The moon represents my heart. I wince when I type out this sentence. It’s terribly awkward English, but I really don’t know how else to translate it. I’m no accomplished translator or anything, but I’ve given this quite a bit of thought and come up with nothing better.
月亮代表我的心 (“The Moon Represents My Heart”) is an extremely famous song in China. Most foreigners here know it, and every Chinese person seems to know it. It’s a pretty simple song, but …
What makes a person fat? The Chinese have a simple 4-part answer: 糖，躺，汤，烫
The charm of the answer lies in the fact that each of the four “causes” is pronounced in basically the same way, written “tang” in pinyin. Each one has a different tone, though, which makes it fun. When Chinese people hear the answer they have to think for a second, running through their mental dictionaries, matching up the proper tones to …
One
Overheard in the office:
Girl A: 索性的索是…？
Girl B: 索尼的索。
Girl A: 哦，知道了。
Girl A: Which 索 character is the 索 in 索性? [索性 is a not uncommon Chinese adverb meaning "simply."]
Girl B: The same 索 as in “Sony”. [索尼 is the Chinese transliteration for "Sony." Its characters are meaningless, chosen for phonetic value only.]
Girl A: Oh, got it!
Two
I recently had the 抽油烟机 in my apartment fixed. I’m not sure what it is …
A while back I told you about my ayi (阿姨). Now I’m going to tell you some more.
My ayi comes from Hubei province. She has a son there attending Wuhan University. I don’t know more about her particular family circumstances than this, but knowing just this much it sounds like a difficult situation.
My ayi is probably in her early 40′s.
My ayi always calls me xiansheng (先生), something like “sir.” I’ve asked her many …
Yesterday I went to a kindergarten to teach a few classes with a co-worker. The kindergarten is inside a walled community. Not the kind of rich walled community you may be thinking of, but rather a big collection of fairly run-down Chinese apartment buildings which happen to be surrounded by a wall.
On the way out, we passed two men burning stuff near the garbage. My first thought was, “Just great. As if the pollution wasn’t bad enough, people also …
China is currently in the midst of a new headwear craze. It’s like a typical sun visor with a swivel down piece of dark transparent plastic which shades the face from the summer sun’s harsh glare. The protective plastic can serve as an extended visor (up), or sort of a whole-face “sunglass mask” (down). See the pictures below, modeled by yours truly. I’m not entirely sure what to call the new hat-like apparel.
The Chinese just call them 太阳帽, …
“Rainbow,” one of my former students and fellow bloggers, has recently finished a poll (survey?) of Chinese students. With the help of an American friend, she was able to provide cultural contrast, with the results nicely graphically displayed. Although the sample size was not large, the questions were well-chosen and the results are interesting. Some of my favorite questions were Can you cook, Do you have an idea now about what kind of job to do after …
Being a foreigner in a smallish Chinese town is quite an experience. Wherever you go, whatever you do, you’re a spectacle. Everything is difficult for you. Nothing goes as expected. If you can speak any Chinese, your (near-constant) audience will be amazed and enthralled. Frequently being the center of attention of a group of non-English-speaking people can really spur one to improve one’s Chinese. A foreigner in a smallish Chinese town who can speak Chinese fairly well can quite quickly …
We say, “make a face.” The Chinese say, “make a ¹íÁ³.” Gui lian is kinda hard to translate literally because ¹í can mean “ghost” or “demon” or a bunch of other things. Á³ means “face.” In this case there’s no trouble understanding, though. Below are some of my students’ gui lian. (click on the image for a gallery of cute kids)
There, now some people might momentarily stop nagging for more pictures (you know who you are). I …
John has lived in China for
12.8
years. He is a linguist focused on SLA and tech.
…
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