Modern Mandarin Chinese Grammar

talkiNG aBoUt dUratioN aNd FreqUeNCy

39.4

我们喝着咖啡谈话。

我們喝著咖啡談話。

Wǒmen hēzhe kāfēi tán huà.

We talked while drinking coffee. (‘drinking coffee’ is the background event)

他看着电视吃早饭。

他看著電視吃早飯。

Tā kànzhe diànshì chī zǎofàn.

He eats breakfast while watching television. (‘watching television’ is

the background event)

To indicate that an event is a background event without focusing on its duration, use 的时候/

的時候 de shíhou ‘when, while.’

我在中国的时候认识他了。

我在中國的時候認識他了。

Wǒ zài Zhōngguó de shíhou rènshi tā le.

While I was in China, I met him.

C43.1

39.4 Indicating frequency

39.4.1 Words used to indicate frequency

The classifiers 次 cì ‘number of times’ and 遍 biàn ‘a time’ are used to indicate frequency.

They are always preceded by a number or the question words 几/幾 jǐ or 多少 duōshǎo

‘how many.’ 次 cì can be used to refer to the frequency of any kind of action. 遍 biàn is

more restricted in its use and refers only to actions that have been performed from beginning

to end.

39.4.2 the grammar of the frequency expression

To indicate the frequency of an action, follow the action verb with number + 次 cì or 遍 biàn

‘times’ to indicate the ‘number of times’ that the action occurs. If the verb is suffixed with

了 le or 过/過 guo, the frequency phrase occurs after the verb suffix.

我已经说了三次，你怎么还不懂？

我已經說了三次，你怎麼還不懂？

Wǒ yǐjing shuō le sān cì, nǐ zěnme hái bù dǒng?

I’ve already said it three times, how can you still not understand? (遍 biàn can be used

instead of 次 cì in this sentence.)

A verb may be followed by both a frequency expression and an object. The frequency expres-

sion always precedes the object.

There are several ways to indicate frequency.

Pattern 1: verb + object, verb + frequency

If the verb takes an object, the verb may be repeated, once followed by the object, and once

followed by the frequency expression.

我去年坐飞机坐了三次。(遍 biàn cannot be used here.)

我去年坐飛機坐了三次。

Wǒ qùnián zuò fēijī zuò le sān cì.

Last year I rode airplanes three times.