How to Pretend You Know Chinese

Hey guys, welcome to Off The Grid, wow. I'm Dan. Mike. Have you ever really wanted to learn Chinese, but thought, nah, it's too difficult, or I don't have time to learn? Well, we have the perfect solution for you. We've got a few easy tips to help you pretend like you know Chinese, even if you're actually completely clueless. And we aren't talking about common phrases like xie xie or ni hao, come on. These are just little details that tend to come up a lot when people speak Chinese. Ready? Here we go. Number one, ai ya. We'll start off with something you probably already know. Say ai ya. Ai ya is an exclamation of any kind of surprise, distress, or displeasure. It means something along the lines of, don't, or shoot, or oh my, depending on how you use it. It can actually be applied to a lot of situations. For example, if you drop something or make some other clumsy mistake. Hey Dan, come here a sec. Ai ya. Or if you're upset or disappointed. Ai ya. My new haircut sucks. Or if you're surprised or shocked. Alright. Ai ya. They forgot the hot sauce again. You like my new hair? Ai ya. Or if you dishonored your family. Ai ya. Number two, mm, or ah. And nod. Now what if you're in a conversation with someone, instead of worrying about actually saying something or replying, all you have to do is do a nod. Or mm, mm, every once in a while. With this, you can either express approval or agreement, or just show the other person that you're actually listening. It works wonders. Mm. Okay, so maybe that trick doesn't work for all situations. If you find yourself in a situation where you need to be shocked or dismayed, you should instead opt for this, the ah. Don't forget to make your mouth and eyes as wide as possible. Ah. Just don't overdo it. Number four, la. Now if you actually can speak a little bit of the language, then here's a way to bring your Chinese to the next level. Simply add la to the end of your sentences. And I mean, even if you aren't speaking Chinese, you could throw in a few la's in there just for the heck of it too. Check it out. Oh, hey la. Let's go la. Okay la. Hurry up la. Sorry la. Fa la la la la. La la la la. Nice la. Of course la. Awesome la. Okay, no. No, that's too much. That's too much. All right. And finally, everybody, no matter what you know or don't know about Chinese, definitely don't go up to like a Chinese person and just go like ching chong ling dong. That's not really Chinese and that's offensive, okay? So stop that. So offensive. We don't even sound like that. Yeah, man. Where did that come from? Seriously. Like when I speak in Mandarin, like you guys heard me in this video, did that sound anything like this? Yeah. Seriously. Anyways, guys, we hope you liked that video and we hope that you learned a few things to be more authentically Chinese. Try it next time. Yep. Use this as a cheat sheet. Again, it doesn't work for all situations, but definitely makes you sound a little more impressive. Guaranteed it'll work. All right, guys, thanks so much for watching. See ya.