma = Hello, how are you?
So, I'm not a Chinese girl, but I've a friend, who's Chinese :)
Malu, thanks for reading. I agree, "Ni Hao Ma" is equivalent to "How are you?" The gist of my blog posting, though, is that "Ni Hao Ma" is rarely said by native Chinese, even though it is grammatically correct and makes perfect sense.
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