4 Sentences with Attributives

[bmw_f1_power]

Hello,

I am working on attributives (adjectives, clauses, etc.) and I've written four sentences that I would like someone to read for me and make corrections.

I have included an English translation in case I messed up the word order and it's hard to tell what I mean (hopefully it's not too hard to tell

)

我昨天坐的那辆火车很快。

That train I took yesterday was very fast. Is 辆 the measure for trains, or just cars?

你有没有我的那本我上个星期买的运动杂志？

Do you have the sports magazine that I bought last week?

他的那辆他上个月买的新红的汽车很漂亮。

That new red car of his that he bought last month is beautiful/good looking.

我很喜欢这个你去年给我的手表。

I really like this watch that you gave me last year.

As always I appreciate all replies.

[Quest]

我昨天坐的那列火车很快。 Consider: 我昨天坐的那班列车很快。

你有没有我上个星期买的那本运动杂志？

他上个月买的那辆红色的新汽车很漂亮。

我很喜欢你去年给我的这只手表。

[CBC]

Your chinese sentences are grammatically correct, but too complete to be idiomatic.

[bmw_f1_power]

Thanks for the replies. I guess I was partly correct, but I'm a little confused now.

Quest:

I was studying the attributives in the book Intermediate Chinese by Yip Po-Ching and Don Rimmington, and they say when more than one attributives modify one noun, the order is generally:

possessive attributive, demonstrative and/or numeral, verbal/clausal att, adjectival att, nominal att.

I'm just wondering why in my 3rd sentence:

他的那辆他上个月买的新红的汽车很漂亮。

You changed it to:

他上个月买的那辆红色的新汽车很漂亮。

My book says the possive and demonstrative/numeral (的那辆) would come right after the subject, but you put it after the verbal/clausal part.

I'm guessing it's just a preferance or something, but does the sentence sound or mean anything different the way I wrote it? I mean, does it make a difference what order I put the 那辆 and the 上个月买的 in?

Sorry to make a big deal about a little point, but it just seems a little confusing to me.

[Quest]

你有没有我的那本我上个星期买的运动杂志？

Avoid double usage of 我 and 的. They sound redundant and awkward. (it's equivalent to saying: Do you have that sports magazine that I bought last week that belongs to me.)

You can say:

你有没有我那本上个星期买的运动杂志。

or

你有没有我上个星期买的那本运动杂志。

他的那辆他上个月买的新红的汽车很漂亮。

我很喜欢这个你去年给我的手表。

1. 新红的 is not a word. You can say 新的红色的汽车(verbose), 红色的新汽车(preferred), or 新的红色汽车。

2. I guess 他那辆上个月买的红色的新汽车很漂亮。and 我很喜欢这只你去年给我的手表。are correct, but it sounds more natural to me to keep demonstrative attributives 这.. and 那.. as close as possible to the noun they modify.

[bmw_f1_power]

Quest, thanks for clearing that up for me. The grammar book I'm using is great because it provides examples of all the points it discusses, but there is no substitute to actually talking to a native speaker.

CBC, I understand now what you meant by not sounding idomatic. Sounding like a Chinese speaker would sound is I think the hardest part, because the way the grammar is set up it is sometimes hard for me to tell which rules are just general rules of usage and which rules would make me sound idiotic rather than idiomatic if I broke them. (OK that was a pretty lame joke, but come on we're just talking about grammar here, give me a break).

Until next time.