The pitfalls and triumphs of learning Chinese

Like any language, Chinese has its myriad subtleties that affect the whole meaning of what you might be saying. Let me give a simple example. The question, ‘can you speak Chinese?’, might be said in at least two ways:

Ni hui shuo hanyu ma?

你会说汉语吗？

Ni hui bu hui shuo hanyu?

你会不会说汉语？

Now, if you would like to give the question some emphasis, you may add jiujing (究竟)。With this small addition, much changes.

The first sentence becomes:

Ni jiujing hui bu hui shuo hanyu?

你究竟会不会说汉语？

That is, it would...