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Chinese Characters: Hide & Seek 2

How many characters can you recognize here?

Hint: 鳥(bird) is the radical of the characters

Last entry answers: 咀 (mouth)、叫(shout, call)、吸(suck)、吻(kiss)、吃(eat)、吐(puke) 

Chinese Characters: Hide & Seek

How many characters can you recognize here?

Hint: 口(mouth) is the radical of the characters

Listen to their Chinese!

Kelvin Rudd

                                                                   Julien Gaudfroy (and his good English!)

                    
                                       Steve Kaufmann (and his 8 other languages...)

                                           

Google Translate

By using the method of data and statistic analysis, Google Translate can provide excellent services in many domains, and outperformed many other online translation tools.

But how well can it handle literary translation?

I tested the tool by using it to translate two short paragraphs: one from Chinese to English, and the other vice versa.

1.

"一个冬夜，我们并肩走着。地上的溶雪混合着污泥。你走在前面，我不习惯走在雪地上，所以慢慢地在后面跟着。不知什么时候，你开始说起共产主义来。"

Here is what Google got:

"A winter night, we walked side by side. The melting snow on the ground mixed with sludge. You walk in front, I am not used to go in the snow, so followed slowly behind. I do not know, you start to talk about communism."

Not bad, really. Except the tense and the last sentence. Google uses the right tense in the first sentence but then becomes inconsistent."I do not know" in the last sentence is completely wrong. "不知什么时候" means "I didn't know when it was".

2. An excerpt from "A true account of talking to the sun at Fire Island" by Frank O'Hara

"Sun, don't go!" I was awake at last.

 "No, go I must, they're calling me."

 "Who are they?" Rising he said 

"Some day you'll know. 

They're calling to you too." 

Darkly he rose, and then I slept.

Goggle:

"孙，都不去！“我已经醒了最后。

”没有，我要，他们给我打电话。“

是谁呢？”瑞星他说：

“有一天，你就会知道。

他们打电话给你了。“

猜谜他站起身，然后我睡了。

Google is obsessed with transliteration; at least when the target text is Chinese. "Sun" and "Rising", for instance, are not literally translated but become names: "孙" and  ”瑞星". It makes a couple of other mistakes: "don't go" should be "不要走" instead of  "都不去"(all not leaving). "Darkly he rose" should be "他陰沉/ 神秘地升起" instead of "“猜谜他站起身"  (solve a puzzle he stand up). "Calling" becomes "打电话" (making a phone call)-for some reasons we just know (intuitively), that there is no way "calling" would refer to "making a phone call".

Literary work is original, creative, and definitely not routine-not a myth that can be easily solved by statistic analysis. After all, when it comes to literary translations, we human beings, too, have a difficult time of it. 

Emilie Story Part IV

今天早上我打電話給大學，我說我要請病假。

我的上司好像有點奇怪，他說：“你是誰？”

午飯後，我上網，打入”太安樓“。看看地圖，太安樓在西灣河。

下午出去前，我看看兒子的睡房，是空的。

奇怪。

然後我坐地鐵去西灣河。

太安樓很大，有很多店和很多人。

我找找看看，不過我看不到那個女人。

我不知道要做什麼，回到街上。

那時正在日落，天空是紅色的。

我認出這條街-是夢裡的那條街。

我開始走路......

Do you know what these words mean?

Hira Hira - Japanese: the feeling you get when you walk into a dark and decrepit old house in the middle of the night.

Kanjus Makkhicus - Hindi: a person so miserly that if a fly falls into his cup of tea, he'll fish it out and suck it dry before throwing it away.

Jayus - Indonesian: someone who tells a joke so unfunny you can't help laughing.

Agelast- English: a person who never laughs

Dactylion- English: the tip of the middle finger

Eccedentesiast- English: a person who fakes a smile

Mytacism- English: the incorrect or excessive use of the letter M

Tarantism- English: an urge to overcome melancholy by dancing

Vigesimation – English: the act of killing every twentieth person

Tetrapyloctomy – English: the act of splitting a hair four ways

Words & Visual Art

"Words are for communication and cities are for living...Traditional Chinese characters became simplified characters; old cities have become new cities..."

-Hung Keung

Kinetic Typography animation by Matt Rogers

Loanword in Mandarin Chinese

Could you understand the following story?

I got a call from a friend inviting me to go to a pàiduì tonight when I was lying on my shāfā, after doing yújiā. I said while sipping my píjiŭ, "Kù! Let's go xuĕpìn this afternoon?"

After my friend had put her new clothes on, I heard her whispered to herself, "I am beautiful, I look like a mótèr!"

At night in the pàiduì we drank xiāngbīn and ate sānmíngzhì, while someone was playing jítā in the background.

When we left a friend asked me if I cared for a ride in his jípŭ chē. "No, you have had too much xiāngbīn, I'd better take a bāshì!" I turned down his suggestion and walked away.

Hightlight here to see the pinyin in English:

pàiduì party

shāfā sofa

yújiā yoga

píjiŭ beer

xuĕpìn shopping

mótèr model

xiāngbīn champagne

sānmíngzhì sandwich

jítā guitar

jípŭ chē jeep

bāshì bus

Party Lover Roberto

A short story about Roberto, a party lover.


By my student Jihoon


罗伯特喜欢派对。


他很幽默和随和。他长得不太好看，但是他常常笑，笑的时候让他活泼的脸看起来更好看。


他很有自信，也常常能猜到一个人喜欢怎么样的派对。


罗伯特很会玩，常常开很奢侈的派对，但是他不是有钱人。


他不在派对的时候，性格完全相反，在工作的时候他很认真和成熟，他努力地赚钱；


但是就在派对把钱全部花光。


他重复着这样奇怪的生活，只有一件事情不变：


他总是很忙，好像他明天就会死去一样。


如果有的事今天不做，以后没有机会做。


我可以在他身上感到他对生命的爱。

Taxi Cantonese 2

Taxi Cantonese 1

If you don't want to end up in the middle of nowhere, and being charged a fortune; it would be better to speak some Cantonese while you are taking a taxi in Hong Kong.

Here are some useful phrases for telling the taxi driver your destination. More to come in the next few posts!

Click the images to enlarge, or even print them out!

Naughty Donkey Making a Mess

An interesting, creative food name can definitely make an impression, especially on the foodies.

Last Wednesday I met a friend for dinner. My friend was planning a trip to Beijing next month. As a foodie, she told me the first thing she wanted to do in Beijing was to try a famous Beijing snack named “Rolling Donkey”(驢打滾；驴打滚; lǘ dă gŭn)-glutinous rice rolls with sweet bean-flour.

Our first encounter with the snack was in “My Memories of Old Beijing”, an autobiographical novel written by Lin Haiyin in 1960. The book was a very interesting read and was highly recommended by schools back then.

Sadly and interestingly enough, my friend could recall nothing from the book but only “Rolling Donkey”. The reason why it was named as such was because the rice rolls are covered with yellow bean-flour, looking like a donkey making a mess on a dusty, sandy ground. A playful name like this made itself impossible to slip away from her memory.

Here are some other interesting Chinese food names I have heard of:

(Click the Chinese names for the photos)

羊乳扇; yáng rŭ shàn: Goat’s Cheese Paper Fan (Yunnan Snack) –Thin, crispy goat’s cheese slices, looking like paper fans

硬面鐲子;硬面镯子; yìng miàn zhuó zi: Floured-Bracelet (Beijing snack)-Baked ring-shaped bread with sesame seeds.

蛤蟆吐蜜; háma tŭ mì: Honey-Spitting Toad (Beijing Snack)-White sesame bread stuffed with red bean paste. The bread cracks in the middle making the stuffing visible.

燈影牛肉；灯影牛肉；dēngyĭng niúròu: Light-shadow Beef (Sichuan snack)- Beef cut thin as if light can shine through, like a piece of canvas of a shadow play.

Love Pre-Anno Domini

First attempt to translate and rewrite one of the greatest pieces of Vincent Fang, a Taiwanese multi-Golden Melody award nominated lyricist.
This translation couldn't be completed without help from a friend, who is a poet.
Visit Arturo Leone's website here.

愛在西元前

古巴比倫王頒布了漢摩拉比法典 刻在黑色的玄武岩 距今已經三千七百多年

妳在櫥窗前 凝視碑文的字眼 我卻在旁靜靜欣賞妳那張我深愛的臉

祭司 神殿 征戰 弓箭 是誰的從前 喜歡在人潮中妳只屬於我的那畫面

經過蘇美女神身邊 我以女神之名許願 思念像底格里斯河般的漫延

當古文明只剩下難解的語言 傳說就成了永垂不朽的詩篇

我給妳的愛寫在西元前 深埋在美索不達米亞平原

幾十個世紀後出土發現 泥板上的字跡依然清晰可見

我給妳的愛寫在西元前 深埋在美索不達米亞平原

楔形文字刻下了永遠 那已風化千年的誓言 一切又重演

我感到很疲倦離家鄉還是很遠 害怕再也不能回到妳身邊

愛在西元前 愛在西元前

Love Pre-Anno Domini

It was 3700 years ago
that the King of Babylon
erected the black basalt stele
where the code of Hammurabi was inscribed.
You are studying the epigraph
at the front of the glass box
while I am adoring your face
in complete solitude.
The priests, the shrines, the wars, the bows and the arrows,
to whom did they once belong?
And why should I care if I know
I am the one you belong to?
Before Hera I made a vow in the name of the goddess;
my love flew through like the Tigris.
When the tangled tongues who
spoke in abstruse languages,
and salivated the dusty ash
of their ancient civilization,
legend turned into a poem to live on.
I left to you my love
pre-Anno Domini.
It was buried deep, deep under Mesopotamia.
Unearthed was the dozens of centuries-old tuppu
with my words clearly imprinted on it.
I left to you my love
pre-AnnoDomini.
It was buried deep, deep under Mesopotamia,
where immortality was cuneiformly carved;
where my words were everlastingly revived.
The history is about to repeat itself.
I need a rest but it will be a long way home;
how I long to return to where you belong.
Love pre-Anno Domini.
Lovepre-Anno Domini.

The motivation

I heard the sounds of children playing, cars honking, and “RRRRRRRrrrrr”. I opened my eyes; a few mosquitoes were having some fun in my hotel room.

Today was my first day in B.

I walked to the front desk. Nobody was there, so I left them a note complaining about the mosquitoes.

It was noon, and I wasn’t fed yet. Right next to my hotel there was a local restaurant. Sweet and sour pork, Kung Pao chicken, chow mein…mhmmm. At the door, a chubby woman looked at me and shouted, “ limian zuo!”

I couldn’t wait to look at the menu: “The thin cow picks three text cure” ...didn’t know what that was. “Living to fry the beef rice” …what?? “The bureau swallows to take the fish idea powder” I had no idea what “fish idea powder” was, probably it was the brain part?

OK, enough.

I checked with the chubby lady to see if they had pork, or chicken. She looked puzzled and said,“bu dong, bu dong!” That left me with no choice but to look down at my menu again. I noticed that on top of the menu, there was “The fried rice of Indonesia”

Hallelujah.

After lunch, I went into a shop selling electronic goods. I walked around and set my eyes on a headset. Before I tried it on, I noticed that there was a notice saying:

I needed more hints to understand what kind of business they were doing in this shop, so I went out and checked the name of the shop again; it said “Translate Server Error”.

I needed a walk to clear my head.

I went into a zoo, and saw a sign:

Creepy, but I smiled back.

Everyone was on the way back to their offices; not many of them had time to stay in a zoo. I saw a few monkeys sitting inside a cage. These funny and furry friends stared at each other; looking bored. I saw another sign:

I wanted to have some fun. I put my right hand into the cage and tapped one of the monkey’s shoulder (whose back was facing me), then I looked away immediately before he turned around, acting as if I was an innocent visitor. He examined my facial expression carefully, and then turned his back on me again. I was having so much fun and couldn't stop from doing it again. This time, his friend saw what I did. And before I knew what was going on, I felt a sharp pain on my index finger.

The monkey bit me!

My finger was bleeding so badly and I didn’t know to whom I could turn for help. I decided to return to my hotel and took a rest.

I put a bandage on my finger and laid down on bed, and then I heard the mosquitoes again. With all the frustrations and pains I had gone through today, I rushed out and shouted at the front desk, “I need all the mosquitoes to be out of my room, now!” The front desk lady, looking scared, replied in broken English, “I see your note, but not understand your handwriting…”

I went back to my room, laid down again, and stared at my bleeding finger, the mosquitoes were started to get excited I could tell.

I needed to look for a Chinese language course tomorrow.

Emilie Story Part III

Part III of the story by Emilie, my student who is a also a talented photographer for Time Out Hong Kong, read her photoblog here.

十一月二十三日 晚

昨晚，我再做一樣的夢，不過有了一點不同：

我醒來前，那個女人說了一個詞。

醒來後，我很快寫下：太安樓。

然後，我在睡覺，但是沒有做夢。

今天，在大學我不能專心，我的學生都問候我。

下午，我回家，試試打電話給在倫敦的太太，不過她很忙，沒有時間說話。

我的兒子再出去跟女朋友一起。

然後我再看那張紙，那三個字：太安樓。

我想我不可以不去。

The power of the word

"Of all the powerful weapons of destruction that man has invented, the most terrible – and the most cowardly – is the word."- Paulo Coelho

I enjoy reading quotes; they are usually precise and influential.

To me, word is:














...and many more.

What made the Civil Rights Act of 1964 outlawed discrimination against race, colour, sex, religion and national origin related to voting, employment and public services throughout America?

It was because of a young American pastor believed that all men were created equal, and publicly dreamt about his four little children would one day live in a nation where they would not be judged by the colour of their skin, but by the content of their character.

What brought down the Berlin Wall? It was by an unintentional, yet powerful mistake. On 9 November, 1989, Günter Schabowski was asked by a reporter at the end of a press conference that when a new law permitting GDR citizens more freedom of travel would take effect. Without being informed in advance, he assumed that it would be on the same day of the regulation notes being handed, he then said,"As far as I know effective immediately, without delay."

Later the same night, thousands of East Berliners rushed to the Wall and tried to climb over it, left the guards with on choice but to open the gate to let the people into West Berlin.

What cost Chinese human right activist Tan Zuoren 5 years in jail? He was accused of "inciting subversion of state power" after publicly questioning why so many schools collapsed in 2008 Sichuan earthquake-while other buildings around them remained standing. Many speculated that the poor construction of the schools was because of corruption.

Imprisonment is probably one of the best ways to shut a powerful vocal critic up.

All the above people, including the words they said, have had great impacts on history and our society.

Now then, what about the powerful words in our daily life? They are usually simple, yet striking and magical.

A person who once meant a lot to me had a problem that many of us have in common-being reluctant to apologise with saying "I am sorry".

The only time when I heard it, my heart was melted in an instant, and tears were running down from my eyes. (was it implying that the effectiveness of words has something to do with its frequency of usage?)

What words in daily life are the most powerful to you?

It's just ketchup

One day, I was interested in writing a post about English words of Chinese origin. I remembered it was a typhoon night, I went to consult this professor who lived across the street from me. I heard her playing mahjong with her friends when I pressed the doorbell.

When she finally opened the door, she was wearing a yellow silk cheongsam with pink lychee patterns on it, holding a cup of Oolong and said,"Chop-Chop! Come on in!"

"Sorry to bother you this late but I just want to ask you about..."I noticed that there was a blood stain on her collar, so I asked,"did he beat you again?" She checked it with a mirror but then quickly said,"oh, no, no...it is just ketchup, I was eating chips the other day..."

Poor lady, she was probably brainwashed by her conservative mother that all ugly truth of the family should be kept as secrets. "So, what brings you here again?"



I know, what a strange story! Please try to find the words that you think are from Chinese.

Highlight here to make the answers visible!

Did you find 9? Excellent!

1. Typhoon
2. Mahjong
3. Silk
4. Cheongsam
5. Lychee
6. Oolong
7. Chop Chop
8. Ketchup
9. Brainwash

Hand Gestures

Home Sweet Home.

I am back.

In Italy, I was trying to speak with an Italian family, but after failing to hold a conversation in Italian for more than 3 minutes, I switched to sign language; yes, the famous Italian hand gestures.

...and it worked.

I even bought a book called Supplemento al dizionario italiano (Supplement to the italian dictionary) to understand this interesting culture better.

Here are a few unforgettable gestures taught by the book:

1. Che vuoi? (What do you expect?)





Shake your hand up and down, depends on how impatient you are!



2. Bere (A drink)






3. Che peso! (What a bore!)

Tap your hand slowly against your chest to show that the thing or the person is boring enough to cause indigestion!

In Chinese culture, people don't use hand gestures as much as Westerners; but we do have hand gestures for number 1-10:

Jokes

The summer sun is not merciful here in Hong Kong; I am running away for three weeks.

Going to three countries where hopefully, in one of them I can practice my hopeless Italian. For the other two, I am going to use sign language.

I have been reading some jokes about these countries as the starter of my journey.

Belgium:

How do you drive a Belgian crazy?

Lock him in a circular room and tell him there's frites at the next corner.

Germany:

Do you know why Germans build such high-quality products?

So they won't have to go around being nice while they fix them.

Italy:

How do you shut up an Italian?

Tie their hands behind their backs.

I hope they didn't offend you, but made you laugh...but just to be fair, here is a Chinese one:

Why would the world have been a better place if Adam and Eve were Chinese?

Because they would have eaten the snake instead of the apple.