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Spin the Wheel of Fortune in PinYin
The Wheel of Fortune is a successful television game show. Since debuted in the U.S. on January 6, 1975, it has been adapted in more than 20 languages. This essay discusses a Chinese version of this game.
The official Chinese writing system consists of thousands of ideographs. In 1958, the Chinese government promulgated a phonetic system, that is, han4yu3pin1yin1 (Chinese language sound spelling), or PinYin for short, which consists of the Latin alphabet and four diacritics or numerals for the tones. Since 1958, Chinese children have been learning the PinYin immediately after entering elementary school. The PinYin indicates standard pronunciation of the ideographs in all dictionaries published in China. Since the advent of computer, the PinYin has also been the most popular coding system for the ideographs. In early 1980s, PinYin was adopted by the United Nations to spell Chinese geographic names and personal names. In summary, PinYin has been widely learned and used in China and all over the world. Therefore, it will be used for the Chinese version of Wheel of Fortune.
Chinese is a tonal language. There are four tones. In this design, they are respectively represented by superscript numerals 1, 2,3, and 4. and placed after the syllable. In Chinese language and writing, the tones are not in the spelling process. In other words, the speaker or reader only spells the phonemes, but not the tones. Therefore, in the Chinese version of Wheel of Fortune, the tones will be provided at the beginning of a game.
There are many unintelligible 'dialects' in Chinese language. The ideographic writing (HanZi) is shared by speakers of all these dialects. Therefore, after a puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will be displayed. They are labeled as 'Ideographs' in following examples.
This game will help:
An English Example:
Clue: Personal name
Solution:
| A | L | G | O | R | E |
Puzzle #1:
| 2 | 2 | 1 |
Clue:现代人名(Personal Name)
Solution:
| m | a | o | 2 | z | e | 2 | d | o | n | g | 1 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
Puzzle #2:
| 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 |
Clue:成语(an idiom)
Solution:
| x | i | o | n | g | 1 | y | o | u | 3 | c | h | e | n | g | 2 | z | h | u | 2 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
胸有成竹
Puzzle #3:
| 2 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 2 |
Clue:中成药 (Chinese herbal medicine)
Solution:
| y | i | n | 2 | q | i | a | o | 4 | j | i | e | 3 | d | u | 2 | w | a | n | 2 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
银翘解毒丸
Puzzle #4:
| 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 |
| 4 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 3 |
Clue: 杜诗两句(two lines from Poet Du Fu)
Solution:
| h | u | i | 4 | d | a | n | g | 1 | l | i | n | 2 | j | u | e | 2 | d | i | n | g | 3 |
| y | i | 4 | l | a | n | 3 | z | h | o | n | g | 4 | s | h | a | n | 1 | x | i | a | o | 3 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
会当凌绝顶, 一览众山小
Puzzle #5:
| 4 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 |
| - | 4 | 4 |
Clue: 歇后语(allegorical saying)
Solution:
| w | a | i | 4 | s | h | e | n | g | 1 | d | a | 3 | d | e | n | g | 1 | l | o | n | g | 2 |
| - | z | h | a | o | 4 | j | i | u | 4 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
外甥打灯笼--照旧
Puzzle #6:
| 4 | 1 | 1 | 3 | : | 1 | 4 | 4 |
Clue: 科学家:理论(scientist:his/her theory)
Solution:
| a | i | 4 | y | i | n | 1 | s | i | 1 | t | a | n | 3 | : | x | i | a | n | g | 1 | d | u | i | 4 | l | u | n | 4 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
爱因斯坦:相对论
Puzzle #7:
| 4 | 3 | 2 | 2 | - | 1 | 4 |
Clue: 梁山好汉 (nickname/hero in the classic novel The Water Margins)
Solution:
| l | a | n | g | 4 | l | i | 3 | b | a | i | 2 | t | i | a | o | 2 | - | z | h | a | n | g | 1 | s | h | u | n | 4 |
After the puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
浪里白条 - 张顺
Puzzle #8:
| 2 | 3 | 2 |
| 2 | 1 | 1 |
Clue: 两名中国演员(Names of two Chinese actors)
Solution:
| w | a | n | g | 2 | x | i | a | o | 3 | t | a | n | g | 2 |
| w | a | n | g | 2 | x | i | n | 1 | g | a | n | g | 1 |
After puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
王晓棠 王心刚Some syllables in Mandarin are defined as in 'neutral tone'. The neutral tone is indicated by superscript '0'. Following are two examples.
| 3 | 2 | 0 | , | 3 | 4 | 1 | 3 |
Clue: 中国歌曲名 (title of a Chinese song)
Solution:
| m | a | 3 | e | r | 2 | a | 0 | , | n | i | 3 | m | a | n | 4 | x | i | e | 1 | z | o | u | 3 |
After puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
马儿啊,你慢些走
Puzzle #10:
| 3 | 3 | 0 | 4 | 4 |
Clue:
Solution:
| l | i | u | 3 | b | a | o | 3 | d | e | 0 | g | u | 4 | s | h | i | 4 |
After puzzle is solved, corresponding ideographs will appear:
柳堡的故事
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