"You do not eat rice."
Translation:你不吃饭。
November 30, 2017
16 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
This discussion is locked.
malkeynz
2799
So since rice is sometimes used as a standin, this could also just mean "you do not eat"?
NickTreat2
126
Yeah, saying "eat rice" for 吃饭 is really weird. It's pretty much always used for "to eat". Eating rice on its own is 吃米饭 or 吃大米. It means "rice" in dish names, such as 红烧牛肉盖浇饭, but even in words and phrases like 一顿饭, it should be understood as "meal"
Exactly - I am a native speaker and it's only used in dish names because it's technically a contraction of 米飯 and meals as indicate as such because rice is literally what makes a meal for most of us except when there's well... Noodles. But if we're taking about rice on it's own it is always 米, if anything it'd be more correct to say 你吃米 rather than 你吃飯.
Come to think of it we even use 糯米 for sticky rice.