DIAN-4

('dian' in the fourth tone)

Some 31 standard Chinese characters have a 'dian' pronunciation. Major sound-indicating components are: 占 (11 occurences, of these, four are 店), 颠 (4)

电 = electricity (this character is part of about every word that is connected to electricity, usually as the first character)

电邮 = dian(4)you(2) = email

邮 = you(2) = post, mail, stamp

***

电池 = dian(4)chi(2) = battery

主电池 = zhu(2) dian(4)chi(2) = main battery (term used in handheld computers)

***

充电 = chong(1) dian(4) = to charge a battery

充 = to fill up

***

电费 = dian(4)fei(4) = electric bill

费 = fei(4) = fee, charge

*****

店 = a shop

店酒 = jiu(3)dian(4) = hotel / lit. alcoholic drink shop

Please note the tone sequence: a third tone followed by a fourth tone. In such instances, the third tone is shortened into a so-called half third tone; it only has the falling part of pronunciation, thus, it is as short as the fourth tone, with the same stress on the first of its two vowels, just as the fourth tone.

Compare this to the same two-morpheme sequence with two third tones: 九点 = jiu(3) dian(3) = nine o'clock. In this case, the third tone of the first morpheme is changed to a second tone.

If a word in the third tone is followed closely by any other word, the tone of the first word is never fully pronounced, probably because it would take too much time. A full third tone sounds the longest of all Chinese tones because it first falls and then rises. 

When Pinyin with tone marks is used, the tone mark for 酒, which is a third tone mark, is not changed. It shows the third tone, even though 'jiu' in the combination that means 'hotel' sounds more like the fourth tone.

Pinyin looks so easy because it just uses those letters of the Roman alphabet that are also used in English. But because of its many hidden rules, it is just as tricky as English. And just as the alphabet use in Spanish is much more straight forward than in English, in Asia, alphabet use is much more straight forward in Indonesian than in Pinyin Chinese.