Question

Mandarin Tutorial: Seasons & Weather

Answer 1

\({\bf{Vocabulary}}\)
季 (jì) = season
ex: 一年有四季 = a year has four seasons
春季 (chūn jì) = spring
夏季 (xià jì) = summer
秋季 (qiū jì) = fall/autumn. easy way to remember this, it shares the left radical with 季 and the right radical is fire (火)
冬季 (dōng jì)
alternatively you can use 天 instead of 季. 天 is a bit less formal than 季 and can be used to refer a specific time/specific days within the season rather than the whole season (季)

Answer 2

cont.
天气 (tiān qì) = general term for weather
不同 (bù tóng) = different/not the same
the way my text uses it, 四季不同的天气 (the four seasons [each] have different weather)

温暖 (wēn nuǎn) warm
note how the radical for sun 日 appears in several places
阳光 (yáng guāng) sunshine
again, notice the radical 日
照 (zhào) to shine (verb)
you've seen this radical before in 照片 (photograph) where 片 by itself means a piece or a sheet. so a photograph is literally a piece of paper upon which light has shined.

闷 (mēn) suffocating or muggy. notice how it has a similar pronunciation to 门 (mén) meaning door, and has the radical for heart (心) inside of it
热 (rè) hot/warm
透不出气 (tòu bù chū qì) hard to breathe
to break this down into characters
透 = to pass through
不 = not/no
出气 = physically or metaphorically, to let out air/vent

Answer 3

cont.
天高 (tiān gāo) big/expansive skies. 高 often means tall but in this situation it means big
气 (qì) air
爽 (shuǎng) clear or crisp, like air that isn't polluted or humid. side note I really like this character <3
惬意 (qiè yì) pleasant. for a character that means "pleasant" 惬 isn't really pleasant to remember/write >_>
冬至/夏至 (dōng/xià zhì) = winter/summer solstice (as a reminder the winter solstice is the day when daylight hours are the shortest and the summer solstice is the day when the daylight hours are the longest)
北 (běi) = north, you might recognize this character from 北京 (Beijing)
风 (fēng) = wind, make sure to get the direction of the tail right (points outward)
起 (qǐ) = to rise, but when you combine 风起 it means the wind rises/blows/makes an accidental ghibli reference

雪花 (xuě huā) = snowflakes, or literally snow flowers which I think is adorable c;
飘逸 (piāo yì) = to swirl, notice how 飘 has the pronunciation radical 票 and the wind radical 风
躲 (duǒ) = to avoid/hide. used in the context of avoiding bad weather.
门 (mén) 里 (lǐ) = inside, literally "door place"
出不去 (chū bú qù) = unable to get out
breaking down these characters
出 = out
不 = not
去 = to go