Hi everyone!

I've gone through Level 4, Chapter 3, Lesson 2 (Fluent Path) and became confused after watching two videos. The two videos in question are called: 'Of‘ and '数字’.

It's in relation to expressing percentages.

In the video called 'Of' (@ 2 min mark), Felix explains that:

百分之二 and 百分之二十 = 20% 百分之三 and 百分之三十 = 30% 百分之零三 = 3%

He mentions that the '十‘ can be omitted, and I can understand that concept along with using 零 to express percentages under 10%. No issues/confusion with that.

However, the next video is where I am confused. It's called '数字'. At the 1.54 minute mark, Felix explains:

百分之九 = 9% 百分之九十 = 90%

I'm confused why '零' was used in the previous video called 'Of' to express 3%, but not used in the '数字' video to express 9%.

So my question is: Is it simply contextual where the speaker can omit ‘零’ if they want to express a percentage below 10%? I hope not because that just sounds super confusing! LOL.

I hope someone can clarify this for me! Thank you!

你好 Julz, i got confused by this as well and I believe it's a mistake made by Felix. In one quiz I believe there's a question on this topic as well and the correct answer for e.g. 百分之三 ist 3% and not 30%. I asked my wife, a Chinese national, and she confirmed it's 3 and NOT 30%.

Hope this helps.

Best regards

Thanks for reply Max! I appreciate your clarification. I also asked some Chinese friends on WeChat today and they said the same as you and confirmed my suspicions.

What confused me further is that when expressing one’s height, you don’t have to use “十” if you want to say for example 1.70m. So it can be “一米七” or “一米七十” which both would be 1.70m. So I assumed this was the case as well when I watched those two videos when Felix said you can drop the “十”。But later I realised either I’m just not comprehending this properly or something’s not right.

Glad to know I’m not going crazy. 感谢你Max!

I think some things in the course feel a bit clunky because Felix reshot so many of the videos. This is especially apparent in the story time I feel. But if you keep following the course it gets more and more clear. I'm on level 8 right now and some concepts get reviewed again and again and it helps tremendously.

Yes, I had noticed that too with the story times. I’m pretty happy with the course and can’t complain. The price versus the content is amazing!