The Beginning of Heaven and Earth

Characters:

Pronunciation: kai(1) tian(1) pi(4) di(4)
Explanation: describes a big event's beginning and ending

Tone: Positive

The Story: According to folk legends, in ancient times the earth was just like an egg--no sky and no ground--and the whole world was in chaos. Mr. Pan Gu slept in this egg-shaped world for about 18,000 years, then he began to move. With his movement, the egg cracked. Meanwhile light and clear air went up and heavy things came down--the upper part became the sky and the lower part became the ground.

At first, the sky and ground were closer to each other and Pan Gu tried to support it. Later with his body growing day by day, the space was enlarged little by little. After 8,000 years, Pan Gu became 45,000 kilometers high! He carried the sky on his head and from that day forward the earth and sky never merge together again.

Usage Example (Pinyin): Ren(2) lei(4) neng(2) gou(4) deng(1) lu(4) huo(3) xing(1) bei(4) ren(4) wei(2) shi(4) kai(1) tian(1) pi(4) di(4) de shi(4).

Usage Example (English translation): Man's visit to the Mars is considered as a kind of "beginning of heaven and earth" thing.

Note: The spoken Chinese Mandarin language has 4 spoken tones. We have attempted to re-create those above where after each syllable we tell you (1), (2), (3), or (4) as they correspond to each of the 4 tones. We encourage you to complement your Xianzai.com Chinese Idioms newsletter with a good offline study program.