“我只是想知道,这到底是怎么一回事” --> The translation has it as "I just want

“我只是想知道,这到底是怎么一回事” → The translation has it as “I just want to know what’s going on here”. Can someone break down this sentence for me? I’m confused about the second part of the sentence, I don’t understand why the translation is “…what’s going on here”. thanks!

Because that’s what 怎么回事 means.

I like to ask “why”? I question many things in life, often finding it very useful to do so. But, for language learning, I found out that this habit is a kind of hindrance, rather than a helpful attribute.

Julien Gaudfroy once noted – “…there’s not much logic in the grammar or the way people speak in the mother language. Why is it this way? Because it IS this way! I was one of those WHY people, but hard work made me realize I was wrong.”

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hmmm… I should probably just take your word, but i’m going to play devil’s advocate and see where it goes.

When learning Spanish, I asked why for almost everything. I feel like this was one of the biggest reasons why I improved so fast (my level is much higher than the 3000 lingQed words, i’ve barely used lingQ for Spanish). Maybe “why” isn’t the right question here, but rather “how” is what I mean. “how” is 回 used here? Does it imply returning to the same issue again? The problem isn’t so much that I want to know “why”, but rather that I don’t really understand what’s happening in this sentence here, other than looking at the English translation given by the lesson, which obviously isn’t the best way to learn.

I somewhat agree with you, and as such am going to modify my question: could you give me a another example sentence or two where this structure is used?

Thanks again for the response!

A lot of very basic words in Chinese can’t be explained.

Even something as absolutely basic as 对不起 doesn’t make any sense whatsoever.

没关系 ? Again, a very basic word. Everyone knows what it means, no one can explain why. It just makes no sense at all.

怎么回事 ? - pretty much the same thing.

I was listening to a podcast the other day, which had this good exchange:

Mr Ha:那么现在学中文的人也多,所以很多学生他们考虑的一些问题,其实我研究中文研究了几十年吧,有时候还不一定能够说的非常得清楚。

Wu Yin:能不能举个例子,什么样的问题?

Mr Ha:你比如说最简单的,对不对,你就“对不起”这种句子,你到底能不能给他分析一下这个结构。这个说老实话,我们现在也说不清楚。那只能告诉他,对不起就是sorry。因为你跟他一分析,越分析越不清楚。再一个你比如说我们经常见到的这个所谓“的”字结构对吧, 白勺“的”。

Wu Yin:嗯。

Mr Ha:这个因为这个“的”字是汉语里面使用频率最高的一个字。但是呢,“的”字到底有多少用法,我们说起来好像很容易,其实呢不是那么容易。你比如说,“你的书”“我的书”这个很好解释,对吧。

Wu Yin:嗯。

Mr Ha:再给你一个句子,“你今天是怎么来的”,你这个“的”就很难说。

Wu Yin:啊呵呵,英语里面没有这样的结构。

Mr Ha:对,你就很难解释,所以有些东西看起来是挺容易的,但是有时候真的,冷不丁的有的学生问我,我也一时答不上来。因为我们现在对于现代汉语的研究还是不够深入,特别是从这个对外汉语的教学的角度来讲,有些东西我们还不能够很明确地说出一个规律。你像我们学英文吧,有些东西规律性很强对吧,很清楚。当然这个跟汉语本身的特点也有关系,汉语本身就是一个从意义出发的,不注重形式。

Good luck.

Also, if you want 100 sample sentences for a word - just jukuu

eg http://www.jukuu.com/search.php?q=怎么回事

Chinese nouns have counters, 一本书, 一棵树, 一门外语 and 一回事. “What kind of thing, event, matter, is going on here?”

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thanks for the Jukuu resource, that’s a gem right there.

ahh, so it’s being used as a measure word. That would’ve explained it. Thanks!

excellent explanation, Steve.

maschingon,
Here is another example: 看跟做根本是两回事。Seeing and doing are two entirely different things . 两回事: two matters/things

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no prob, the link to the podcast and full transcript, mentioned above, is here : Login - LingQ