No. 7,281 in Chinese
老三
"老三" means "the third child" or "the third eldest" in a family.
In a sentence
他是家里的老三。
He is the third child in the family.
老三 is used here to refer to the third sibling or child in a sequence of birth order.
这家餐馆的招牌菜是“老三炖肉”。
The specialty dish of this restaurant is 'Third Bro's Braised Meat'.
老三 here might be a nickname used for a person associated with the dish, possibly the third sibling in a family who is renowned for this recipe.
在会议上,他总是喜欢扮演老三的角色,不争不抢。
In meetings, he always enjoys playing the role of 'Third Bro', not fighting or competing.
老三 in this context is used metaphorically to describe someone who assumes a modest or less competitive role, possibly likened to the stereotypical traits attributed to the third in line.
Hear it in real podcasts
The recording above is a synthetic voice. Hear how people say “老三” in actual Chinese podcasts.
Find “老三” in podcastsLearn it from shows you like
LangTurbo plays Chinese podcasts with a transcript and the English under every line. Tap a word like this one and it tells you what it means right there. For iPhone, iPad and Android.
Learning English?
LangTurbo plays real English podcasts with every line translated into 中文, and tells you what any word means in that sentence. For iPhone, iPad and Android.
Chinese books and courses on Amazon (an affiliate link: a purchase through it supports this site).