Example sentences
nǐ你qù去guò过zhōng中guó国ma吗？
Have you been to China?
zhōng中guó国cài菜hǎo好chī吃。
Chinese food is delicious.
About this word
中 is middle or center and 国 is country, so 中国 is literally "the central country". The name is older than the modern nation: it began as a way of referring to the states of the central plains, the ones at the middle of the known world as opposed to the surrounding regions. The same 国 builds the names of other countries in modern Chinese: 美国 (America), 英国 (Britain), 法国 (France), plus 外国 (foreign country).
The story behind the character
中
中 is actually a flag. The vertical stroke is the pole, and the box is the banner. Armies planted a flag in the center of camp, and that center became 中. You think of it as "middle," but it's a flag standing in the middle.
国
The traditional 國 is a wall (囗) around 或, which meant territory. A wall plus a territory, that's a country. The simplified 国 swapped 或 for 玉 (jade). Same idea: walls, land, and treasure.