"七点差十分。"
Translation:Ten minutes to seven o'clock.
67 CommentsThis discussion is locked.
The meaning given to me for the new character was "worse," which could not possibly make sense in context. So I had to intentionally give a wrong answer in order to see the correct one to find out what it means.
Using logic, worse would mean less than complete. So, ten minutes worse than 7 means 10 minutes before completing 7 o'clock. It makes perfect sense.
差 does have that meaning but, as is the case for a lot of Chinese, context is king.
Actually you had two options; 1, do as you did and learn from a mistake (the main learning strategy of young children everywhere) or 2, you could have used a secondary source to find a more detailed definition for this character. I usually do the 1st and when I'm still confused then resort to the 2nd.
Or the third option, to guess the sentence meaning from the words in the word bank, with knowing the meanings of all but one character. xD
jeff BLANK Bob who thanked him. What did jeff do? You see how one character can do a lot.
Even without the word bank you could make an educated guess, having read the 'tips' and combining these with one's own common sense. Yes, the hover-over hint says "worse", now that would probably mean subtracting some small amount from some big amount.
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They're trying to teach you specifically how to say "ten minutes to seven", not just have you give anything that has the same meaning.
It's wrong because that's not how the given Chinese is saying it. The whole point is to understand the literal meaning of the Chinese words.
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Nothing wrong with it. Report it (as I did) and hopefully it will get fixed. I get notifications fairly often about the DL Chinese team accepting my suggestions.
七點差十分。
1. In Taiwan, the character "差" is pronounced as chā, not chà.
2. In Taiwan we prefer to say "差十分七點" but it is even more common to just say "六點五十分."
Why is "o'clock" 2 separate words? You have to tap " o " and then tap " 'clock " but that's not really a thing. It is 1 word...
"Ten to seven" would be the most natural way to say this in American English (West coast). "Ten to seven o'clock" (or "Ten minutes to seven o'clock") is never used.
Again -- this is weird robot English. I said 'ten to seven' and added 'o'clock' since it was shown though you'd never say this in English. I was corrected for not saying 'ten minutes' although 'ten to seven' is what native (American) speakers usually say. There are so many of these weird translations that it is quite frustrating.
@Marin - what is really weird is that you answered "ten to seven 'o clock" and then started complaining that it is not the right answer. Whatever made you think that that was the right answer?
Agreed. Ten minutes before seven o'clock should be accepted, and yes, I did report it.
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"O'clock" really should be a single tile; it trips me up every time. At minimum, it should be graded as a typo instead of a mistranslation.
Putting "o'clock" on a previous question was marked wrong, but on this one omitting it was marked wrong. Please make it consistent
Answered "Ten minutes to 7 o'clock." Marked wrong with the suggested correct phase "Ten minutes to 7 o'clock" ... Wat?
'normally' i would not say ' to seven o'clock', just 7. even if you walked up to a stranger on the street and said '10 minutes to 7' that person would know what you are talking about. minutes indicate that you ARE talking about time.
Now I see why you have trouble learning Chinese.
A hint is not an answer. It is merely a pointer.
10 mins to 7 o'clock is the same as ten minutes to seven o'clock. It is correct not incorrect. Tq
Can Duolingo make "o'clock" a single word? Unnecessary confusion in my opinion
I really think they should clarify that this doesn't mean "ten minutes worse than 7:00"
It is perfectly clear that the Chinese way of saying things is not always the way we say things in other languages. How do you suppose someone from another culture would react to hearing "give it up!"? Idiomatic expressions NEVER translate word for word.
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10 of 7, 10 to 7, 6:50, 10 minutes to seven are all equivalent in English. That tough on a robot, but the database should be able to handle it.
@salihua - interesting that you are not able to handle "10 minutes to 7 o'clock"...
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These time translations are not consistent so it's so hard to remember what each one wants. I'm giving the correct answer but not in the exact way it is looking for. a little frustrating.
@Laura - English also has many variants. Lets stop cribbing and start learning some Chinese here.
Oho. So please answer 8:45 for this question too .. and complain why it's not being accepted now? :-)
ROFL 6:50 still being rejected. Too rigid and literal. Sue there's value in knowing the pattern phrase, but 6:50 says the student got it.
@medjzL - ROFL... 七 = 6？And the rest of the Chinese sentence = 50?
And you think the student got it? Excellent counting... ;-)