Learn Hardcore Chinese: zhōumò tā bú shàngbān, zài jiā xǐzǎo, xǐ yīfu, hái dǎsǎo chúfáng. - On weekends she doesn’t work; she stays home to shower, wash clothes, and also clean the kitchen.

Chinese usually doesn’t need a preposition like “on” before time words. You just put the time expression at the beginning (or sometimes before the verb).

周末她不上班。
= “(On) weekends she doesn’t go to work.”

You can think of 周末 here as “as for weekends / during weekends.” The “on” is understood from context; Chinese doesn’t add an extra word for it.

Also, 周末 can mean “this weekend,” “on weekends,” or “at the weekend” depending on context. The sentence itself doesn’t mark singular/plural; English has to choose.

Why is 不 used here (她不上班) and not 没?

不 and 没 are both negation words, but they’re used differently.

不 normally negates habitual actions, general facts, preferences, or future actions.
没 normally negates past events, existence, or completion of an action.

In this sentence:

她不上班 = “She doesn’t go to work (on weekends) / she doesn’t work (then).”
This is a regular/habitual situation, so 不 is correct.

If you said:

她周末没上班 = “She didn’t go to work this weekend (on one particular weekend).”

That changes the meaning to a specific past weekend, not her usual habit.

What is the difference between 上班 and 工作? Could we say 她不工作 instead?

Both relate to “work,” but they’re used differently.

上班 = “to go to work / to be on duty / to be at work”
- Focus is on being at one’s job/place of work or being on shift.
工作 (verb) = “to work” in a general sense.

In this sentence:

她不上班
implies “She doesn’t go in to work / doesn’t have to be at work (on weekends).”

If you say:

她周末不工作

it can still be understood, but:

It sounds more like “She doesn’t work on weekends” in a broader sense (maybe she has no work at all on weekends),
不工作 can sound a bit stronger, potentially implying not having a job (depending on context).

不上班 is the most natural choice here when you mean “she doesn’t have to go in to her job on weekends.”

Why isn’t 她 repeated in the second part? Why is it not 她在家洗澡、洗衣服?

In Chinese, once the subject is clear and doesn’t change, it is very common to omit it in later clauses.

Original:

周末她不上班，在家洗澡、洗衣服，还打扫厨房。

The subject 她 clearly applies to all the following actions: 在家洗澡, 洗衣服, 打扫厨房. So repeating 她 is unnecessary.

You can say:

周末她不上班，她在家洗澡、洗衣服，还打扫厨房。

This is grammatically correct, just a bit heavier and less natural in casual style.

Why is it 在家洗澡 and not 洗澡在家?

The normal word order in Chinese is:

Subject + (Time) + Place + Verb + Object

So:

她周末在家洗澡。
= She + weekend + at home + bathes.

在家洗澡 is “(she) bathes at home,” with 在家 marking the place before the action.

洗澡在家 feels unnatural. Place phrases like 在家 almost always go before the verb, not after it, unless you’re doing something special with emphasis or using a different structure.

What exactly does 在 mean here? Is it like the “-ing” progressive marker?

在 has (at least) two common uses that learners meet early:

在 + place = “at / in / on (a place)”
- 在家 = “at home”
- 在厨房 = “in the kitchen”
As a progressive marker before a verb, showing “be doing”:
- 她在洗澡。 = “She is taking a bath.”

In the sentence:

在家洗澡

在 is part of 在家, which is a location phrase: “at home.”
It is not the progressive marker in this sentence; it simply tells you the place.

Why is there no word for “is/are” like 是 in this sentence?

Chinese doesn’t use 是 the same way English uses “to be” with actions.

是 is mainly used to link two nouns/pronouns or a noun with a noun phrase:
- 她是老师。 = “She is a teacher.”
- 今天是周末。 = “Today is the weekend.”

But with actions, you just use the verb; you don’t say “she is bathe”:

她在家洗澡。
Literally: “She at home bathes.”
Natural English: “She takes a bath at home.”

So in 不上班、在家洗澡、洗衣服、打扫厨房, these are all action phrases; 是 is not needed.

Why is there no 了 or any tense marker? How do we know if this is past, present, or future?

Chinese doesn’t mark tense the way English does. Instead, it relies on:

Time words: 周末 (weekends), 昨天, 明天, etc.
Context
Aspect particles like 了, 着, 过 (which are about aspect, not pure tense)

In this sentence:

周末她不上班，在家洗澡、洗衣服，还打扫厨房。

This describes a general, repeated situation/habit about weekends.
So there’s no need for 了 (which would suggest completed actions, often in the past or as a specific event).

You would understand it as:

“On weekends she doesn’t go to work; she (usually) bathes, does laundry, and also cleans the kitchen at home.”

The habitual meaning comes from 周末 and the lack of completion markers, not from a tense suffix.

Does 洗澡 mean “to take a bath” or “to take a shower”? Is there a difference?

In everyday modern Mandarin, 洗澡 basically means “to wash oneself,” and in practice it covers both:

taking a shower
taking a bath (in a tub)

When you just say 洗澡, you don’t necessarily specify bath vs. shower unless context makes it clear. People might add extra words if they want to be specific, but 洗澡 alone is the normal, general verb for “bathe / take a shower.”

Why do we have 洗澡、洗衣服 and not just 洗澡、衣服 with one 洗 for both?

In Chinese, when you list multiple verb-object combinations, the verb is often repeated for each object, especially when the objects are quite different:

洗澡、洗衣服
literally: “bathe, wash clothes”

If you just wrote 洗澡、衣服, then 衣服 would stand alone without a verb in this parallel structure, which feels incomplete and unnatural.

You can sometimes omit a repeated verb if the objects are very similar and the meaning is clear, but here:

洗澡 (bathe)
洗衣服 (wash clothes)
are related but clearly different actions, so repeating 洗 is normal and clearer.

What does 还 mean here, and where does it usually go in the sentence?

还 in this sentence means “also,” adding another action to the list:

在家洗澡、洗衣服，还打扫厨房。 = “At home she bathes, washes clothes, and also cleans the kitchen.”

Common meanings/uses of 还 include:

“also / in addition” (as here)
“still / yet”
“even” (in some patterns)
“rather” (e.g. 还可以 = “it’s okay / not bad”)

As an adverb, 还 usually comes before the verb it modifies:

还打扫厨房
= “(she) also cleans the kitchen.”

What is the difference between the comma ， and the special comma 、 in this sentence?

In modern Chinese punctuation:

， (ordinary comma) is used to separate clauses or larger parts of the sentence.
、 (dùn hào, “list comma”) is used inside a list of similar items or phrases.

In the sentence:

在家洗澡、洗衣服，还打扫厨房。

We have:

洗澡、洗衣服 — two parallel actions in a mini-list → use 、
Then a larger break before 还打扫厨房 → use ，

This makes the structure clearer:
First a list 洗澡、洗衣服, then another action 还打扫厨房.

Why is 不 pronounced bú here instead of bù?

The character 不 is usually pronounced bù (fourth tone).
But there is a common tone-change rule:

When 不 is followed by another fourth-tone syllable, it changes to bú (second tone).

上 in 上班 is fourth tone (shàng), so:

不 + 上班 → bú shàngbān, not bù shàngbān.

This makes the phrase smoother and easier to pronounce.