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- "他的生日是什么时候？"
"他的生日是什么时候？"
Translation:When is his birthday?
9 Comments
Why would you use 时候？日期 makes more sense. 时候 is like time. Birthdays all start at the same time: midnight, so what's important is the date. Now if the sentence was about a party, it would seem normal but this just sounds weird to me.
970
The question was, "when is his birthday?" The question did not use 几点 to ask for what time or hour. It asked 什么时候 or "when", right?
In English, "when" can mean any frame of time; such as next week, tomorrow, in October, this summer, or even a specific date. Does 什么时候 work the same way as in English?
According to the link below, 什么时候 can be used to ask for a date:
Wáng Lì: Nǐ shénme shíhou jiéhūn?
王 丽：你 什么 时候 结婚？
Wang Li: When will you get married?Zhāng Wěi: Bāyuè shíjiǔ hào.
张 伟：八月 十九 号。
Zhang Wei: August 19th.
Yes, 什么时候 in English is when. I am a Chinese and I speak it fluently as well as English. But usually I use 什么时候 at the beginning of a sentence. For example, 你什么时候回来? Or I would say 你及时来我家? So we acrually use 什么时候 and 及时 intervently.
- 970
I have seen comments from other native speakers saying 什么时候 is often used at the beginning of the sentence. If it's wrong to use it at the end, DuoLingo should update the Chinese phrase.
My reply @grippygecko was because they believe 什么时候 is used to ask a question only about time and not about dates.
