maxiewawa

Watching the Olympic games, I got the idea of commentating on what was happening around me, to practice my spoken Chinese. Here’s what happened.

(i can’t get podpress working, so you’ll have to do the “right click/save As…” thing here. Sorry.)

A foreigner walking down Nanjing rd can’t fail to be approached by people trying to sell things. At 5 minutes 30 I meet one of these guys. Here’s what we talked about.

什么？
包包手表要吗？
包不要。
看一下吧。(不要。)
衣服，手表。。。
衣服不要。
你要买什么东西呀？
什么都不要！
什么不要，什么都看一下。你喜欢的给你便宜。
不喜欢的不便宜呀？
不喜欢的不要买。喜欢的话给你便宜。你想去哪里？
我想走一走。欣赏这个。。。
上海的buildings.
你走到我店里，更好看!

What?
You want watches, bags?
I don’t want bags.
Have a look. (Don’t want to).
Clothes, watches…
Don’t want clothes.
What do you want to buy?
I don’t want to buy anything!
If you don’t want anything, have a look at everything. (As nonsensical in Chinese as in English!) I’ll give you what you want cheap.
The ones I don’t like aren’t cheap?
Don’t buy the ones you don’t like. If you like something, I’ll give it to you cheap. Where are you going?
Just having a walk, enjoying the…
Shanghai’s buildings. Come to my shop, it’s even better (than the buildings)!

Hope it’s helpful! I’m always interested in bringing the personality of a language, how it’s actually used in real life into my posts, so I hope you’ve been able to get a feel for where Chinese is spoken as well as how it is spoken.

Stay tuned for Commentary #2. As I “rehearsed” this I had all these interesting observations about what was going on around me, but when the mic was on I froze up a little. I hope I’ll be a bit looser next time.

A conversation in a Chinese shop usually goes like this:

“Hello welcome can I help you.”

“意大利经典.” (A classic Italian sandwich please.)

“你要什么面包?” (What bread would you like?)

“好的，大的…”

But occasionally, and much to my annoyance, the person behind the desk insists on using English, often very difficult to understand English. The conversation goes like this:

“Hello werrrcum, kenn-eye herrp pyu.”

“意大利经典.” (A classic Italian sandwich please.)

“You wanna which-a?” (Pointing to bread)

A confused foreigner might just shrug and try to continue in English, deciphering what the hapless sandwich maker is saying along the way. He or she misses out on a small opportunity to practice his or her Chinese. Although it’s not a large opportunity, as any language learner will tell you, every little opportunity counts, and eventually these snatched conversations go together to form a fluent mandarin speaker.

So if you ever find yourself with someone who stubbornly refuses to speak mandarin to you, I suggest my own special technique for making someone speak mandarin. Try this:

“Hello welcome, can I help you?

“意大利经典.” (A classic Italian sandwich please.)

“You wanna which-a?” (Pointing to bread)

哈？(HA?)”Which-a?” (Pointing again.)

哈？(HA?)”你要什么面包啊！” (Which bread do you want?)

(Smile of recognition) “哦！白面包。” (Oh! White bread.)

“Big/smoh?”

哈？(HA?)”Big/smoh?” (Tries communicating with sign language)

哈？(HA?)”大的还是小的？” (Big or small size?)

“哦！大的.” (Oh! A large one.)

Etc.

You’ll notice that after each English phrase, you should reply with 哈？(HA?) This makes it clear that you don’t speak English. You might have to reply to a question with 哈 several times before the other person gets the point, but eventually they’ll start speaking Chinese to you.

And finally, I only recommend this for situations when you’re the customer in a shop. The 哈? technique is designed only for those situations when one is being served, and the person doing the serving doesn’t seem to understand that the servee wishes to practice his/her Chinese.

If a friend or one of your peers keeps answering your Chinese questions in English, you’ll need a more subtle approach.

Here’s another story that I’ve read out and filmed loud in an effort to improve my spoken Chinese. If you can’t see the video, it’s here.

The article is here.

It’s not the same as the version that I was reading from but is close enough.

Basically, the story is this:

A taxi driver, while waiting for the next shift to show up, witnesses a robbery. He cunningly drives away, in the direction the thieves were running. Sure enough, they flag him down and jump in. They state their destination as the international cinema. He attempts to make a u-turn, but the thieves stop him, wanting to get as far away from the scene of the crime as possible.

The taxi driver maintains his cool, asking “So, you’re seeing a movie at this hour?” One of the thieves, obviously shaken, stutters “um… yes….”. The driver has a stunningly bold idea; he finds his phone, and dials “110″, the number for the police. “Hey buddy,” he says. “I was waiting for you but two customers came, so I’m on a job. I’m at the corner of (something-something) and (something-something) at the moment, can you come here instead? Thanks.”

The thieves in the backseat catch on that he wasn’t talking to the next shift, but the police. “Can you stop, I need to buy some cigarettes” says one thief. Instead, the driver locks the doors and floors the car. After a lot of screaming and shouting, and attempts to break the windows, the driver is forced to stop. The thieves escape. He gives chase, screaming for help all the while. The thieves are eventually apprehended by passers by, other drivers, and three (yes, three!) police cars that turn up.

The translation really doesn’t do the article justice. It is portrayed as such a dramatic story in the original Chinese; the crafty taxi driver comes up with a brilliant scheme to catch the wicked thieves… I’ve just stated the facts in my translation.

I wonder if anyone unfamiliar with mainland Chinese newspapers finds the original article interesting; I’m always struck by how the Chinese newspapers try to stay aloof, and use chengyu as much as they can. Newspapers that originate outside mainland China use much simpler language, and try to appeal to the masses more. I remember learning in high school that newspapers in Australia try to write at a level that can be understood by a high school student; in China there isn’t this philosophy of simple reporting.

Reading aloud is the weakest part of my Chinese language skills. It has been quite a while since I made a Chinese video so I made this one.

You can read the full story here or my translation below.

Yesterday morning another Qantas flight from Melbourne to Canberra had mechanical problems.

Qantas says that at Melbourne airport a passenger plane had problems with its air conditioning system. At 11:30 in the morning, when a Qantas flight entered the runway, and prepared to take off for Canberra, flight crew noticed the problem, resulting in the flight being cancelled.

Smith, a passenger said that after the flight crew heard the mechanical noise, the flight returned to the hangar. they mentioned that it might have been a problem with the air conditioning. Engineers inspected the air conditioning system, but decided not to take a risk, and that they needed to begin a more thorough inspection. This is the reason that the plane was returned to the hangar, and why all passengers were asked to disembark.

Shanghai residents got one of these in the mail today. Huh? Looks like a thermometer at first, but when you open it, you find out that it’s crappy little plastic spoon.

It occurs to me that not everyone can read what’s written on the packaging, and so not everyone realises what the spoon is for.

You can’t eat with it. You can’t scoop up anything with it. It’s hard to see what practical use it has. So why the crap did someone package thousands of these up, and put them in mailboxes around Shanghai???

I’ll give you a moment to guess. Or for all you who are literate in Chinese to read the packaging.

Finished? Or do you need a bit longer to mull it over?

Ok, here’s the translation.

On the front packet it says (on the left, in blue):

• Healthy World Expo, Healthy Shanghai. (Shanghai is hosting the 2010 World Expo.)

On the top right side (in multicolour) it says:

• A Healthy Life, Starts With Salt.

The smaller writing says:

• The World Health Organisation’s recommended standard: Every person, every day has 6 grams of salt. Consuming too much salt can lead to high blood pressure.

By now you must have guessed that this little spoon is meant for measuring salt. A full spoon is two grams of salt.

On the reverse side is a little blurb about the consequences of having too much salt. Apparently the average Shanghainese citizen has 9.9 grams, a little too much. Some kind soul (more likely a kind organisation!) has packaged these up and handed them around, so that residents can measure precisely the amount of salt in their cooking.

So it’s a public health thing. But I just can’t help laughing when I imagine an illiterate person opening his mailbox, finding a nicely packaged tiny white spoon and thinking “what the hell???!!!”

In case you didn’t know, I have a podcast feed here: http://maxiewawa.libsyn.com/rss .

I started it with the idea of regularly uploading music there; in case you didn’t know in a former life I was a pianist, one of those people (usually asians!) who started playing when they were 5 and never ended up giving up like older people.

But for some reason, I’ve developed mild RSI in my wrists, and long hours playing piano isn’t possible… what to do with my podcast? I’ve paid for the space, so I might as well use it.

Today, probably inspired by meeting The One And Only Hyunwoo Sun yesterday, whose length and breadth of creative output far eclipses my own meagre efforts, I recorded this.

For me, language learning dialogues are always really boring. No conversation at a post office begins “Good Evening sir, I would like to post this letter”, but every language learning dialogue seems to begin in such stilted, wooden way. So I went to my local chemist with a hidden microphone and recorded this natural dialogue.

 

 Buying Throat Medicine in Mandarin Chinese: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

The old guy has a really thick Shanghainese accent, and I use some Shanghai dialect greetings, but I hope you can pick up something that is said. If not, here is my transcript.

Me: 你好。(both) 好久不见！ Hey! Long time no see!

我嗓子有点干，有点痒。My throat is a bit dry, a bit itchy.

Him: 含片好吧？Do you want some throat lozenges?

Me: 恩。Yep.

Him: 你喜欢哪一个含片。(??) 这个好一点。Which lozenge do you like? (??) This ones are a bit better.

Me: 是不是甜的？Are they sweet?

Him: 不太甜。Not so sweet.

Me: 哦。哪一个不太甜？ Oh. Which one is not so sweet?

Him: 这个不太甜。要甜的么，吃这个。This one is not so sweet. If you want sweet, eat this one.

Me: 这个吧。新的，没试过。I’ll go with this one. It’s new, I haven’t tried it before.

Him: 这个效果好。他（看了贵）里面有32片。This has good effect (is effective). There are 32 in a box.

Me: 十块。是吗？10 yuan, right?

Other Chemist: 钱给我。Give me the money. (ie pay over here)

Him: 找你十块。10 yuan change.

Me: 谢谢。再见。Thanks. Bye.

The most important phrase that I’d take away would be 是不是甜的/shìbùshì tián de or “is this sweet?” If I have a choice between a drink/medicine/food that is sweet and one that isn’t, I always take the one that isn’t. The word for “sweet” (as in flavour) is the last one.

I’m not sure of the ethics of secretly recording people, but if Mr Chemist guy, if you’re reading this and take offence, just let me know and I’ll take it down. And if anyone else thinks I’m doing anything underhand or sneaky, please remember that it’s all in the name of education.

—————–

I noticed something on Wordpress that I never have before. A feature called “incoming links” shows all the places that have linked to my blog. Most of them were written by me, but one wasn’t. Li’l Miss Sunshine has written a blog post all about this humble author. Well, I couldn’t be more happy! Li’ll Miss Sunshine, I tried to write a thank you on your blog, but I don’t have a membership there, so I’ll just let you know here how overwhelming it is to read what you read. That’s the first time that anyone has put pen to paper (or finger to keyboard) to write about me, and I’m getting a bit emotional just thinking about it.

Have a look at Li’l MIss Sunshine’s very flattering post here.

Thanks again!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6KNEAk7g9L8

The last part of the taxi driver series! Where are we this time??

I realise now that the whole idea behind the Taxi Driver series might not be immediately obvious. Let me explain!

The whole story starts about 9 months ago, when I started a 4 month course at Shanghai Foreign Languages university, studying Chinese. (Yes, I realise that in China Chinese isn’t a foreign language, I don’t know why they teach it at that university.) One of my classmates and her best friend were from Belgium.

At the end of the 4 months, when everyone parted, we promised to stay in touch. All being language students, we all promised that the next time we met, we’d be speaking each other’s languages. To this end, I’ve been listening intently to FrenchPod101.com, trying to learn French. At FPod101 last week, we heard a dialogue between two passengers in a taxi.

The dialogue goes something like this:
Passenger: The Champs ElysEes please.
Driver: OK.
Passenger: What’s that?
Passenger 2: That’s the Louvre.
Passenger: What’s that?
Passenger 2: That’s the … the…
Passenger: The Eiffel tower! Pfff… Really!
Driver: The Champs ElysEes. (We have arrived)

I adapted this to fit another city, Brussels, as a nod to my Belgian friends. The passengers wanted to go to an address in Brussels, and the landmarks they pointed out were notable Brussels locations. I hit up Hyunwoo, who helped me with the French for the various landmarks, we met up on Skype, I pressed “record” on Garageband, and we did our thing!

The idea to do the other languages was Hyunwoo’s. We adapted the same dialogue for Chinese, Korean and Japanese.

We had great fun and learnt a lot. Expect to hear a lot more of these little skits in various languages from Hyunwoo and I. And if you want to participate, let us know by replying to this message. And don’t think that because you don’t speak Chinese, Japanese, Korean or French that you can’t participate. The only reason we didn’t do more languages is that we don’t really have the expertise to adapt it into other languages, not because we didn’t want to.

More from Hyunwoo at why-be-normal.com.

It has occurred to me that not everyone can see the video from the place they are. Well if you can’t see it here, have a look at it at youtube.

One of my favourite shows has to be Seinfeld. I have every episode on DVD, and at any given time discs are strewn around the apartment, a sign of how regularly I watch them.

Some well meaning person has added Chinese subtitles to each episode. For the most part they are accurate, but sometimes they are confusingly not. But these mistakes present something of a riddle to the bilingual Seinfeld fan (and I hope that I’m not the only one!). Trying to work out what the translator thought the characters were saying takes some solving. Take this bit of dialogue.

• Elaine: (To Putty, who is staring at the seat in front of him) Don’t you want something to read?
• Elaine: 你不要吃什么吗？

This first one is easy. Obviously the translator has misheard “read” as “eat”. Easy, right? Well hang on, they only get harder from here.

• George: Who, David Putty?
• George: 谁，大卫伙伴？

I’ll give you a clue if you can’t follow the Chinese (or the English). “David Putty” is someone’s name, but someone has translated his surname (”Putty”) as “伙伴”. Look up 伙伴 and you’ll find “partner”, “associate”, “sidekick” and a long list of synonyms. How could someone hear “Putty” and translate it as “伙伴“? Got it yet? Ok, I’ll give you a few moments.

The translator has heard the line as “Who, David, buddy?” and translated it that way. “Buddy” has been translated into Chinese as 伙伴.

I won’t help you at all with this one.

• Jerry: You saw Putty!
• Jerry: 你跟伙伴约会了！
• Kramer: (Surprised) Hoochie moochie!
• Kramer: 谁呀？

Obviously the confused translator has translated Kramer’s nonsensical “hoochie moochie” as “who?”. Next!

• Jerry: Don’t forget to buy me some duty free Kahlua!
• Jerry: 忙完过来吧
• Answer:Don’t forget after you’re busy to come over!

Say the original English line quickly, and you can see how the mistake was made. “Kahlua” isn’t such a common word and you can see why it was heard as “come over”.

• Jerry: Hey everybody, who’s ready to laugh?
• Jerry: 大家，谁断了腿？
• Answer: Hey everybody, who’s broken a leg?

Don’t forget that in Jerry’s accent, “leg” and “laugh” have almost the same vowel sound.

• George: (In silly voice) Hello! I’m slippery as an eel!
• George: 你好！我用了耳朵！
• Answer: Hello! I’m using my ear!

To make things extra difficult for the translator, these episode features a silly voice that Jerry has made up.

• Jerry: That was the mother on “Bewitched”. You mean PANdora.
• Jerry: 给我十元。
• Answer: Give me ten dollars. (The first sentence was obviously not translated.)

Next comes a line from Jerry’s nemesis, Newman.

• Newman: You’re a useless pustule!!
• Newman: 你是没用的妓女！
• Answer: You’re a useless prostitute!!

“My favourite:

• George: The tide had taken them out!
• George: 泰国人拿走了！
• Answer: The Thai had taken them out!

Here’s a few that I couldn’t solve. Maybe a reader can help out!

• Claire: So you’re insane?
• Claire: 你是说你没清醒吗？
• Answer: So you’re not awake? So you’re sleep saying? Any other suggestions??

Here’s another difficult one that I’m not too sure about.

• Jerry: You know this girl Claire I’m seeing.
• Jerry: 我想你很聪明。
• Answer: You know how clever I seem.

My answer only works if you swap around 你 and 我 though. If the subtitle was 你想我很聪明 my answer might work, but not as it is originally. Anyone have any better ideas? Leave them in the comments!

Here’s a movie about a syllable that many Chinese learners get wrong.

Try to get the distinction between yi and yu, and try not to make your yu sound like yi. Today’s lesson features a special guest star.