Even Metal and Stones Can Be Torn

Characters:

Pronunciation:in(1) shi(2) wei(2) kai(1)

Explanation: Said of all kinds of difficulties that can be overcome if one works hard.

Tone: Positive

The Story: Xiang Quzi was a good archer from Chu in the Zhou Dynasty. Once he walked along a mountain path in a dark night. He saw a tiger crouching on one side of the path. He shot an arrow towards it, but the tiger didn't make any movement. He walked closer and found out that was actually a big stone and the arrow had almost been shot into the stone! Wow!

(People said this happened because Xiang was a very powerful man and he concentrated so much on his opponent. He was confident in overcoming the big opponent. Other perhaps said it was because he had poor night vision...)

Usage Example (Pinyin): jin(1) shi(2) wei(2) kai(1), ta(1) zhong(1) yu(2) ying(2) de(2) le nu(3) hai(2) de ai(4).

Usage Example (English translation): People say even metal and stones can be torn, and at last he had the girl's love.

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.