Beginning of an article on qiushibaike.com:
这是一件发生在楼主身上的糗事,事情是这样的: ... (the story is explained)
My initial semi-literal translation:
This embarrassing story happened to the OP (original poster) themselves. It was like this: ...
However, after reading into the first part more, I noticed the 是, which led me to think that it's one long noun phrase.
I would break it down like this:
这。。。是。。。一件发生在楼主身上的。。。糗事。
Breaking down the noun modifying phrase further:
一件。。。发生在楼主身上。。。的
And further yet:
发生。。。在楼主身上
where 在楼主身上 is a location complement of 发生.
Therefore, a second attempt at literal translation is:
This is an embarrassing story that happened to the original poster. It was like this: ...
Questions:
- Is the second translation more accurate?
- Does 发生 really take location complements? I only know of phrases like 发生了事故, where there is no location complement.
- Is the following reasoning correct?
- 在我公司发生了事故 is ambiguous as it can mean either "an accident has happened at my company" or "an accident that has happened at my company".
- The ambiguity is there because of a lack of a classifier 一件 or possessive particle 的.
- Clarity can be achieved by adding them, like so:
- 在我公司发生了一件事故 - an accident has happened at my company
- 一件在我公司发生了的事故 - an accident that has happened at my company
- 的 in the second sentence is optional.
- If (2) is true, can I move 在我公司 after 发生了 in (3) without changing the meaning?