Does anyone know what “ping tao” means? I’ve heard it numerous times, but can’t figure out its meaning. I only have this pinyin to go by.
Thanks for your help!
pindao? Channel (TV)
Well, I got the impression it might be slang or something people/person-related. Sorry, I don’t have much to go by…
What situations do you hear it in? TV? On the street? At work?
I heard it used within a social setting. I was at dinner with a friend and we were soon joined by her friends, and then the friends’ friends. Anyway, it was the 3rd party friends who were using the phrase, and while my friend and I didn’t know what it meant (we’re not very good with the language at all), I also didn’t feel comfortable asking the others. Just curious.
Hmmm…maybe it’s a name of a person or place…
I think you heard 姘頭 which means a mistress or a lover.
You’ll have to give better context than that, or it’s just a wild, unreliable guessing game.
There’s no “ping tao” that I know of; there’s ping2dao4, level line, pin2dao4, channel, and pin1tou, mistress. Of these, pin2dao4 channel is by FAR the most common in conversation, e.g., “it’s on the Discovery Channel”, so this is probably what you heard.
[quote=“Dragonbones”]You’ll have to give better context than that, or it’s just a wild, unreliable guessing game.
There’s no “ping tao” that I know of; there’s ping2dao4, level line, pin2dao4, channel, and pin1tou, mistress. Of these, pin2dao4 channel is by FAR the most common in conversation, e.g., “it’s on the Discovery Channel”, so this is probably what you heard.[/quote]
Good point, Dragonbones. With the tonal variations, and my untrained ears, it’s hard to pinpoint the right definition.
Thanks, everyone, for the feedback.
For this kind of “conversational fishing”, get yourself a copy of the Lanbridge Pinyin Chinese-English Dictionary" published right in Taiwan. The dictionary is arranged in Pinyin order without regard to tones (although tones are marked on each entry) so it’s easy to find the variants you might have missed in terms of tone sensitivity – stuff you could never find in a standard dictionary without knowing the right first character to look under. Best listening aid I’ve ever found.
Also remember common “mistakes” in your listening or their pronunciation – check both final -n and -ng (pin vs ping here); check both n- and l-; for people with really amazing accents, check h- and f-. 
Ironlady’s right – you want to check a pinyin-ordered dictionary. That one’s good, but my own preference is the ABC Chinese-English Comprehensive Dictionary. Either way, as she says, check for mistakes too – I’d add t/d and p/b, too, and even more importantly in Taiwan, remember that retroflexes are all over the place, so x/sh/s, ch/c, and zh/z are interchangeable; e.g., if you hear zang, be sure to check zhang also.
Wow! That’s all very helpful information. Thank you, ironlady and Dragonbones. I’ll get one of the recommended dictionaries, which will be a valuable addition to my growing language library.
I’m into my second week of Mandarin conversation class (based on reading pinyin), so my head’s spinning a bit. But I must do as my teacher encourages me, “Jia1 you2!”