Joseph Lemien
high-maintenance and low-maintenance In English, we can talk about a person who is high-maintenance or low-maintenance. A person is high maintenance if he/she requires someone else to do a lot of things. A high-maintenance has many needs. A low-maintenance person has fewer needs. For example, if someone wants me to send them text messages regularly, this is a high-maintenance thing. If I rarely need to do anything to maintain my relationship with a person, then it is a low-maintenance relationship. We ca use this phrase to describe other things as well. For example, a low-maintenance haircut would be a haircut that doesn't require effort/time to maintain. A high-maintenance car is a car that requires a lot of effort/time to maintain. How can I describe this concept in Chinese. Is there a word or phrase in Chinese to describe a person like this?
Sep 29, 2015 7:35 AM
Answers · 6
3
Hi Joseph, I'm afraid there is no such phrase in Chinese that can be equally used as "high/low - maintenance". When we refer to people who are high-maintenance, we say they are 难伺候的 or 要求高的、挑剔的, while 容易满足的,要求不高的 can describe people who are low-maintenance. In terms of things, like cars or machines, we would say 需要很高维护费。But we should be flexible in translation and make sure the whole sentence make sense.
September 29, 2015
Of course. 'high-maintenance' means '难伺候的, 挑剔的', 'low-maintenance' means'要求不高的,随意的'. Also, 'low-maintenance' has another meaning when it is translated into Chinese. It can also means that cars or machines don't need much money or time to repair. we say'低成本的'.
October 7, 2015
low - maintenance低成本的 high- maintenance高成本的
September 29, 2015
I support C-duo's opinion. There is no equivalent phrases to low-maintenance/high-maintenance. If you only focus on a certain/specific field, you may find set phrases to express your concept.
September 29, 2015
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