B1
好像 — seems, and I think
How 好像 works in Chinese for appearances and for softening a claim you are not sure of, and why it is not the same word as 像.
好像 goes in front of whatever is being reported and says it appears to be so.
他好像不高興。
Tā hǎoxiàng bù gāoxìng.
He seems unhappy.
好像要下雨了。
Hǎoxiàng yào xià yǔ le.
Looks like rain.
似乎 is the written equivalent and behaves the same way. You will read it far more often than you will say it.
Most of the time it is hedging
This is the use a textbook rarely mentions and a conversation is full of. 好像 softens a claim you are not certain of, and the English is I think rather than it seems.
我好像見過他。
Wǒ hǎoxiàng jiànguo tā.
I think I’ve met him before.
他好像姓王。
Tā hǎoxiàng xìng Wáng.
I think his surname’s Wang.
Nothing is appearing to be the case in either. The speaker is declining to commit, which in Chinese is done with this word far more than with 我想 or 我覺得.
Not the same as 像
像 compares two things. 好像 reports an impression. They look related and are used quite differently.
他像他爸爸。
Tā xiàng tā bàba.
He looks like his father.
他像不高興。
他好像不高興。
像 needs something to compare him to. 不高興 is a state rather than a thing, so the sentence has nothing on the other side of the comparison.
好像…一樣 — as if
Paired with 一樣, it makes a comparison to something untrue — the as if of English.
他說得好像他去過一樣。
Tā shuō de hǎoxiàng tā qùguo yíyàng.
He talks as if he’s been there.
The 一樣 is what closes it, in the both-halves way so much of Chinese works.