Time - Periodic time, days of week, month and year.

Here we look at the periodic time, by that I mean, days of week/months, today, yesterday, last year, next year etc. First we look at days of the week. It would be helpful if you have gone through the number lesson here. then we look at months and then other periodic time variable. if you want to learn how to tell the time then thats a different lesson, look here.

Days of week

The days of week are just 星期 (meaing star or day period) followed by the number of the day, as follows:

It can be seen that the days are just the numbers from one to 6 for Monday - Saturday. Sunday is slightly different because 日 means Sun, hence day of the Sun. So its day 1, day 2, day 3 etc etc. Mandarin does not have names for the days like European languages.

Months of the year.

The months of the year work in a similar way to the days of the week. 月 (moon) stands for month, the month ordinal is placed before this character to signify the month.

So its basically the first month, the second month, the third month etc. In Mandarin they do not have specific name for the months as we do in European languages.

---

  

---

Seasons

Here are the season, there are only four of them so not hard to forget!

• spring - 春天 - chūn tiān
• summer - 夏天 - xià tiān
• autumn - 秋天 - qiū tiān
• winter - 冬天 - dōng tiān

Other periodic time.

Other time periods are described below. There are others but i have just put the essentials up here.

• Today - 今天 - jīn tiān
• Tomorrow - 明天 - míng tiān
• Day after Tomorrow - 后天 - hòu tiān
• Yesterday - 昨天 - zuó tiān
• Day before Yesterday - qián tiān

• This week - 本星期 - běn xīng qī
• Last week - 上星期 - shàng xīng qī
• Next week - 下星期 - xià xīng qī
• Weekend - 周末 - zhōu mò

• This year - 今年 - jīn nián
• Last year - 去年 - qù nián
• Next year - 明年/来年 - míng nián/lái nián
• Year after next - 后年 - hòu nián
• Year before last - 前年 - qián nián

I hope this lesson has been useful and hope that it will serve as a reference for you. I may add other information to this page so please keep coming back. Click here to go back to lesson index and read another. Dont forget to try the chatroom where you can meet fellow learners and make new friends. Practice your manadarin, or meet people in your area who speak chinese.

---

  

---

Why donate? |

Donations help make this site and software better!
Please make a donation however small.

Thanks!

Please donate to this site.

Click the donate button now! Help make this site and software better.

---

Please support Mathew's organisation; read his story, click the image below. God bless you Matty!

---

chineselearners - The site for lovers of Mandarin Chinese. Tools include pinyin dictionary, simplified dictionary, traditional dictionary, translator, radicals, stroke order diagram page, ??? lookup and much more ...