Conversation 1:
Chinese person: Why don’t you like fish?
Me: I like fish, it’s just hard to eat it with all these tiny bones in it.
Chinese person: Don’t fish in America have bones in them too?
Me: Yes, but the chef removes them. That’s his job.
Question: Do Westerners not eat a lot of (otherwise tasty) fish simply because they have too many bones?
Conversation 2:
Me: I come from Florida.
Chinese person: Oh, your home is by the
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I while back I added a new blog to the CBL called Shanghai Streets. It’s a photoblog covering life in Shanghai. It has had some good shots. My favorite so far is probably these shopping girls, but I really like this building, and this picture of Taco Popo, a decent attempt at Mexican that I’ll always remember fondly. So there’s a photoblog to keep your eye on. You’ll also notice that zanhe.com (mentioned in a previous …
Code switching: a term in linguistics referring to alternating between one or more languages or dialects in the middle of discourse between people who have more than one language in common. –Wikipedia
I was riding with my girlfriend in her car. We were pulling up to my apartment, and the guard was motioning to her.
Legend: SHH=上海话 (Shanghainese), PTH=普通话 (Mandarin)
Her (SHH): Can’t I park here?
Guard (SHH): No, you need
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So what’s with all the poetry lately? Chinese poetry, even.
Since he’s no longer in China, Brendan has converted Bokane.org into a Chinese poetry translation showcase. Brendan has a lot of courage to tackle such a task, and he repeatedly surprises me with his skill.
Words are Pretty is sporting a cool new look, and John delved into some Chinese poetry over there too, which you might have missed if you’re not a frequent reader because he’s been relatively prolific …
You ever hear the stories about the alligators in the New York City sewers, or the monkeys and boa constrictors living in the wilds of the Florida Everglades? What would you say to a story of a white ferret living in the bushes surrounding an apartment complex in downtown Shanghai?
I probably wouldn’t pay much attention if I heard such a story, but I never did hear it. Rather, I’ve seen it multiple times with my own eyes, scurrying from …
Tian over at Hanzismatter is doing a good job showcasing bad tattoo choices Westerners make. This post has nothing to do with that kind of tattoo. I’m talking about a kind of tattoo that Chinese people themselves get. I’ve seen it on multiple occasions. It’s a small tattoo consisting of three dots (usually, I think) on the back of the hand near the base of the thumb. I keep meaning to ask people about the meaning of their tattoo when …
Back in the days before I had an ayi to cook for me, I taught spoken English classes at ZUCC in Hangzhou. I had a pretty nice apartment there with a full kitchen. I could have easily hired a cook there too, but never did. I rarely cooked myself, besides boiling frozen dumplings in instant soup and then dousing them with sweet and spicy sauce. Most of my meals were spent with my awesome co-workers at ZUCC.
Still, in my …
“Eat Poop You Cat” is a party game I recently discovered via Metafilter. The premise:
Each person writes a sentence, such as, say, “The hot soup burned my tongue.” The next person illustrates the sentence. Then the first portion is folded over, and the next person must try to reproduce the original sentence from the drawing. Then the drawing is folded over, and another illustration is produced.
The mutations can be hilarious. You don’t have to “know
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John has lived in China for
11.8
years. He is a linguist focused on SLA and tech.
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