A Character a Day 在

Video script:

Good morning. In this video, we are going to talk about character 在.  It means to exist or be located at. First let's see how to write it.

The oldest writing of the character shows us the structure of a house beams and columns. Later its shape changed into this appearance more like the one we are using right now. The left part refers to the beams and columns, which represents the house. The right part is 土, which represents the land.  So this character means "owning house and land, one is settled down and located at certain place. " We can still see this meaning in its modern usage.

在 can work as a verb, which means 'to locate at, to exist' .

For example, -  你 在 哪儿?   你 you, 在 to locate at, 哪儿 where.  Where are you? 

-  我 在 办 公 室。 我 I, 在 to locate at, 办公室 office. I am at the office.

在 also works as a preposition. It can mean 'at, on, in'. Such as,  我在办公室看书。 我 I, 在 at, 办公室office, 看 read, look; 书 book;  I read a book at the office.

That's all for today. I'll see you soon. Thanks for watching.