maxiewawa

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.

Local newspapers are a great place to get an insight into a place’s culture. 新民晚报 is a newspaper that comes out every day in Shanghai.

Of most use to learners of Chinese is that section called “建议与呼声” (Suggestions and Opinions). The pieces in this section are very short, have useful vocabulary and tell an intruiging story. Here’s something from today’s paper:

• 围墙成了小便处：臭气冲天熏路人 - 读者王女士来电：漕东三路漕东支路附近有一幢没有厕所的公房，里面住着一些外来人员，他们经常在马路对面的围墙边“方便”，臭气冲天弄脏周边环境。
  （From Mrs Wong, a reader: Near Cao Dong supplementary road, off Cao Dong Road Three, there is a public housing estate without a toilet, where various outsiders live. They often “relive themselves” on the wall opposite, and the stink fills the air and dirties the surrounding area.

My apologies for starting with the dirty one first. From reading this short article, you can learn words like 公房/gōng fáng/public estate, 对面/duì miàn/opposite, 马路/mǎ lù/road, the “polite” way to refer to urinating, 方便/fāng biàn (yes, it literally means “convenient”) and on top of it all, these words all fit nicely together into a short “story”. Here’s another.

• 无证小贩进小区，吵吵闹闹烦煞人 - 读者吴女士来电：金汤路1781弄真光七街坊内，每天早上5时起，就有小摊贩摆摊，讨价还价声吵醒四邻。居民多次向有关部门反映，问题就是不能解决。这个“弄堂菜场“不知何时才能取缔。 (From a reader, Mrs Wu: Inside the living complex at Division seven of lane 1781 of Jin Tang Rd, every morning from five o’clock, residents are woken by the sound of street sellers plying their wares and bargaining. Residents have complained to relevant authorities, but the problem can’t be fixed. It is unclear when this kind of “laneway vegetable market” will be outlawed.

This passage gives the Chinese reader some great words. Many of them we don’t really have in English. I have translated ‘小摊贩’ as “street sellers” but I don’t think that’s such a good translation. Maybe “Hawkers?” Anyway, we don’t have enough of them in English speaking countries to have a proper word. And I’ve also used “plying their wares”, which is kind of an old expression but is basically a specialised verb for what street sellers do. “Hock their stuff” might be a better word.

Anyway, here are some other words that might help you understand.

每天早上5时起：Every day from five in the morning. This is just a fancy newspaper way of saying 每天早上从五点钟. Times are usually expressed in spoken Chinese as <something>点钟, the <something>时 pattern is usually reserved for newspapers, newsreaders, official documents etc.

问题就是不能解决：问题/wèn tí = problem. 就是/jiù shì = is (emphatically). 不能/bù néng = not possible. 解决/jiě jué = to resolve a dispute or a conflict. Thus, 问题就是不能解决 = The problem can’t be solved.

I’d buy the entire newspaper just to read the five short paragraphs that are included in each day’s 建议与呼声. I think they give such a great insight into everyday China. I mean, I could try to describe the din that those street sellers make in the morning, with a story, or an article, or a youtube video, but nothing would compare with Mrs Wu’s short complaint. I just love that it’s straight from her mouth, so to speak.

Here’s another.

• 车到终点搞卫生，垃圾扫到马路上 - 读者邓昌黎来信：公交916路，726路开进呼兰路终点站后，经常有司售人员把车厢里的果皮，饮料包装盒等垃圾扫到马路上。碰到风大时，满地的垃圾随风飞扬，行人及乘客意见很大。
  The 916 and 726 buses, which terminate at Hu Lan road, often have ticket sellers that throw such rubbish as peel, and empty drink cartons onto the road. When the wind picks up, all of the rubbish flies everywhere and pedestrians and passengers alike have suggestions.

One of my favourite Chinese expressions is in this short passage. “有意见” literally means “to have suggestions” but is exclusively used when someone has a negative view, or is angry about something. For example, the crazy chair-wielding guy who was fixing to fight the entire staff of a Sony store in an earlier post might be described as “having suggestions” (有意见)。

And just to show that they aren’t all negative, here’s the final article for today:

• 方便洗手装龙头，泗泾邮局很周到 - 读者永德来信： 日前，我去松江泗泾邮政支局寄信，见营业大厅的角落里新添了水斗和龙头，旁边还配了块小毛巾。寄信的人贴沾邮票后，手上的浆湖或胶水可以马上洗清擦干。邮局这种人性化的服务，不仅为客户提供了方便，也能让柜台保持清洁。
  A letter from a reader, Yong De: Recently, I went to a post office at Si Jing, Yong Jiang to post a letter, and noticed in the main business area a new basin and tap, and next to them, a small towel. Those wishing to post a letter, after affixing stamps, can immediately wash their hands of glue or other messy things and dry them immediately. This kind of personal service not provides customers with convenience, but keeps the counters clean.

Some words of note: 水斗/shuǐ dòu = basin, 龙头/lóng tóu = tap (faucet) 方便/fāng biàn = convenient/convenience/to go to the toilet (in the final meaning, this also appeared in the first story), 擦干/cā gān = to wipe dry.

I hope you like these stories, I’ll keep doing them, they give such a poignant insight into Chinese life!

I made my way to the Apple Service Center, and this time they were open. The helpful guy at the desk said that my warranty would indeed cover a new hard drive. That was good. They would try to recover what they could from the dead hard drive, but couldn’t guarantee anything. That was gad.

But whether or not they can fix it, I will have a new hard drive, and my blog will be musical once again!

On the way back to the metro station, I noticed a large crowd gathering. Knowing how much the readers of my blog enjoy a weird story, I wandered over to have a look. As I arrived, I looked around, puzzled. What was everyone looking at??

“有人跳楼!” (I’ll translate this later!)

Ugh. I knew that I would regret it, but quickly scanned the ground near where everyone was looking for a puddle of person.

“那边！” (Up there!) said someone, pointing up.

Oh! I breathed a sigh of relief, and looked up at the fourth floor at a woman dressed in a red tracksuit, howling and screaming, on a window ledge.

Now, regarding “有人跳楼”. It basically means “A person was/is/will be jumping off a roof”.

It’s not true to say that the Chinese language has no  tense. I don’t think there’s any language in the world that hasn’t got a past tense. But in Chinese it is often ambiguous, more so than any other language. All that is clear is that a person, a building, and jumping is involved. Whether the person is on the ledge, falling through the air, or bloody mess on the ground is not clear.

Anyway, it seemed that a lot of people were having the same problems with the Chinese language. After hearing that there is/was/will be a person jumping off a roof, they first looked on the ground for their grisly remains, scanned the air for their falling body, and finally found the person standing on a ledge.

Needless to say, a large group had formed, and was blocking traffic. I watched the spectacle for a while. The woman was crying and howling about something, it wasn’t clear what. Even if she had jumped, she wouldn’t have hurt herself badly; although she was on the fourth floor, there was an atrium that was on the second, so she wouldn’t have fallen far enough to do herself serious damage. It was still disturbing though.

A scuffle broke out behind me. Astonishingly, it was between a man and a police officer. There weren’t any punches thrown, but there was a lot of shirt grabbing and wrestling. Another policeman appeared, and their reaction was really surprising: they ran off around the corner. Back home a group of policemen would have smacked the guy to the ground, handcuffed him, and taken him away!

A lot of onlookers were faced with a dilemma. Should they follow the policemen being chased around the corner, and see what happened, or continue watching the screaming suicidal woman? After some hestitation I followed the fight.

But I had hesitated too long. A group was gathering about 50 meters down the street, and I couldn’t see what was going on. I could have run down, but that would mean missing the crazy woman.

A group of Shanghainese were gossipping away about what had happened. One noticed me and said “Even the foreigners are having a look!” (I understand enough Shanghainese to know when someone’s talking about me!) “So what’s going on?” I asked. “Oh, nothing,” she answered. Typical. Every dramatic street scene  plays out in Shanghainese dialect, and I never know what’s going on.

By the time I made my way back to the audience for the crazy woman, the crowd was blocking traffic. The SWAT team had arrived, and was trying to get people out of the way. I saw a strange sight: a fully armed policeman, with bullet proof vest, helmet, and large firearm, banging on a rusty bicycle loaded with scrap wood, yelling out “whose bloody bike is this? Get it out of the way!”

People were shouting at other people to get out of the way, and I took that as my cue to leave. Bikes were going in every direction, policemen were telling people to get out of the way, and I didn’t feel like staying.

I walked down the street to an intersection, where a few people on bikes were looking down the street, puzzled. From the intersection, you couldn’t see what was going on, only that there was a large crowd, and a lot of people yelling at other people to get out of the way.

So I’m not sure how the story ended. I didn’t want to wait for the woman to jump, and for the CSIs to appear, and I was still in shock about possibly losing my computer.

Stay tuned for the conclusion to the Saga of the Dead Hard Drive, and possibly another dramatic story from the streets of Shanghai!

And don’t forget to backup important data in case your computer dies like mine!

Here’s a secret. You can actually get by in China without speaking much Chinese.

You can get by in day to day life with body language, pointing, and a helpful bilingual friend. You really can.

But the one place where every foreigner needs to interact with locals regularly is in the taxi. You’ll be in taxis regularly here, and no taxi drivers speak any English. As a taxi driver told me once, “If I could speak English I wouldn’t be driving this bloody taxi” or words to that effect.

Most foreigners in China can get by in a taxi without any language problems after a year or so of practice. But after watching this video (and the 2 sequels) you’ll be able to learn Taxi Chinese much more quickly.

In this first lesson you’ll learn how to get your driver headed in the right direction.

到――――路，――――路。
Dào— lù, —lù.
To the crossroads of ___road and ___road.

If you’re able to say where you’re going, use this expression. The first syllable dào means ‘to’, and lù, means ‘road’. So you’re saying “to__road, ___road”. It’s important to have two roads; roads are really long here and just saying a single road will be a problem.

After you say the above phrase, substituting the address you want to go to, you might get the response ha? Don’t worry, this is a standard response, and translates as “pardon me?” Just say your address again. If he says ha? again, you’re probably saying it wrong. Maybe try the next phrase.

地址给你。
Dì zhǐ gěi nǐ.
Here’s the address.

You would say this phrase as you handed the driver a piece of paper with the address written in Chinese. Dizhi is address, gei is give and ni is you, so you are literally saying “give you the address”.

It’s a good idea to get your destination written in Chinese, because Chinese pronounciation can be difficult. And be sure to get it written in Chinese characters, or HanZi. Don’t show the driver something that looks like this: it will just confuse him. Show him something that looks like this.

Now before setting off, the taxi driver might suddenly ask you a question. In Chinese. Before you panic, just know that he’s probably just asking which route you think he should take. He’s probably saying “lupu bridge a little crowded today; do you think we should take Yan’An road or just take the tunnel?”

If the driver starts asking you which way you should go, just answer him this way.

走最快的。
Zǒu zuì kuài de.
Go the fastest way.

Zǒu means “walk” or “go”. Zuì kuài is fastest, and de is ‘the one’. Literally you’re saying “go the fastest one” or “take the fastest way”.

And you’ll be on the way!

You’re only halfway there though. Well, to be precise a third of the way. You still have to chit-chat with the driver while he drives, and let him know what to do when you’re near the destination. Tune in next time for Taxi Chinese part two, where you learn how to talk with the driver during the journey.