Hi,

Have anybody come across this word/expression? According to my Chinese teacher it is a polite way of saying that someone died.

As in:

he died = 死了 (not sure about the use of 了 here?)
he passed away = 去了

I am just curious. It sounds fine to me, but couldn't find it on MDBG and it wasn't in the Skritter vocab.

Well, they often say someone's 去世（了）, but I guess it's not a big stretch from that to 去了. Sounds reasonable.

死 is a word to be abstained from, so it’s described in all sorts of round about ways. 去了 = gone, so it means passed away. Where they have gone to? The answer is 彼岸。Where is 彼岸? It’s in the west (帰西). Why they go there? They are having a tour there (仙游). How? By riding a crane (骑鹤西去)。

Sorry, 帰西 is Japanese. In Chinese it should be 归西.

I've heard of it being used this way. I'm pretty sure I've heard 他走了 when someone was talking about their dead grandfather too, but I might be remembering wrong.

he passed away means 他走了。I'm a Chinese.You can talk with me and if you have a trouble in learning Chinese.I'm very glad to help you.
My facebook:http://www.facebook.com/#!/bookwholesale
My msn:binqilin1988@hotmail.com

@ MK1977: don't think you're wrong. I've heard that term used as well.

Thanks to all of you!

PS: I wrote Mandarin today and again realized how awesome Skritter is!