"我喝什么？"
Translation:What do I drink?
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Would there be a difference here between 'What do I drink?' and 'What am i drinking?' Does Chinese make a difference between the present continuous and the simple present?
There are no verb tenses in Chinese, but if you want to emphasize that it is present continuous, you can add ‘在’ before the verb. So 'What am I drinking?' would be ‘我在喝什么？’
Well, I wouldn't say they don't have any tenses. They have a word for past tense, I think it was "le", and I'm sure they have a word for futere tense, too, but we haven't learned it in school, unfortunately..
Those aren't tenses. For insteance, 了 does not denote past tense, it denotes a completed action.
There aren't any actual verb tense conjugations, unlike that Latin-Germanic languages. In Chinese, you can say that you're doing something by adding 在 in front of the verb. But in normal conversation, even without 在 people will still assume you're talking about a present action. If you add 了 behind the verb on the other hand, then that becomes a past action. If you want to talk about something in the future, then add 會 in front of the verb. These are applicable to all the verbs that I can think of on top of my head.
The only things that tend to stump foreigners are when you start adding conditions in your sentence, such as "What time did you eat? What time will you eat?" But this is quite easy, just put the time directly in front of the verb itself, and the problem is solved. TBH it's kinda hard to just think of issues that people might have so feel free to ask.
What is the pinyin for the characters that emphasize the tenses please? Past, present continuous, and future. Thank you!
Hey, you can look up specific characters on ArchChinese.com. 在 is "zai" with a downward tone. 會 is "hui" with a downward tone. 了 is "le" with no accentuated tone.
So in the case of this problem, though, "what do I drink" is a way of asking "what am I drinking", correct? At least in English it would be an odd thing to ask someone unless you were testing them or something.
Wow, I just came here I clarified my questions reading you guys. Please keep helping :)
The character that makes the sound "ma" is used to indicate that the sentence is a question
I am not sure why your comment appears here, in the context of this particular exercise; because, the question in this exercise is a "what" question rather than a "yes or no" question, and therefore does not involve the interrogative particle 吗 ("ma").
The 么 of 什么 is pronounced more like "me," (not the English word "me" but "me" in pinyin) and is part of the word for "what;" whereas, the interrogative particle 吗 (pronounced "ma") is appended to a sentence to indicate a "yes or no" question. 我喝什么? is not a "yes or no" question, and accordingly does not involve 吗 ("ma"); rather, it is a "what" question, and accordingly involves the word 什么 ("shenme"):
我喝什么？= ”What am I drinking?" (or "What do I drink?")
我喝吗？= "Am I drinking?" (or "Do I drink?")
I don't think "what do I drink?" is grammatically correct... But icr i'm italian ahahahahah
This question does not make sense. Why would I ask myself, "What do I drink?" What context do Chinese people use this kind of question?
I do wish "I drink What?" would have been accepted. It's valid English (modulo the uppercase, but honestly I wish Duo didn't give us that hint, it always feels like cheating and I do my best to ignore it).
I keep putting what do l drink and it says wrong... again again again...
