Harbin is world-famous for its Ice and Snow Festival.
Tips
usage
滨 is a bound morpheme — it does not appear alone in modern speech. It forms compounds like 海滨 (seaside), 湖滨 (lakeside), 河滨 (riverside), and is embedded in place names like 哈尔滨 (Harbin) and 滨海 (coastal).
register
Classical/literary. In everyday conversation, use 岸边 (shore, bank) or 海边 (seaside) instead.
Left-side water radical, the three-drop form of 水. Carries the meaning: 滨 is the water's edge, the shore where land meets sea or river. Same indexing radical as 海 sea, 河 river, 港 harbor, 岸 shore (in compound 海岸 vs. 海滨).
Right side 宾 supplies the sound — bīn stays bīn with no shift. The 'guest' meaning is not active; 宾 is purely a sound tag. Same phonetic appears in 缤 colorful, 槟 betel-nut, 殡 to lay out for burial — a tight bīn family.
