What do the Chinese call America?

In Chinese, America is called 美国, pronounced Meiguo in Mandarin pinyin, which literally means beautiful country. This is a phonetic abbreviation. The full formal name for the United States of America is 美利坚合众国, pronounced Meilijian Hezhongguo, where Meilijian is a phonetic transliteration of America and Hezhongguo means united states. In everyday speech, everyone just says 美国 Meiguo for America and 美国人 Meiguoren for an American person. The choice of characters is interesting because early translators chose characters that sounded like America but also had positive meanings, 美 meaning beautiful, 国 meaning country. This is common in Chinese transliteration to pick auspicious characters. In Cantonese, which is spoken in Hong Kong and Guangdong, America is pronounced Meigwok. In historical texts, America was also called 亚美利加 Yameilijia, which is a fuller phonetic transliteration. So when Chinese speakers talk about traveling to the US, they say 去美国 Qu Meiguo. The official short name for the USA in Chinese state media is also 美国.