Word
要不是 合同 写 得 很 清楚， 我 还 真 不 放心 马上 把 押金 给 她。yàobúshì hétong xiě de hěn qīngchu, wǒ hái zhēn bú fàngxīn mǎshàng bǎ yājīn gěi tā.
Meaning
If the contract hadn’t been written so clearly, I really wouldn’t have felt comfortable giving her the deposit right away.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Lesson
Breakdown of yàobúshì hétong xiě de hěn qīngchu, wǒ hái zhēn bú fàngxīn mǎshàng bǎ yājīn gěi tā.
我wǒ
I
不bù
not
很hěn
very
给gěi
to give
Questions & Answers about yàobúshì hétong xiě de hěn qīngchu, wǒ hái zhēn bú fàngxīn mǎshàng bǎ yājīn gěi tā.
What does 要不是 mean, and how is it different from 如果不是?
要不是 means if it were not for... or if ... had not .... It often introduces a condition that prevented a bad result.
In this sentence, 要不是合同写得很清楚 means:
If the contract had not been written so clearly...
Compared with 如果不是, 要不是 is usually more conversational and often more emphatic. It commonly appears when the speaker wants to say that something negative would have happened otherwise.
Why is 不 pronounced bú in 要不是 and 不放心?
This is because of a tone change rule for 不.
Normally, 不 is fourth tone: bù.
But when it comes before another fourth-tone syllable, it changes to second tone: bú.
So:
- 不 + 是 becomes búshì
- 不 + 放 becomes búfàng
This is a very common pronunciation rule in Mandarin.
Why does the sentence say 写得很清楚 instead of 写很清楚?