Why does the Chinese word for "Ice cream" sound like
Bing-chee-lean?!

冰淇淋

The Real Meaning

In Mandarin Chinese, the character 冰淇淋 (pronounced as bīng qí lín) actually translates to Ice cream.

This is actually a phonetic import from English! Chinese just made it sound Chinese.

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冰淇淋 is ice cream! Fun fact: this is actually borrowed from the English pronunciation. So you already know how to say it — sort of!