How to write “Happy birthday” in Chinese

By Sujanti Djuanda – Chinese teacher at Lingolearn.com

Chinese is the most spoken language in the world. In spite of that basic fact there are not too many people outside of China in the world that know Chinese. One of the reasons for that is the complexity of the language and having a completely rich and different set of characters does not ease the process. It is known that children in China start very early to learn the written characters of their own language. It is then no wonder that only very few people attempt to learn the language.

happy birthday in chinese

Nonetheless, it is always a nice gesture when communicating with Chinese people to be able to say some words or even write something nice and symbolic. Using a happy occasion to express our feelings or wishing well to our business colleagues or social acquaintances is a great opportunity to learn new Chinese characters and new Chinese phrases.

The best occasion that each person is happy to hear from his friends is of course the their Birthday. So, How to write Happy birthday in chinese?

when wishing a friend a happy birthday in Chinese it is common to say shēngrì kuàilè [Birthday happy in a loose translation]. The written characters representing Happy Birthday in Chinese are: 生日 快乐. The word birthday [shēngrì] is written as 生日 and the word happy [kuàilè] is written 快乐.

Another form of wishing someone a happy birthday in Chinese in a sentence is to say or write: Wishing you a happy birthday! In Chinese the phonetic way to say it would be: Zhù nǐ shēngrì kuàilè! And the characters representing it are: 祝你生日快樂!

Although Chinese is a complex language, basic understanding of the language can be achieved by focusing time and effort in doing so. The special set of characters and their magnitude is intimidating for many people but using proper studying materials, guidance and enough practice will allow any person determined on mastering the language to succeed. Even basic understanding will allow you theoretically to contact at least 1 billion people. That alone is more than a good enough reason to learn Chinese for the average person.

Now business people, looking for commercial and business opportunities and interested in the Asian market, should no doubt consider basic and advanced knowledge of the Chinese language. Understanding your opponent in his own language and culture can serve as a major advantage in the world of commerce. Not to mention that the knowing of the culture of your colleagues or competitors can assist you in negotiations and help you to avoid making cultural mistakes. It is true that the usage of a local mediator can help in that sense but understanding it yourself can make the decision making easier and will have lower costs.

The benefits of learning another language and especially Chinese are more than numerous. They involve both the personal achievement of learning a complex language and the further activation and enhancement of our brains as well as the economical advantages opening wider window of business opportunities. That alone may serve as an advantage that should convince any person to learn Chinese.

好運 Hǎoyùn

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happy birthday in chinese


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