# Elementary | Checking out at a Hotel

An episode of [ChinesePod - Beginner](https://invisiblenetwork.ai/podcast/1489328856), 18 Mar 2026, 16 min.

Audio: https://anchor.fm/s/109bf914/podcast/play/116611950/https%3A%2F%2Fd3ctxlq1ktw2nl.cloudfront.net%2Fstaging%2F2026-2-9%2F2c5d1788-b528-935b-ef95-6be84d88cf76.mp3

It's checkout time, also known as "check the room for consumption of overpriced snacks and beverages or theft of towels time." In this lesson, learn how to tell the hotel you're checking out, and the Chinese you're going to hear when they bust you. Episode link: https://www.chinesepod.com/1637

## Transcript

[0:06] Watch What to Learn. Chinese, but Chinese.
[0:09] But that's the way to. Learn Chinese.
[0:15] Chinese, but that's. The way to learn.
[0:20] Chinese Hello, welcome to Chinese Spot.
[0:25] My name is Dilu and this is an elementary lesson.
[0:28] Hey guys, I'm John. So today we are in a hotel.
[0:31] Yes, but not for long because it is time to check out.
[0:34] So check out in Chinese is TOI Fang TOI Fang.
[0:38] OK, TOI, that's fourth tone, right?
[0:41] Should that and then Fong second tone.
[0:44] Mei tui Fong. And literally this means to
[0:47] return the room, right? Sure, that.
[0:50] So you stayed there. Now you're returning the room.
[0:53] But we say check out. We say tui Fong.
[0:56] Do it. OK, so you're going to hear this
[0:57] Fong, which refers to the room and several other words.
[1:00] So keep your ears perked for that.
[1:02] And according to John, there are a lot of fongs going on.
[1:06] Yeah, you'll hear them. So here we go.
[1:08] Three times. DPN.
[1:52] Oh. OK,
[2:25] and now the translation. NI hao.
[2:36] Hello I want to check out. NI hao.
[2:42] Hi I'd like to check out. NI hao Hua Yao puy Fung haute
[2:49] Qing gayua Fung ka. OK, please give me your room
[2:53] card. Haute Qing gayua Fung ka.
[2:57] OK, your room card please. Haute Qing gayua Fung ka gay.
[3:05] Here you go. Gay.
[3:07] Here you are. Gay Yi gong Shi Liang bai kuai.
[3:12] Altogether it's 200 RMB. Yi gong Shi Liang bai kuai.
[3:19] Your total is 200 kuai. Yi gong Shi Liang bai kuai Fang
[3:25] fei bouche Yi bai baash kuai ma. The room fee isn't 180 kuai.
[3:32] Fang fei bouche Yi bai baash kuai ma.
[3:37] Isn't the room fee 180 kuai? Fang fei bouche E bai bash quima
[3:44] fu yuen shuo nima hula lian ping pijo.
[3:50] The maid said you guys drank 2 bottles of beer.
[3:54] Fu yuen shuo nima hula lian ping pijo.
[3:58] Housekeeping said you drank 2 bottles of beer.
[4:02] Fu yuen shuo nima hula lian ping pijo oh beta.
[4:08] Oh, that's right. Oh, Theta.
[4:11] Oh, that's right. Oh, Theta.
[4:15] Busted for the beer? Expensive.
[4:17] Yeah, expensive beer. OK, so let's take it from the
[4:20] top and the first line. This is the key thing you need
[4:23] to say when you're checking out, right?
[4:25] What Yao TOI Fang? What Yao TOI Fang?
[4:29] OK, so Yao can take on different meanings here.
[4:31] It means want to right? I want to check out.
[4:33] Should that what Yao TOI Fang? So tui Fong again, that's fourth
[4:39] tone, second tone, and it's a verb meaning to check out.
[4:43] Exactly. Now in the very next line, we
[4:45] have another word that has Fong right?
[4:47] What do we hear? Fong ka, Fong ka.
[4:52] So Fong ka literally means room card?
[4:55] Should that when you want a room card you can say qinge wah Fong
[5:00] ka qinge wah Fong ka. OK so please give me a room
[5:06] card. Should that?
[5:07] OK, but you're probably only going to use the sentence if you
[5:09] work at a hotel, right? You're right, John, but still,
[5:12] it's good to learn stuff. Why don't we?
[5:16] Go over the tones here. Funka funka.
[5:21] OK, second tone. Third tone.
[5:24] And the answer is gay. Gay.
[5:28] OK, so that's the verb to give. And in this case, it's just here
[5:31] you go, Shuda, I'm giving it to you.
[5:34] Quite short. OK, then we get into money,
[5:36] right? E gong Shu Liang bai kuai.
[5:40] E gong shui Liang bai kuai. OK, so that first word.
[5:45] E Kung, E kung and. That means all together or in
[5:50] total. Ah, Shuda.
[5:51] And actually we have a tone change here, right?
[5:53] What are the tones that we're hearing?
[5:55] 2nd and 4th. OK, but when you see it written
[5:58] you'll probably see 1st and 4th. Don't worry about it.
[6:00] When you pronounce it, you want to say Yi.
[6:01] Kong right shuda shuda Yi Kong Yi Kong Shu Liang bai Kwai.
[6:07] So all together it's 200 Kwai. Or you can say Liang Bai Yuan.
[6:12] OK, so Yuan second tone, that's the more formal way to say it,
[6:15] and Kwai is the much more spoken way to say it.
[6:18] But they're both R&B. OK.
[6:21] So we're not talking about dollars and this is where the
[6:23] little dispute comes in, right? What does the the customer say?
[6:26] Pashua Fang fei bouche E by bash Quima.
[6:31] Fang Fei Bouche E by Bash Quima. OK, so notice the sentence ends
[6:37] with ma, so we know it's a yes, no question.
[6:39] Right, but. But it's a negative question.
[6:45] Blah blah blah, ma. So it isn't the room fee 180
[6:49] Kwai. May as well let's look at the
[6:51] subject of the sentence first. OK.
[6:54] And it is. Fun fei.
[6:56] Fun Fei second and 4th. OK.
[6:59] And that literally means room fee.
[7:01] Right way fun fei. So this person is asking, isn't
[7:05] the room fee 180 Kwai because that's what they thought it was,
[7:08] right? Should that Fengfei Bushei by
[7:12] Bashu Kuaima? So this is a pattern you can use
[7:15] when you want to confirm something that you thought you
[7:18] knew. Should that?
[7:19] So what's another example of a simple case where we might use
[7:22] this pattern? This negative yes, No question.
[7:25] I have an example that ABC's are familiar with.
[7:28] Oh, I know you're talking about American born Chinese.
[7:30] They come to China and Chinese people look at them and expect
[7:33] them to speak Chinese because they look Chinese, right?
[7:36] But when they talk, apparently the Chinese are not that good.
[7:41] Right. So what do the Chinese people
[7:42] say to them? They will say yeah.
[7:46] Aren't you Chinese? Can't you just automatically
[7:49] speak Chinese? Well, it it happens sometimes,
[7:51] but well, you know, people have a lot of expectations to other
[7:55] people. OK, when some of us have
[7:58] expectations for our hotel room. So back to the hotel.
[8:01] It's not 180 Kwai. And why?
[8:04] Because fu yuan Shu nima hula lian ping Pijo.
[8:09] So Fu Yuan, that's some kind of service person.
[8:14] We're in a hotel, so we're talking about the housekeeping
[8:17] like made type person. Should in Chinese Fu yuan is a
[8:21] word for those people in service industry.
[8:24] Okay, so it could be a waiter in a restaurant or it could be
[8:27] someone working in a hotel. So anyway, housekeeping said
[8:31] right? Foo yuan, sure.
[8:34] Foo yuan, Sure. And here's something interesting
[8:36] about Chinese It doesn't matter whether they're saying it right
[8:38] now or whether they said it 10 minutes ago, We just say schwa.
[8:43] Yeah, it doesn't really matter if it someone says or said, you
[8:46] just need to put a shua after the subject.
[8:49] Right, so it could be Lasha, Shua or.
[8:51] Mama Shua. You don't have to say said.
[8:54] You just say shua dua. OK, so what's that housekeeping
[8:57] say? Niemann hula lianping Pijio.
[9:01] Niemann, Hula. Lianping, Pijio.
[9:03] OK, so you all drank 2 bottles of beer, so here we do have the
[9:09] LA, right? Dua hula hula.
[9:12] OK, so this law indicates that the action is complete.
[9:15] Maitua. The beer is gone.
[9:17] You drank the beer, now you got to pay.
[9:19] Do it hula Leon ping PGO. OK, so here we have a measure
[9:24] word. Ping PINGD arshun.
[9:28] OK, second tone. So that's bottle.
[9:30] So we have 2 bottles. Leon Ping.
[9:34] Leon Ping. And they are bottles of.
[9:37] PGO, PGO. All right, second tone, third
[9:41] tone. That's beer.
[9:42] So evidently we're referring to the the beer they stuck in the
[9:45] the mini fridge. Should that in the hotel room?
[9:49] OK, the overpriced beer. Right.
[9:52] Because we know it's not imported beer.
[9:54] Probably not. OK, but they admit they drank
[9:57] it, right? Do it tashua.
[9:58] Oh do ITA. Do ITA.
[10:01] OK, so here's a question for you.
[10:02] Why is it Duy da and not just Duy?
[10:05] It just sounds more natural. There's no obvious differences
[10:08] here. OK, yeah, you'll notice that
[10:10] when Chinese people speak, sometimes they say how,
[10:12] sometimes they say how da. Or duy sometimes duy da.
[10:17] OK, so it makes it sound a bit more casual, more spoken,
[10:20] because if it's just one character like 333, you sound
[10:23] kind of like a robot or something, right?
[10:26] Yes, possible. So why don't we listen to the
[10:28] dialogues 3 more times and talk more about the dialogue?
[10:31] OK, here we go. Greetings everyone and welcome
[10:34] to Chinese Pod Trivia. Our first question is how long
[10:42] will it take you to become an intermediate tiny speaker using
[10:45] the Chinese Pod app? Is it A the rest of your life B
[10:49] you should already be an intermediate speaker?
[10:51] C3 months or D Chinese Pod has an app.
[10:57] You should already be in. Oh, that is incorrect.
[11:01] The correct answer is C3 months. That's right, Head over to
[11:04] chinesepod.com now to register for your access to over 4000
[11:09] lessons. Get the Chinese Pod app now on
[11:11] Google Play or the App Store. DE Hua DPN.
[11:25] Niha. YL 3 file.
[11:54] OK. None.
[12:36] So Dilu, you said that I said there's lots of fongs in this
[12:40] lesson, right? Sure, there are many fongs.
[12:43] What's the? So let's review them.
[12:47] The first one, Toy Fung. Toy Fung.
[12:50] All right, all right, 4th tone. Second tone.
[12:54] Our listeners remember what that means, I'm sure.
[12:56] And what's the next one? Fung ka.
[12:58] Fung KA. OK, second and third and then
[13:03] the last one. Fung fi Fung fi. 2nd and 4th.
[13:07] OK. And that's the fee.
[13:10] Now I have a very important question here relating to
[13:13] numbers. What is it?
[13:15] It's about two R Yeah, two. And the two way is to say 2.
[13:20] Oh, you mean in the dialogue we have Liang Bai Kuai?
[13:24] Right, but can we say R Bai Kuai?
[13:27] Yes you can. All right, so now we're going to
[13:29] explain a little bit about why sometimes it's R and sometimes
[13:32] it's Liang. Why don't you tell us?
[13:35] OK, well this simple rule is when you're counting, we're just
[13:39] reporting numbers for the number 2 and the number 20.
[13:42] You use R. Duet R&R shirt.
[13:47] OK, so if you just say 123, then you say?
[13:50] Nisha ER son. OK.
[13:53] And the same goes for like a phone number that has a 2IN it
[13:57] or a street number that has a 2IN it.
[13:58] You're saying each number individually you use.
[14:01] R. OK.
[14:02] And then in the number 20, of course is.
[14:05] R Shirt. R Shirt.
[14:07] Then when you get to the big numbers starting at 100, you can
[14:11] switch over to Liang. Liang bai, Liang bai.
[14:17] All right. And then when you get to even
[14:18] larger units, like 1010 thousand, we're not going to go
[14:21] into these, but that's when you always use.
[14:23] Liang Liang. OK, so think of R as a simple
[14:27] one for 2 and 20, and then when you talk about measure words,
[14:30] what do you use? If the 2 is before a measure
[14:33] word, you always say Liang. Like in the dialogue we have
[14:37] Liang ping PGO. Right, so that's always Liang.
[14:40] All right, so 2 bottles of beer? What about two people?
[14:43] Liang Gu Ren. How about two glasses of water?
[14:48] You can say Liang bai shui, Liang bai shui.
[14:52] All right, And those are the basic rules.
[14:54] Do it. John, I have a question for you.
[14:56] All right. Actually, it's a quiz.
[14:58] A quiz. OK, what is it?
[15:00] Liang ping pijo du Xiao Qian in the dialogue.
[15:05] Arshukui Yang Ping Pijo Yikong Arshukui.
[15:10] Fei Cheng Hao. Thank you.
[15:12] Thank you. All right.
[15:13] So if our parties have any questions, please go to Chinese
[15:16] Pod and leave us some comments there.
[15:18] Yeah, we'll be at chinesepod.com.
[15:24] As usual, Chinese Pod provides an extensive selection of
[15:27] learning materials for this lesson on its website,
[15:29] www.chinesepod.com. You can access this lesson
[15:34] directly with the lesson #1. 637.
[15:37] So just go to www.chinesepod.com/one. 637.
[15:43] And you will find a transcript, vocabulary and much more.
[15:47] The link again www.chinesepod.com slash. 1637.

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