第三十五天

[nnozomi]

第七天！ You know the drill. Post something you like :)

Mine comes via presumenothing (and I think also trobadora), 寻人启事's a cappella Mayday medley, lovely harmonies.

Link to playlist 🎵

大家好好休息吧 (and/or 这个星期也好好努力吧, depending on time zones)

Comments

[nnozomi]

…I'm assuming this is already explained online somewhere in English?
I hate to say it, but you are, as they say, laboring under a misapprehension! Or else my googling abilities are just not great, also likely, but I can't find a single mention of this in English. Um... the tone markers go on a first, then o or e, in iu they go on the second vowel, followed by a discussion of ü that I can't make head or tail of???

[presumenothing]

………y'know, I don't even know why I'm surprised, it's not like this is an incredibly basic thing we learned in the first year of school or anything. And yet translations of Iroha are everywhere (granted this one isn't historical, but, why).

Anyway. Line-by-line that unfortunately destroys the seven-syllable rhythm:

a母出现别放过, / If "a" appears don't miss it,
没有a母找oe, / If there's no "a" then look for "o" or "e",
iu并列标在后, / If "i" and "u" are together then put it on whichever comes later,
ü母上面两点抹。/ Put the two dots above the "ü".
单个韵母不必说, / Single vowels are duh,
jqx小淘气, / "j" "q" and "x" are cheeky,
见了ü眼就挖去。/ And dig out "ü"'s eyes once they see them.

Basically, tone markers always go on vowels, so if there's only one vowel then of course it goes there. In words with multiple vowels, the priority goes in decreasing order as follows:

1. a (always first priority)
2. o or e （they don't appear together anyway)
3. i (in "ui") or u (in "iu")
4. ü (with the dots included… EXCEPT after j, q, or x where the dots are omitted even though it's still a ü sound which I have never actually known the reason for, but assume it's because there's no need to disambiguate since they don't go with regular u sound anyway)

Hence:

1. 老师 lǎo (has a) shī (single vowel)
2. 头 tóu (no a, has o) and 月 yuè (no a, has e)
3. 鬼 guǐ and 求 qiú (the latter vowel in iu/ui)
4. 绿 lǜ and 略 lüè keep the dots (regardless of where the tone marker is) to distinguish from 路 lù…
5. …but 居 jū 取 qǔ 选 xuǎn drop the dots completely though it's still pronounced ü in all cases.

[trobadora]

ü (with the dots included… EXCEPT after j, q, or x where the dots are omitted even though it's still a ü sound which I have never actually known the reason for, but assume it's because there's no need to disambiguate since they don't go with regular u sound anyway)

Ha, yeah, I'd really like to know why. I mean, yeah, it's not ambiguous, but still - WHY CAN'T YOU SPELL THE SAME SOUND THE SAME WAY OMG. It's a really irritating inconsistency!

(Sorry for the belated rant, LOL.)

[nnozomi]

ack, trobadora's response reminded me that you wrote all this out very clearly and I never responded to it! 真对不起啊，我怎么真么无礼貌。Thank you! Maybe I'll see if I can memorize it for fun.
单个韵母不必说, / Single vowels are duh,
Excellent 意译！
after j, q, or x where the dots are omitted even though it's still a ü sound
I have finally learned this after spending a LONG time on zoom (züm?) with a native speaker friend, trying to repeat "出去" back at her correctly. I'm not sure I ever mastered it but at least I understand it in theory.

[presumenothing]

Just "zum" is fine XD ü really only comes after n or l.

but at least I understand it in theory.

Mood!