#hope yall are as well as to be expected
Both 東西 (东西) dōngxī and 事兒 (事儿) shì’r translate to “thing,” but the things they apply to don’t actually overlap much! After awhile this is the sort of thing that just “sounds weird” if you mix them up, but until then here’s some tips to keep them separate~
Measure Words 量词
- for 东西 the measure word is 个
- for 事儿 the measure word is 件
Concrete Things/Experiences - 东西
东西 is generally for actual objects, but also extends to abstract things that could be touchable, sorta? hard to explain but let’s try examples
哎呀 那个东西我放在哪儿？
Āiyā nàgè dōngxī wǒ fàng zài nǎ'er?
Where’d I put that thing??
maybe the most common use of dongxi, as the equivalent for “thingy/thingamabob” when you forget the word
今天社会上有很多美好的东西，也有不少丑恶的东西。
jīntiān shèhuì shàng yǒu hěnduō měihǎo de dōngxī, yěyǒu bù shǎo chǒu'è de dōngxī.
There are many nice things as well as ugly things in today’s society.
the “nice things” mentioned here could be enumerated, you could say “the internet” or “air conditioning,” bad “things” could be “the rising cost of housing;” even as abstract nouns they are nouns. What they are not is…
Tasks/Abstract Happenings - 事儿
事儿 applies to tasks, happenings, situations. This is why “有事儿吗?” is “Did something happen/are you ok?” not “Do you have a thing?” It’s also why as a polite way to get out of something you can “不好意思，已经有事儿” as in you already have a commitment/thing to do.
对不起，忘了这件事儿了。
duìbùqǐ, wàngle zhè jiàn shìrle.
Sorry, I forgot about that. (say if your supervisor asked you to do something)
今天我忙死了！得做很多事儿！
jīntiān wǒ máng sǐle! Děi zuò hěnduō shì er!
I’m so busy today! I have to do so many things!
现在那件事还好吗？
xiànzài nà jiàn shì hái hǎo ma?
Did the matter get sorted out?
I hope that separated them out decently. The idea for this post came from flipping through 汉语常用近义词语辨析 Common Chinese Synonyms Discriminated if this is something you’d like more of (or hmu) !(•̀ᴗ•́)و ̑̑
