起飞(qǐ fēi) - to take off (of an aircraft) in Mandarin

起飞 (qǐ fēi) is what an aircraft does at the start of a flight. Its opposite is 降落, to land. Airport announcements, boarding passes and flight apps all use it, so it is a word you meet before you meet the country.

It stretches into the figurative just as the English does: an economy, a career or a business can 起飞. That parallel makes it one of the easier metaphors to carry across.

The trap is the grammar around it. 起飞 is intransitive, so the aeroplane takes off and nobody takes it off: 飞机起飞了, not 他起飞飞机. The pilot flies the plane, which is 开飞机. And note the tone sandhi is not triggered here, since only the first syllable is third tone.