176 To Have Free Time

Harvard University student Stephen Turban manages to find some time to discuss the question of having or not having time, with ShaoLan! This phrase, like many others, has a very interesting background, while the structure of the question actually helps you to learn how to ask a whole host of other questions in Chinese. As usual, ShaoLan makes sure that the cultural context is clear so that you know how to reply to the question in a polite way. Don’t miss this episode!

The Chinese sentence for “do you have time” is 有空嗎/有空吗?. 有 is the verb “to have,” 空 means “space” or “free time” and 嗎/吗 is simply the verbal question mark, so 有空嗎/有空吗 means “do you have time?.”