弹指一挥间

彈指一揮間

tánzhǐyīhuījiān

idiom

Meanings

1 in the snap of a finger / in a flash
2 literally: in the moment of a finger-flick

Characters

to flick / snap

to wave / flick

moment / interval

Examples

三十年弹指一挥间，孩子都长大了。

Sānshí nián tán zhǐ yī huī jiān, háizi dōu zhǎngdà le.

Thirty years passed in the flick of a finger — the children are all grown up now.

弹指一挥间，我们已经毕业十年了。

Tán zhǐ yī huī jiān, wǒmen yǐjīng bìyè shí nián le.

In the blink of an eye, it's already been ten years since we graduated.

Tips

history

弹指 (finger-snap) is originally a Buddhist unit of time — a very brief instant. The expression was popularized by Mao Zedong's 1965 ci-poem 《水调歌头·重上井冈山》: 三十八年过去，弹指一挥间 — 'Thirty-eight years have passed, in the flick of a finger.' Used today mostly with spans of years or decades.

usage

Almost always paired with a time span (几十年, 多少年) for nostalgic effect. Rarely used for literally brief moments — for those, prefer 一瞬间 or 转眼间.

Stroke Order

弹 dàn

指 zhǐ

一 yī

挥 huī

间 jiān