Help me figure out this funny-sounding word: something like "bin bin byan byan"

Language Learning Chinese
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I was watching the weather report on some Taiwan news channel and I think the announcer was talking about rain, and said something that sounded, to my English-speaking ears, something like (this is not pinyin) “bin bin byan byan”.

I can’t remember the vowel sounds, but each word started with “b” (or “p”) and ended with “n”. And it was a four-word phrase that consisted of two repeated words, like “bin bin byan byan” or “ban ban bin bin” or something along those lines.

Any idea what the phrase might have been?

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邊邊 or 邊緣 maybe, when talking about the effects of a rain band or Typhoon?

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傾盆大雨

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I recall people saying bing bing biang biang sometimes to describe hitting or pattering sounds. No clue how you’d write it, I think you’d have to use zhuyin for the latter.

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Yes, that sounds pretty close to what I think I heard!

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Yeah…taiwanese use this phrase a lot “bing bing biang biang”…especially my boss :rofl:
你們講話很吵耶…bing bing biang biang bing bing biang biang 人家在睡覺! My wife uses this on me and the kids too all the time :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

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So “bing bing biang biang” carries a connotation of excessive loudness?

Any idea how to write it in Chinese characters?

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There is no character with the biang pronounciation.

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Yeah! Like when someone’s trying to sleep or work or just want some peace & quiet and the kids are making a tantrum or when I’m in the kitchen doing the dishes and there’s a lot of “clinking and clanking”…it’s like chiding someone (like your kids or your employees, usually with someone you know) telling them to “Turn the volume down”

I dont think there’s any characters associated with this phrase. One is just mimicking the sound/noise that comes when a racket is made.

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But there almost certainly exists some TV show or movie, with Chinese-language subtitles, that uses this phrase. It would be interesting to see how such a phrase would be written into a subtitle.

I did find this phrase: 吵吵嚷嚷 (chao3 chao3 rang3 rang3). Maybe the “biang” in “bing bing biang biang” is a corruption of “rang”?

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No. Different onomatopoeia

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We usually use 吵吵鬧鬧.

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The plot thickens! According to this BBC article, “biang” may refer to the sound of slapping that is made when making “biang biang” noodles.

English version here:

And, according to the article, the Chinese character for “biang” is apparently some kind of made-up character with 58 strokes.

Wikipedia does have an entry for biang biang noodles, using these characters: 𰻞𰻞麵.

So, is it possible that the “biang biang” of “bing bing biang biang” is the 𰻞𰻞 from biang biang noodles?

This still leaves the question of what characters are used for the “bing bing” part…

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Is Biang more a Taiwanese sound than Mandarin.

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Isn’t ‘biang’ used for the sound of a gunshot? Can’t say I’ve ever heard it used for rainfall, even a heavy rain on a metal roof.

My wife’s Hakka side describe a light rainfall, or the beginnings of a downpour, with what sounds like “Deek deek doke doke” … I use this all the time now (Is it raining? Hai hao, yidiandian, deek deek doke doke).

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Yes hakka people have similar words.

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Maybe the weather announcer that I was watching was talking about hail?

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Hm, makes a little sense to me – at least in terms of language, the hail part less so, doesn’t seem like the season for hail.

My guess is it’s a Taiwanese phrase, and someone will be along to explain it in due time.

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That character won’t display on my phone. Fake character!

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Thinking about it, this is a quite remarkable nested example of reduplication – a pair of double words (“bing bing” and “biang biang”), forming a four-word set that conveys the idea of clamor, with the whole four-word phrase then itself being repeated twice for emphasis.