Chinglish: "遇到问题" and "meet a problem"

Some Chinese students translate "遇到问题" to "meet a problem". This is not correct. The correct way to say it is "I have a problem", "I had a problem", "this problem happened to me before". Say whatever but avoid "meet", because that's a word for people, as in "I met him on the street". If you have to have an exact match for "遇到", say "encounter", as in "the operations team encountered a serious problem at the time the system went live". But it's too formal for normal use.

"in [with] regard to" ,"regarding","concerning", "about"

> Can i use them as a sentences like the followings?
> 1) I have set bunch of ideas as regard the problem.
> 2) With regard to the problem,i have set bunch of ideas.
> 3) I have set bunch of ideas with regard to the problem .
> 4) In respect to the problem, i have set bunch of ideas.
> Are those sentences correct?

There's no difference between these words or phrase ("in regard to" ,"regarding","concerning", "about", and "with regard to"). But it sounds weird when you mix formal words ("with [or in] regard to") with informal words such as "bunch of". And obviously whoever uses formal words should never write "i" when he means "I". Many Chinese and Indians have this horrible yet easily correctable mistake in not using capital letters when they should.

I don't think you can say "bunch of" not following "a"; "a bunch of" is correct but "bunch of" is probably not. "As regards" is heard. I'm not sure if anybody says "as regard".

No "to" between two verbs

> "Let’s help push the cart across the bridge"
> 能解释下 "Help" and "push" 为什么能并列吗？

Most verbs need "to" to be inserted in front of the verb following it, e.g., "He told me to do it". There're a couple of verbs that don't need the "to", e.g., "He let me do it". And there's one verb that can, but doesn't have to, be followed by "to", and that verb is "help", e.g., "We can help you to finish the job", "We can help you finish the job". In fact, Americans often omit the "to" and I think more and more British do that too now.

In very informal English, people omit "to" after "go", e.g., "Let's go eat", or omit "and", e.g., "Go ahead do it".

Don't omit that "that"

> He tried to isolate the germ he thought was causing the disease.
> 我认为 i thought 是插入语，插入语在句中不做任何成分，所以这句话在
> was前是不是缺了一个that 呢？

I agree. The word "that" should not be omitted.

Also see this:

"There're too many people make such mistakes."

Indeed many Chinese say that because it's a direct translation from Chinese. The word "that" (or "who") after "people" should not be omitted. Or just say "Too many people make such mistakes."

You deserve it!

> 日常的会话中也常常用到一句“You deserve it!”，这句话是说这是“你应得的”，就是“活该、
> 自作自受”的意思。比如有人老爱脚踏两条船，结果到头来同时被两个女人给甩了，这种人
> 你就可以对他说 You deserve it.

Most of the time I hear people say "You deserve it!" in a positive way, although the negative usage is also heard:

"You're all hardworking people. At the time our company is coming to the end of an unprecedented profitable year, you all will receive an unprecedented bonus, because you all deserve it!"

Silly or idiot?

A friend's little girl played with my daughter. Both are about 11 years old. One called the other an idiot and caused some unpleasant reaction. I always thought "silly" would be a word used in joking and "idiot" is clearly used in an offensive context, like "You silly boy!", "That's a f!@#$ idiot!"

I did some research. I agree with the last message in this thread:

groups.google.com/group/alt.english.usage/browse_frm/thread/f404499647463ff8

or directly at
groups.google.com/group/alt.english.usage/msg/9b57d36e96deaba8

I've been reading newsgroups for 10 years. My impression is that "idiot" is often used in flames (argument beyond technical content), but "silly" is not, at least in newsgroups. I remember watching a Japanese movie on the airplane. The teenage girl chased her singer model all the way from Tokyo to New York and back to Tokyo. She finally got his affectionate attention, when she grew up, mentally. In the last scene, the guy ran to the airport seeing her off, from outside the security check-in, calling her. She smiled and said (sounds like) ba-da. The English caption is "You idiot!" The context is clearly not about her resentment against the guy. It's quite the opposite actually. So I think the word "idiot" is very wrong here. I don't know Japanese. But I guess the translation should be something like "You silly boy!"

English translation: 碰到问题

> 如果你碰到这个问题，你的思路是什么？

碰到 is meet only if you 碰到 a person. It's NOT meet when you 碰到 a problem. This is a very common mistake the Chinese people make in writing English.

Encounter is the correct word here. But it's too formal. You can always work around it by saying something like "What's your thought when you have this problem [or when this happens to you]?"

English translation: 介绍信

> “介绍信”用英文怎么说？

Reference letter. Some say recommendation letter.

> 想知道正宗中国特色的介绍信，就是以前（好象现在有时候还需要）那种单位开的到别的机构/单位办事的介绍信怎么说

I see what you mean. I was thinking of the letter a job seeker is using.

OK. 正宗中国特色的介绍信 is something English speaking countries don't use. So there's no corresponding word or phrase in English. You may want to say "authorization letter" or "proof of identity letter". If you do, you must explain in a few sentences what it means and why it's needed.

Wrong English translation for "What do you think you are worth to us?"

> What do you think you are worth to us？
> (你怎么认为你对我们有价值呢?)

Looks like many Chinese web sites have that wrong translation (search on Google and you'll know). The sentence means How much do you think you're worth? Or how much do you think your expected salary is? The Chinese translation, if translated back to English, is Why do you think you're valuable to us?, which is a legitimate but totally different question.

English translation: 我正在办理护照

> 我正在办理护照
> 主要是这个办理，感觉prepare不太对

办理 or 办 is an interesting word in Chinese. It's used in so many places. I think in most (but not all) cases it's equivalent to "apply for".