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坎坷不平

Mandarin · pinyin kǎn kě bù píng

potholed and bumpy road (idiom); fig. full of disappointment and dashed hopes

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Characters in this entry

坎: kǎn · pit, hole; snare, trap; crisis; trigram ☵; hexagram ䷜
坷: kě · clod of earth, lump of soil
不: bù · no, not; un-; negative prefix
平: píng · flat, level, even; peaceful

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

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Mandarin tones

3–3–4–2 · kan3 ke3 bu4 ping2

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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.

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Compare dictionary sources 1 Cantonese reading

Rime Cantonese 粵拼

ham1 ho2 bat1 ping4

Cantonese word readings for 坎坷不平. This lexicon supplies readings, not definitions.

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