候
hòu HSK1

wait

候 hòu
wait verb
to wait for something or someone, or to be in a state of waiting

请您在接待室稍候片刻，经理开完会马上就到。

qǐng nín zài jiē​dài​shì shāo hòu piàn​kè, jīng​lǐ kāi wán huì mǎ​shàng jiù dào.

Please wait a moment in the reception room; the manager will be here as soon as the meeting finishes.

watch verb
to observe, monitor, or examine a specific state or condition

医生正在给病人候脉。

yī​shēng zhèng​zài gěi bìng​rén hòu mài.

The doctor is taking the patient's pulse.

climate noun
seasonal weather conditions or the general state of the atmosphere

此时正值深秋之候，山坡上的红叶开得正灿烂。

cǐ​shí zhèng​zhí shēn​qiū zhī hòu, shān​pō shàng de hóng​yè kāi de zhèng càn​làn.

It is now late autumn, and the red leaves on the hillside are at their most brilliant.

five-day period noun
an ancient Chinese unit of time measurement consisting of five days

古人将一年分为七十二候。

gǔ​rén jiāng yī nián fēn​wéi qī​shí'èr hòu.

Ancient people divided the year into seventy-two micro-seasons.

inquire after verb
to greet someone or visit them to show respect or concern for their well-being

他每逢春节都会专程回乡，去拜候当年的小学老师。

tā měi féng Chūn​jié dōu huì zhuān​chéng huí xiāng, qù bài hòu dāng​nián de xiǎo​xué lǎo​shī.

Every Spring Festival, he makes a special trip to his hometown to visit his former primary school teacher.

Frequency
Character
Written text
341st most common 645.3 per million
Movie subtitles
145th most common 1245.4 per million appears in 99% of films
Word
Movie subtitles
4.05 per million appears in 1% of films
Written text
25.2 per million

Details
HSK 2.0
Level 1
HSK 3.0
Level 1
Strokes
10
Unicode
U+5019

Sources
Definitions
CC-CEDICT
Frequency data
MTSU Chinese text computingSUBTLEX-CHBCC Corpus (BLCU)