好家伙
hǎo jiā huo · HSK 7
man!
😲 好家伙 = good (好) + family (家) + fellow (伙); a hearty good-fellow shout-out turned into oh-boy!
Literally good-family-fellow, it works like calling someone good buddy, then got repurposed as a standalone exclamation of surprise or admiration: man!, oh boy!, my God! The 好 good signals the warm, impressed tone.
好 — woman 女 + child 子
好 is an associative compound showing a woman 女 beside a child 子, depicting a mother with her baby. From this image of maternal affection it came to mean 'good, fine, pleasing.' The reading hǎo means 'good'; read hào it means 'to like.'
家 — roof 宀 + pig 豕
Originally a pictograph of a pig under a roof, since domesticated pigs were kept in or under the home in ancient China. Over time the meaning broadened from 'household' to 'family,' and by extension 'home' or a specialist (as in 专家, 'expert').
伙 — person radical 亻 + fire 火
伙 combines 亻 (person) with 火 (fire), originally referring to a group of people sharing a cooking fire — a mess unit of soldiers or travelers. From this it broadened to mean 'companion,' 'partner,' or 'group,' and is now common in words like 伙伴 (partner) and 伙计 (mate).