Getting around China in Chinese: tickets, trains and directions
Long-distance travel in China is fast, cheap and almost entirely in Chinese: the stations are huge, the signs alternate between Chinese and English, and the announcements are not repeated in English. The metro is the easy part — station names are also written in pinyin.
What actually slows people down is not vocabulary, it's not knowing how to stop a conversation that has run past them. Four repair phrases — I don't understand, say it again, speak slowly, write it down — do more for a traveller than any amount of new vocabulary.
8 steps · 8 phrases · tap any phrase to hear it
Listen to all 8
Hands-free playback — good for a taxi, a queue, or the plane.
Back-to-back Chinese — good once the phrases are familiar.
- 1
Find the station
You may hear
前面左转。
Qiánmiàn zuǒ zhuǎn.
Turn left ahead.
火车 means train and 站 means station, so 火车站 and 地铁站 (metro) both follow the same pattern. 哪儿 is the casual spoken form of 哪里 — you'll hear both constantly, and they mean the same thing.
- 2
Buy a ticket as a foreigner
You may hear
去哪儿？
Qù nǎr?
Where to?
Foreign passports usually can't be read by the self-service ticket machines, so go to the staffed window (人工窗口) and bring the passport you booked with — the ticket is tied to it. Tickets also sell out days ahead around public holidays, and the official app is 铁路12306, which has an English version.
- 3
Ask the price and the class
You may hear
二等座五百五。
Èrděng zuò wǔbǎi wǔ.
Second class, 550.
High-speed trains sell 二等座 (second class), 一等座 (first class) and 商务座 (business). Second class is comfortable and usually all you need. 一张 asks for “one ticket”, and 张 is the measure word that goes with it.
- 4
Confirm the departure time
You may hear
九点二十开。
Jiǔ diǎn èrshí kāi.
It leaves at nine twenty.
Chinese time is spoken as number + 点 (o'clock) + minutes, so 九点二十 is 9:20 — exactly the pattern on the numbers page. Gates close about five minutes before departure and stations are big, so arrive with the time to spare.
- 5
Stop the conversation
You may hear
我说慢一点。
Wǒ shuō màn yīdiǎn.
I'll speak more slowly.
The most useful three words in the language when someone launches into directions. Say it early rather than after they've finished — by then they'll have to start over, and most people will.
- 6
Ask for the repeat
You may hear
我再说一遍。
Wǒ zài shuō yí biàn.
I'll say it again.
一遍 is “one time from beginning to end”, which is why 再说一遍 asks for the whole thing again and not just the last word. Pair it with 请说慢一点 and you'll get most instructions a second time, slowly.
- 7
Ask them to write it down
You may hear
你等一下，我写。
Nǐ děng yíxià, wǒ xiě.
Hold on, I'll write it down.
The escape hatch for any conversation you can't follow. Characters are copy-pasteable — paste them into your map app or a translation tool — and place names are exactly what people can't explain but can write.
- 8
Ask a stranger for a photo
You may hear
好，一二三。
Hǎo, yī èr sān.
OK — one, two, three.
Hand the phone over first, then ask, and expect the countdown in Chinese. 张 is the measure word for photos; 拍照 is the general verb. Some tourists get asked for photos themselves in rural areas — 可以 (sure) is a complete answer.
Also worth having ready
Not part of the flow, but the ones people wish they'd practised before this situation.
Common questions
- How do I buy a train ticket in China as a foreigner?
- Use the staffed ticket window (人工窗口) rather than the self-service machines, which usually can't read foreign passports. Say 我要买票 (I want to buy a ticket), show your passport and the destination written in Chinese. The official booking app is 铁路12306 and has an English version.
- How do I ask for directions in Chinese?
- Where is X? is X 在哪儿 (X zài nǎr) — for example 火车站在哪儿 (where is the train station?). If the answer comes too fast, 我不懂 (I don't understand) followed by 请说慢一点 (please speak more slowly) or 请写下来 (please write it down) will usually get you written characters you can copy.
- Do I need Chinese to use the metro in China?
- Barely. Metro station names, signs and ticket machines are labelled in English and pinyin, and announcements repeat in English in most big cities. Taxis and long-distance buses are where Chinese phrases actually matter.
Every phrase used here, in full
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