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喝西北風

简喝西北风 · 繁喝西北風

Mandarin · pinyin hē xī běi fēng

(lit.) to drink the northwest wind (idiom)
(fig.) to go hungry; to have nothing to eat

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Characters in this entry

喝: hē · drink; shout, call out
西: xī · west(ern); westward; occident; Kangxi radical 146
北: běi · north; northern; northward
風: fēng · wind; air; manners, atmosphere; Kangxi radical 182
风: fēng · wind; air; manners, atmosphere

Written characters and their own readings; the entry’s pronunciation is shown above.

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Mandarin tones

1–1–3–1 · he1 xi1 bei3 feng1

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Read this spelling in Classical texts

Follow a written form into the eight pinned witnesses: Analects, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi, Sunzi and the Mao Shijing. A match is a place to investigate; it does not prove that a modern dictionary sense fits the passage.

喝西北風 · find source passages ↗ · 喝西北风 · find source passages ↗

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Compare dictionary sources Wiktionary · 1 sense · 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

hot3 sai1 bak1 fung1

Cantonese word readings for 喝西北風. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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Wiktionary English definitions · Chinese section

Independent source senses for this spelling, with usage labels retained. Not matched to the pronunciation above.

phrase

(idiomatic) to have nothing to eat

Source page · dump 2026-09-02 · Contributors & history

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