Learn Hardcore Chinese: yǒu rén bāng wǒ bǎ qiánbāo jiǎn huílái le. - Someone helped me pick up my wallet and bring it back.

In Chinese, 有人 literally means “there is a person / someone”. It functions like English “someone”.
You cannot normally start a sentence with bare 人 to mean “someone”; 人帮我… sounds incomplete and unnatural. You need 有 to make it existential: 有 + 人 = “there is a person / someone”.
If you know who the person is, you can replace 有人 with a pronoun or a name, e.g.
- 他帮我把钱包捡回来了。 — “He helped me pick the wallet up and bring it back.”
Using 有人 tells us the identity is either unknown, unimportant, or not being specified: “Someone helped me…”.

Should there be a measure word after 人? What is the difference between 有人 and 有一个人?

有人 = “someone / some people” in a general, indefinite way. No measure word is needed.
有一个人 literally = “there is one person”. It:
- emphasizes the number one, and
- often introduces a specific person in a story, like “There was a man who…”
In this sentence, you’re not stressing the exact number, just that some person helped you, so 有人 is more natural.
You could say 有一个人帮我把钱包捡回来了, but that sounds more like starting a narrative about that particular person, not just casually saying “someone helped me.”

How exactly does 帮我 work here? Is the structure “help me” + “do something”?

Yes. The pattern is:
帮 + somebody + (do something)
= “help somebody (to) do something / do something for somebody”.
In this sentence:
- 帮我 = “help me / do it for me”
- 把钱包捡回来 = “pick the wallet up and bring it back”
Put together:
有人帮我把钱包捡回来了。
≈ “Someone helped me by picking the wallet up and bringing it back” /
“Someone picked the wallet up and brought it back for me.”
So 帮我 marks you as the beneficiary of the action that follows.

What is the function of 把 in this sentence?

把 introduces a special structure:
Subject + 把 + Object + Verb ( + complement )
It lets you:
1. Move the object (钱包) in front of the verb, and
2. Emphasize what happens to that object.
Here:
- 把钱包: “take the wallet / as for the wallet”
- 捡回来: “pick (it) up and bring it back”
So 帮我把钱包捡回来 highlights the wallet being acted on and the result (it ends up back with you).

Can I leave out 把 and say 有人帮我捡回钱包了? Is that correct, and what is the difference?

有人帮我捡回钱包了 is grammatically fine and understandable.
With and without 把:
- 有人帮我把钱包捡回来了。
  - Typical 把-construction.
  - Slightly stronger focus on the wallet being handled and brought back.
- 有人帮我捡回钱包了。
  - More neutral word order: the verb directly takes its object.
  - Feels a bit less “manipulative / result-focused” than the 把 version.
In everyday speech, both are acceptable. The 把 version sounds very natural and is often preferred when you want to stress the result affecting the object.

Could I say 有人把钱包帮我捡回来了 instead? Why is 帮我 before 把钱包?

有人把钱包帮我捡回来了 is not natural.
The usual pattern with 帮 when it means “do something for someone” is:
- 帮 + person + (把 + object + verb …)
  → 帮我把钱包捡回来
Here 帮我 forms a chunk: “help me / do X for me”, and what comes after is the thing done:
- 帮我｜把钱包捡回来
If you put 帮我 after 把钱包, it breaks this pattern and makes it unclear whether 帮我 is:
- helping me, or
- helping the wallet (which doesn’t make sense).
So keep 帮我 together before the 把-phrase:
有人帮我把钱包捡回来了。

What does 捡 mean here exactly? How is it different from 拿, 找, or 找回?

捡 (jiǎn) = to pick (something) up, especially from the ground.
Common contrasts:
- 拿 (ná) — “to take / hold / carry”. It doesn’t imply picking up from the ground.
  - 拿钱包 = “take/hold the wallet”.
- 找 (zhǎo) — “to look for / to search for”.
  - 找钱包 = “look for the wallet”.
- 找回 (zhǎohuí) — “to get back (after searching for it)”.
  - 把钱包找回来了 = “managed to get the wallet back (after looking for it)”.
捡回来 in your sentence suggests:
- the wallet was lying somewhere (e.g. on the ground), and
- someone picked it up and brought it back.

What does 回来 add after 捡? Could I just say 捡了钱包?

回 (huí) = “back” (return).
来 (lái) = “come (towards the speaker)”.
Together as a directional complement, 回来 after a verb means “back (to here / to the original place)”.
So:
- 捡 = “pick up”
- 捡回来 = “pick (it) up and bring it back (to me / to where it belongs)”
If you only say 捡了钱包, you state only “picked up the wallet”; you don’t explicitly say it got brought back to you.
捡回来了 clearly indicates the wallet ended up back in your possession / at your location.

What does the 了 at the end do? Is it just past tense? Could it go after another word instead?

The 了 here marks a completed action (perfective aspect), not a grammatical “past tense”.
It attaches to the verb phrase 捡回来, which is why it appears at the very end:
- 捡回来了 = “picked (it) up and brought (it) back (successfully / already)”.
Chinese doesn’t mark tense like English; 了 tells you the event is viewed as complete, and context tells you it happened in the past.
You might see other versions in real life:
- 有人帮我把钱包捡回来了。 (your sentence — very natural)
- 有人帮我把钱包捡回来了呢。 (adding a tone particle)
You normally would not move this 了 up to after 帮 (帮了我把钱包捡回来), because the completed action you’re really talking about is the picking up and bringing back, not just the abstract “helping”.

Can I drop the 了 and say 有人帮我把钱包捡回来? How does that change the sentence?

有人帮我把钱包捡回来 is grammatically possible, but:
- It sounds more like a plan, instruction, or request, e.g. “Have someone help me get the wallet back.”
- Or it can sound incomplete in isolation, as if part of a longer sentence.
With 了, it clearly describes a completed event that has already happened.
In the typical context of telling someone what happened, you almost always include 了 here.

The English meaning is “someone helped me pick up my wallet and bring it back.” Where is “my” in the Chinese? Why is there no 我的钱包?

Chinese often leaves out possessive pronouns when the owner is obvious from context.
Here:
- 帮我 already shows that the action benefits me.
- It’s natural to infer that the 钱包 involved is my wallet.
So 钱包 by itself is understood as “my wallet” in this context.
You can say 我的钱包:
- 有人帮我把我的钱包捡回来了。
- This is correct, but a bit redundant in casual speech, because the ownership is already clear.

How is 有人帮我把钱包捡回来了 different from saying 我的钱包被人捡回来了?

有人帮我把钱包捡回来了。
- Focuses on “someone helped me”.
- Emphasizes the benefit to you and the action of helping.
我的钱包被人捡回来了。
- Uses the passive 被 construction: “my wallet was picked up and brought back by someone”.
- Focuses more on what happened to the wallet, less on the idea of helping you.
Both describe a similar outcome (wallet back), but:
- 有人帮我… highlights a helper.
- 被人… highlights the wallet as the affected thing.