Which 行? xíng or háng?

[Pegasus]

Hi Chinese Forum community, 

 

I went to a Chinese restaurant today during a particularly busy lunch time. After waiting in line/queue to give them my name and tell them the size of our party, the host asked us for our cell/mobile phone number and told us that we'll receive a text message when they're about ready to seat us. The restaurant is located inside a mall in the US, and this allowed us to walk around the mall and shop (if we wanted to) while we were waiting for a table. (The wait was particularly long, estimated at about one and a half hours.)  

 

After walking around the mall for about one and a half hours, I received a text message telling me to come back to the restaurant. When we got back to the restaurant, I wasn't sure which line to get in. It's a good thing I asked one of the staff because I almost got in the line for the bar, which would have been the wrong line. The staff member pointed me to the line I should get in. When I got to the front of that line, I noticed a sign in English and in Chinese which read: "Texted Guests Line. 收到餐館短信的客人，請排此行。" (I attached a picture of the actual sign to this post if you want to look at it.) 

 

My question is this: How do I read the 行 character on that sign? Is it xíng or háng?

 

Most of the time when I encounter 行, it's xíng. The only time I've encountered it as háng is in the word for bank 銀行 (yínháng). However, after reading through the various potential meanings of 行 in my Chinese-English dictionary, I'm beginning to wonder if it's háng in this case. Which is it? 

 

Also, could anyone help me break down the 請排此行 part of the sentence please? I understand it as "please form a line/queue here" or perhaps more naturally "please line up here" or "please queue up here". Is this the right way for me to understand this sentence? I know 排 from the 排隊 / 排队, which I know means "to line up" or "to queue up". If they had written "請在這裡排隊", I would have completely understood. But instead, they wrote "請排此行". Does this mean exactly the same thing? 

 

Thank you very much for your help. I appreciate it. 

 

Sincerely,

Pegasus 

 

 

 

[atongmu]

I am by no means a fluent speaker, but I would assume there were two possible lines. So it is saying the people who texted "queue up in this line" so it has to be "háng" as háng means a row or line.

 

edit- I should add that English has similar situations, where context helps you know what is correct. ie homonyms. Not saying that is exactly the same as chinese, but gives you an idea.

 

read vs. read; book vs. book etc. 

[lips]

hang2

 

Word-for-word translation would be "Please follow this queue."

[calibre2001]

行 (háng) means line (line from line up)

Please queue in line.

[Lu]

行 is also háng when it means 'line' as in a book, so in your sentence, I immediately read it as háng. Xíng means 'to go', which wasn't applicable here.

 

请 please

排 stand [in line], queue

此 this

行 line.

 

此 doesn't mean 'here', it means 'this' as opposed to 'that'. It's 文言文, very formal, you'd rarely if ever use this in speech. But it's very suitable for signs like this. 请在这里排队 is not incorrect Chinese, but the wrong register for a sign.

[roddy]

And it's line again in 行业 - line of work. 

[Demonic_Duck]

I don't think “请在这里排队” is the wrong register for a sign. Signs can use informal language too.

排此行 strikes me as unusually formal. A happy middle ground would be something like 在此排队.

[skylee]

“I don't think “请在这里排队” is the wrong register for a sign.“

”排此行 strikes me as unusually formal.”

I disagree.

[Pegasus]

Thank you everyone. All of you really helped me to understand the sentence better. I was thinking of it as "please line up here", but I now understand it more precisely as "please use (line up in) this line". 

 

And, thank you for explaining the use of 行 to mean "line" and giving me the other examples where it can be used to mean line, like "line of work" and "line in a book". Fascinating that it can be used in "line of work" the same way it can be used in English to mean "line of work". That's so awesome. I don't think I'll ever forget about "line" meaning of 行 now. 

 

Cheers!

[LinZhenPu]

Fascinating that it can be used in "line of work" the same way it can be used in English to mean "line of work".

There's heaps of sayings like that in Chinese. I'm convinced it's caused by the heavy American influence on modern Chinese culture.

[lips]

...caused by the heavy American influence on modern Chinese culture...

Not this one.

皆次当行。——《史记·陈涉世家》 行 here means a trade.

行, meaning a business, was in use at least since before the Song dynasty.