white

When 白(bái) doesn’t mean “white”!

In Chinese the colour white is always expressed as “白色” (bái sè). But白(bái) is also a common word for “doing something in vain”.

Colloquially in English we would say “doing something for nothing”. E.g. I stood in the cold for two hours, but the lead singer went out of a different entrance, so I waited all that time for nothing!

The structure for this use in Chinese is: 白(bái)+verb

Here are some examples for how this is used:

1. 白做 (bái zuò)

(Wǒ de diànnǎo tūrán guān jī le, kěshì wǒ wàngjì bǎocún wǒ de wéndàng le. āi! Bái zuò le!)

我的电脑突然关机了,可是我忘记保存我的文档了。哎!白做了!

My computer suddenly shut down, but I forgot to save my documents. Oops! My work was in vain!

2. 白活 (bái huó)

(Tā kāi wánxiào shuō, shí nián hòu hái méiyǒu mǎi fángzi jiù bái huó le.)

他开玩笑说,十年后还没有买房子就白活了。

He joked that he would live in vain if he still couldn’t buy a house after ten years.

3. 白等 (bái děng)

(Jīntiān wǒ hé yí gè péngyou yuē hǎo yìqǐ qù chī wǎnfàn, kěshì tā yìzhí méi

yǒu lái, yě méiyǒu gěi wǒ dǎ diànhuà. Suǒyǐ wǒ bái děng le tā liǎng gè xiǎo shí.)

今天我和一个朋友约好一起去吃晚饭,可是他一直没有来,也没有给我打电话。所以我白等了他两个小时。

Today I made an appointment with a friend to go to dinner, but he has not come, and he did not even give me a call. So I waited for him for two hours in vain.

4. 白说 (bái shuō)

(Wǒ gēn tā tán le liǎng gè xiǎoshí, tā hái shì fàngqì le. Wǒ zhēn de bái shuō le.)

我跟他谈了两个小时,他还是放弃了。我真的白说了。

I talked with him for two hours, but he still gave up. I really felt that everything that I said was in vain.

Ok, so now could you try to make a sentence with the pattern “白(bái)+verb”  and share it with us in the comments below!

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