Level 2 · Lesson 5

我去学校
I go to school

你去哪儿？我去学校。

去 and 来 take a place straight after them — and which one you use depends on where you stand.

听 · Listen

对话
 李明 —  安娜，你来学校吗？ 
Anna, are you coming to school? (Li Ming is at school)  
 安娜 —  我不去学校，我去医院。 
I'm not going to school — I'm going to the hospital.  
 李明 —  王老师来学校吗？ 
Is Teacher Wang coming to school?  
 安娜 —  王老师不来学校，王老师去公司。 
Teacher Wang isn't coming to school — she's going to the company.  
 李明 —  你哥哥去哪儿？ 
Where's your elder brother going?  
 安娜 —  我哥哥去商店，我妈妈也去商店。 
My brother's going to the shop, and my mother is going to the shop too.  
 李明 —  好，再见！ 
All right — goodbye!  
 安娜 —  再见！ 
Goodbye!  

讲解 · Explanation

我去学校。我去商店。我去医院。

The place follows 去 directly, exactly as 饺子 follows 吃. English needs a preposition — 'go to school' — and Chinese needs none at all: the place simply is the object of the verb. Say 我去学校, never 我去到学校.

你来学校吗？我去学校。

去 and 来 are the same journey seen from two ends. 来 means the movement is towards where the speaker is; 去 means away from it. In the dialogue Li Ming is standing at the school, so for him it is 你来学校吗？ Anna is somewhere else, so for her the very same trip is 我去学校. English blurs this — you shout 'I'm coming!' to someone you are walking towards — but in Chinese you must first ask yourself where the other person is standing.

你去哪儿？我去公司。

哪儿 nǎr behaves like 什么: it waits in the object's own seat and the answer drops into that seat. 你去哪儿？我去公司。 Same order, one word swapped. Notice that 哪儿 is written with the r said as part of the syllable — nǎr, one breath, not nǎ-ér.

生词 · Vocabulary

词	Meaning	注 · Note
去	to go	away from the speaker; 不去 is bú qù
来	to come	towards the speaker; 不来 is bù lái
学校	school
商店	shop, store
医院	hospital	医 as in 医生 doctor
公司	company, firm

练习 · Practice

你去哪儿？ 'I go to school.' Which is right?

你来学校吗？ Your friend is standing at the school gate and phones you. Which does she say?

我不______医院，我去公司。 'I'm not going to the hospital, I'm going to the office.'

排一排。 Arrange the words: 'My mother is going to the shop.'

去、来、学校、商店、医院、公司 Match each word to its meaning.

用一用 · Use it

我去……。你去哪儿？

Say where you are going today in the frame 我去 …, using all four places: 我去学校。我去商店。我去医院。我去公司。 Then ask it of someone else — 你去哪儿？ — and answer for a third person: 我哥哥去公司。 Last, stand in your own doorway and decide which verb a visitor gets: from where you are standing, they 来.