混饭

混飯
hùnfàn
verb #32,052

Meanings

  1. 1 to scrape by
  2. 2 to make a meager living
  3. 3 to get by working

Examples

HSK 5
Tā zài chénglǐ hùnfàn yǐjīng shí nián le.
He's been scraping by in the city for ten years now.
HSK 6
Wǒ zhǐshì hùn kǒu fàn chī bàle.
I'm just trying to make a living, that's all.

Tips

register
混饭 is colloquial and self-deprecating - implies you're getting by without any grand ambition. The fuller idiom 混饭吃 (literally 'mix rice to eat') and 混口饭吃 ('mix a mouthful of rice to eat') are more common in conversation. Avoid in formal/job-interview contexts.
memory
here doesn't mean 'mix' - it means 'drift along, muddle through'. Same in 混日子 ('drift through the days'). Combined with ('rice/food'), the literal image is 'just chasing the next meal'.

Stroke Order

hùn
fàn