Friday, February 29, 2008

A Taste of the Future

NOTE:  This post really has nothing to do with China.  That being said, it’s my blog, and I’ll write about whatever I damn well please.  This is an election year.  I urge you all to use your heads.

My mother just forwarded over the following email making the rounds.  It came from a friend of my father’s who works in the oil industry, and one presumes is a Republican Conservative of some nature.

Well, this will really make you think…..thought that you should see this information.  Check the site below as well.

Taxes...Whether Democrat or a Republican you will find these statistics enlightening and amazing.

http://www.taxfoundation.org/publications/show/151.html

Taxes under Clinton 1999 Taxes under Bush 2008
Single making 30K - tax $8,400 Single making 30K - tax $4,500
Single making 50K - tax $14,000 Single making 50K - tax $12,500
Single making 75K - tax $23,250 Single making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 60K - tax $16,800 Married making 60K- tax $9,000
Married making 75K - tax $21,000 Married making 75K - tax $18,750
Married making 125K - tax $38,750 Married making 125K - tax $31,250

It is amazing how many people that fall into the categories above think Bush is screwing them and Bill Clinton was the greatest President ever. If Obama or Hillary are elected, they both say they will repeal the Bush tax cuts and a good portion of the people that fall into the categories above can’t wait for it to happen. This is like the movie ‘The Sting with Paul Newman’; you scam somebody out of some money and they don’t even know what happened.

I normally just ignore this sort of thing, but I was so angry I couldn’t let this one go.  My response is posted below.  Please feel free to pike it for your own use if you like.

Miscellanea

1.  My 20th high school reunion is coming up this year.  (Yes, I am an old bastard.) I posted a link to this website on the reunion website, so to the regulars here, please… be gentle.

2.  A few people have written and asked me what the Chinese gansta rap song was that I used in the Great Wall video.  It was by a Taiwanese rapper named—and I swear I’m not making this up—MC Hot Dog.

Rock out with your chopstick out.

Thursday, February 28, 2008

Thinking Chinese

I had a breakthrough last night in my attempts to learn to speak Chinese, which even after four months here is still complete shit.  (Seriously, it’s as hard as learning Chinese.)

To get home from my apartment I take a taxi along the 3rd Ring Road (freeway) until I get to the San Yuan Bridge.  There you have to do one of those loop-dee-loop things to do a U-turn and get to my apartment complex, which is on the other side.  The guy asked me something, and I knew from experience he was asking how he wanted me to get to the other side.  Without even thinking about it I said:

xiān yīzhízǒu, ránhòu yòuguǎi

This means “First drive straight, then turn right.” I have to admit I was pretty damned happy with myself.  I answered a question without having to first translate it into English in my head.

Thank heaven I’m able to amaze myself with such ease.

Wednesday, February 27, 2008

Ignorance is Bliss

When I was in Shanghai six years ago, my coworkers and I came up with a running gag, saying that all the Chinese who worked for us were calling us “ignorant barbarians” behind our backs.  It then evolved into us using the term to refer to each other.  Instead of “Wassup, nigga!” we had “Wassup Ignorant Barbarian.” Then, since we were duty bound to take this as far as we could, we asked one of the girls in the office to translate it for us.  I don’t remember exactly what the translation was but it was something like Oo-Jeh-Dah Ye-mai-yan.  The end result was we would scream it at people, drunk off our asses, out the taxi window at four in the morning.  Imagine a taxi with three drunken lao wei, screaming “ignorant barbarian” out the window. 

At any rate, I was in Chinese class earlier tonight when the word wú zhī de came up.  Wú zhī means ignorant, and de is a particle which comes at the end of words to indicate ownership or possession of something.  In Chinese zh is pronounced like a letter j with a “juh” sound.  So the Pinyin for wú zhī de literally means “not know,” and sounds almost identical to the the Oo-Jeh-Dah of my Shanghai days.  (This should not be confused with wǒ zhī dao, which means “I know.")

Not so much luck with the second word.  The direct translation of “Barbarian” into Chinese is mán, phonetically spelled “mahn” and spoken in an upward tone.  This is followed by zi, a short flat word which indicates that the word is to be used as a noun.  We got it halfway right the first time, anyway.

I also found out another fascinating little tidbit.  The Chinese word for “electricity” or “electric” is diàn.  The next word, nǎo, is one you should all become familiar with after reading this post.  Go ahead and click the link, I’ll wait.

Okay, you’re back.  You now know that nǎo means “brain.” The word that goes in front of it, diàn, means electric.  Thus the word diàn nǎo means “electric brain.” Now, what product do you think is named an electric brain?  That’s right, a computer.  But the weird thing is that when the Chinese hear diàn nǎo they don’t think “electric brain” they think “computer.” Here’s a couple of other examples.

diàn tī, meaning “elevator.” Literal translation is “electric ladder.” You can also refer to an escalator as diàn tī because tī also means “steps”
diàn huà, meaning “telephone.” Literal translation is “electric speech.”

The Local Tail

Every time I log on to my favorite Torrent site (to get the latest American TV shows, like the Terminator show on Fox) I am greeted by an ad on the left-hand side for a dating site advertising “Girls in Your Area!” and showing the inevitable pictures of hot girls.  “Wow, who woulda thunk it that these hot girls were in my area!  I’m gonna sign up right now!” At any rate, now that I’m in China all the local girls are Chinese, therefore I’m greeted with pictures of sexy young local Chinese girls, like the ones in the picture below.

“Wow, who woulda believed that so many local Chinese girls look exactly like American strippers!”

I would be remiss, also, if I failed to point out that the official spelling change from Peking to Beijing occurred in 1949, when the People’s Republic of China was founded.  The communists adopted the Pinyin system, which spelled words differently.  Thus the name of the city didn’t change, only the way it was spelled using Roman characters.  So these hot white girls who are actually Chinese locals somehow manage to use a spelling of Beijing that’s 49 years old, roughly four decades before any of them claim they were born. 

Click Here for Less...

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Tentacle Snack

A little while ago one of the girls who works for me was eating what I thought were potato chips.  Se offered me one and handed me the bag.  One look and I knew it wasn’t chips, so I asked her what it was.  See if you can guess.

That, my friends is dried fried squid.  Imagine taking calamari, then drying it like jerky.  Revolting doesn’t even begin to describe the taste.

Sunday, February 24, 2008

Tóng Xìng Liàn Zhě

On Friday night I had what might possibly be the strangest experience of my life.  We went to a rock club here to listen to a friend’s band play.  They were sort of a heavy band, but sort of nu-metal, not old school.  At any rate, we all got nice and shithammered.  I was standing at the bar, wrecked, when this Chinese guy next to me asked where I was from.  Now, this happens all the time in China, people ask you where you’re from and they talk to you for (a) the novelty of talking to a foreigner ("How do you like China? etc.) and (b) to practice their English skills.

These two guys were sort of mid-30s to mid-40s, wearing business casual, and completely shitfaced.  I told him I was American, and they told me that they worked for Motorola and had been to many cities in America.  One of them showed me his phone, which was an engineering prototype of the next generation RAZR.  They asked what I was drinking (Jack & Coke, of course) and insisted on buying me one.  No problem.  Then the time for the next round came and I said, “I’ll get this one.”

“No no no no no!  This is difference between China and America.  In America people take turn to pay for drink.  In China, the guest no pay.” Okay, fine, if you guys want to buy me drinks all night knock yourselves out.

So after maybe 30 minutes of talking to these guys, who seemed nice enough, one of them says, “Are you ready to go home and go to bed?”

“Excuse me???”

“You want go home and go to bed?”

“What do you mean?”

“I love you.”

I was in utter disbelief.  These guys were a couple of homos trying to pick me up.  Now, imagine the situation.  We were in a hole in the wall metal bar.  Other than the friends of the band there was almost nobody in there.  I was dressed like a 14 year old boy, unkempt and unshaven.  I’m also a huge 6’5” doofus.  So there was nothing about the club I was at, the way I was dressed, or the way I was acting to in any way indicate that I might be interested in some hot man-on-man action.  If I’d been better dressed, and we were in a techno club or something, then okay, maybe I could see gay guys going there to pick up other guys.  But there are gay bars here in Beijing, so it’s not like man action can’t be found if that’s your thing.  Honestly, many of you reading this blog know what I look like.  Is there ANYTHING about me that would cause someone’s gaydar to go off?  I look like I should be a welder or something.

Anyway, when the guy told me he loved me I said, “What???  Get the fuck away from me you piece of shit.” I wasn’t so much offended at the idea of some guy trying to pick me up, it was more that they had been acting like any old regular Chinese guys who want to talk to a foreigner, except they surreptitiously wanted to do me up the pooper.

Coincidentally, it was right at this moment that one of my friends came up and said we were leaving to go to another place, so I once again told these two guys to go fuck themselves—literally—and left.  I swear to God, this city is nothing but one series of surprises after another.

Friday, February 22, 2008

Face Time

You’ve probably heard about the Japanese concept of “face.” Basically it’s like honor, your standing.  If you do someone an honor you give them face, and if they do something dishonorable they lose face.

China has the same concept.  And, like the Japanese, they are very cognizant of the junior man/senior man idea.  If the senior man does something for the junior man, then the junior man receives face.

As the senior man in my group, my employees always expect me to do things like walk through the door first.  If we’re coming back from lunch someone will almost always run ahead of me to open the door.  It’s not a “kissing up to the boss” thing, it’s their way of giving me face, of showing respect for my seniority.

I’ve started using this to my advantage.  I’ll make an effort to get to the door first, then I’ll hold it open and let all my employees go through before me.  Every single one of them will say “thank you” as they walk past.  Today was the birthday of a girl who works for me.  (I say “girl” because she just turned 22.  Christ I’m old.) Someone got her a birthday cake and we went into the conference room to cut it up.  She grabbed a knife and cut the cake into slices, then gave me the first piece.  I said, “No, you have the first piece, it’s your birthday.” She was adamant, as the senior man I was essentially entitled to the first piece of cake.  I knew if I insisted that she have it she would end up losing face, so I took it.

Her boyfriend came in to work a little while ago to pick her up for dinner.  He didn’t speak a lot of English, and I was introduced as the senior man.  A few minutes later he said, “Sir, may I have your business card?” I can’t imagine being called “sir” in that manner.  It’s not like a Denny’s waitress using sir and ma’am as a common courtesy, he sincerely called me “sir” as a sign of respect.

I also started a thing where every Friday I take the whole crew out for hot pot.  There’s eight of us total, and the bill for all of us to stuff ourselves is about $24.  This gives the crew a great deal of face, while at the same time reinforcing my position as the senior man.

It’s an odd system sometimes, but it works quite well.  These kids bust their asses for me, and it’s largely because of the face I give them.

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Money, It’s What I Want

A few days ago I was at Carrefour and I took some money out of my account through a Citibank ATM.  I just pulled the receipt out of my wallet and noticed the following written on the back.

You will remain solely responsible for complying with all laws and regulations of all liabilities associated with the use of foreign exchange and reporting thereof to the authorities in The People’s Republic of China.  This receipt verifies the amount withdrawn in this transaction as indicated.  You are therefore advised to keep this receipt in your possession for any possible inspection by the relevant government authorities.

Spooky language, huh?  Basically if you change foreign money into RMB, and later want to change it back into Euros or dollars, you have to have a receipt indicating where and how you acquired the money.  If you can’t produce an ATM receipt, or your form from the bureau de change at the airport, you can’t convert it.  I can imagine a whole lot of pissed-off tourists who come here for the Olympics and end up going home with money that is worth less than the value of the paper it’s printed on, simply because they tossed their ATM receipt.

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

What time would that be?  Why, it’s the award season.  This means that every studio is sending out DVD screeners to the members of their various academies.  And when there are screeners floating around, they’ll end up for sale in China.

Tonight a coworker and I went to a DVD store which is, I shit you not, the Mecca of DVDs.  It’s larger than the DVD section at your local Best Buy.  I’d be willing to bet, without exaggeration, that they had 20,000 different DVDs in this place.  It was ENORMOUS.  And it was in a basement, down a set of metal stairs.  You’d never know that it was there even if you were walking past the front door.

So, what did I get?  Here’s the list.

Juno
Elizabeth: The Golden Age
We Own the Night
The Number 23
Rescue Dawn
Meet the Robinsons
Awake
The Illusionist
The Golden Compass
Into the Wild
Jackass 2.5
Blood Diamond
Michael Clayton
The Island

And I also got three boxed sets of TV shows.

Blackadder, Seasons 1-5
Californication, Season 1
House M.D., Season 4

So, let’s assume that each one of the DVD moves above would be an average of $15 retail at Best Buy.  That’s $210 worth of movies.  And let’s give each one of the boxed sets an average price of $30.  That’s $90, giving us a grand total of $300.  With an 8% sales tax this is $324.

For all the items listed above I paid the whopping sum of ¥320, which works out to $44.75.  So I paid roughly 13% of what the items would cost in the US.

Not too shabby, huh?  Whenever I end up returning to the US I’m going to have the world’s largest pirate DVD collection.

Chubby Chinese

Outside my office window is a little courtyard, and right now there are five or six boys around twelve years old tossing a basketball to each other.  I was standing there watching, and I noticed that one of the kids was kinda chubby.  I also noticed that one of the kids was holding a bottle of Coca Cola.

You’ll be shocked, shocked to learn that the fat kid and the kid drinking the soda are one and the same.

China, meet obesity.  Obesity, this is China.

Wednesday, February 20, 2008

Naturally

I’ve got a little tickle in the back of my throat, so I went to the pharmacy to buy some cough syrup.  There’s one brand of Chinese syrup which damn near everyone, including the foreigners, uses.  It’s called Nin Jiom Pei Pa Koa. 

Based on the prescription by a famous Chinese physician Ip Tin See in the Ching Dynasty, Nin Jiom Herbal Cough Syrup, Pei Pa Koa, is a blend of 15 herbal ingredients.  Without any artificial additives and alcoholic substances, it has no side effects and will not cause drowsiness, making it a perfect choice for those who care about natural healthy life.

The name of the product is Cantonese Chinese, which is primarily spoken in Hong Kong.  It’s so different from Mandarin Chinese that even the Chinese can’t understand each other.  Note the use of “Ching Dynasty” in the blurb, when the proper Pinyin spelling is Qing.  It tastes like shit, and it’s worked like a charm so far.

Anyhow, while I was in the pharmacy I saw some Centrum vitamins and decided to buy some since I’m out.  Chinese pharmacies are a real pain in the ass.  You ask for something, and the pharmacist will then try to sell you the most expensive thing in the store, claiming that it’s “natural” and “more healthy.” I had to get angry with her and tell her to just sell me my fucking vitamins, that I wasn’t interested in her wacky Chinese shit made from twigs and flowers and God knows what else.

I’ve never understood why so many people think being “natural” makes something better.  Dentistry without anesthesia is more “natural” than dentistry with it, but I doubt even the most fervent tree-hugging hippie environmentalist douchebag would choose to get his root canal au naturale.  Think about it.  Dead rats are natural.  Cancer is natural.  Dog shit is natural.  Perhaps I should whip up dead rats, tumors, and dog shit, pour it into a bottle, and call it “Dr. Lee’s All Natural Wonder Tonic.”

I don’t eat organic food unless I have to.  I’d much rather eat food grown in nitrate fertilizer than in cow shit.  It’s vastly more safe and healthy, because animal dung can contain numerous diseases, and those can get into the plants.  There was an outbreak of disease in the US a few years ago—tuberculosis or hepatitis, something like that—and it was determined that the source was fruit cups served in school cafeterias.  It seems that the Mexican fruit company was fertilizing their fields with “all natural” human feces, and that disease in this feces was embedded in the plants that grew in it.

I bet one of the selling points the Mexican company used was that its products were “all natural.”

Tuesday, February 19, 2008

“But That’s In Ohio”

I was just out at lunch with my employees, and some guy was trying to back out of a parking space right where we were walking.  We did the dance—we stopped, he backed out a little and stopped, we kept walking, he backed out a little more, we stopped, and so on.  After about the third time this happened I said, “Come on, douchebag, make up your mind.”

One of the girls who works for me said, “I know douchebag is an insult, but what does it really mean?” I kinda hemmed and hawed a little bit, trying to think of the best say to phrase it, when she said, “It’s liquid that you use to clean your pussy.” I just about died laughing, and I told her she was correct.

She then said that she learned about the literal meaning of “douchebag” when she was watching an American movie with Chinese subtitles.  One of the characters referred to the other one as a douchebag, and the Chinese translation was as follows.

In Pinyin this is yīn dào qīng jié jī qì and literally translates to “vagina cleaning machine.” So, in the movie, one character refers to another as a “douchebag,” and the Chinese viewer thinks he called him a “vagina cleaning machine.”

* Bonus points to anyone who can explain the title of this post.

Simple Sentences

I’ve blogged before on the simple nature of Chinese sentence structure.  Consider this sentence.  “I would like two bottles of cold beer.” In Chinese this is “Wǒ yào liǎng píng bīng píjiǔ.” Translated word-for word this is “Me want two bottle ice beer.” The Chinese word for “cold,” lěng, is used to describe temperature outside the body, like you’re out in cold weather, or saying your apartment is cold.  When you want a cold drink you ask for an “ice” drink, which implies that you want the drink very cold.

Here’s another one.  “I need to go to the bank first, then I need to go to Phoenix City.” (Phoenix City is the name of my complex.) In Chinese this is Wǒ xiān qù yínháng, ránhòu qù Fèng Huáng Chéng.  Word-for-word this is “Me first to bank, then to Phoenix City.” See the difference in sentence structure?  In English you’d say “I need to go to the bank first.” In Chinese you say “Me first to bank.”

That’s one of the hardest things about learning Chinese, how to properly structure your sentences.  If I said to a taxi driver Wǒ qù yínháng xiān, literally “Me to bank first,” he would have difficulty understanding me, because the correct way to say this in Chinese is “Me first to bank.”

Harder Than Chinese Arithmetic

Here’s a couple of fascinating little tidbits I learned this evening in Chinese class.  First, their word for “sun.” In Pinyin this is rì.  The accent mark indicates the 4th tone, spoken in a sharp, downward manner.  See if you can guess how to pronounce this word.  I promise you, there’s nothing in English which even comes close.

Okay, now click here to actually hear someone say it.  On the top line of the Chinese characters you’ll see rì.  Click this and you’ll hear a sound file with it being spoken.  Basically it’s like saying “Rrryuuuh.”

Next up, I’ve spoken many times about how the Chinese will create words which are transliterations from English.  One good example is “chocolate,” which the Chinese call qiǎo kè lì.  This is, phonetically pronounced, similar to “Chow kuh luh.” However, while a word like “chocolate” seems an obvious choice for transliteration, see if you can guess what this word is:  dīng kè.

Give up?  That’s the English language acronym DINK, meaning Double Income No Kids.

Here’s another transliterated word:  jiǔ bā.  I’ll give you a clue, the only transliterated word is bā.  Here’s another hint, jiǔ means “liquor.” That’s right, the word bā comes from the English word “bar.” Here in China, though, the word “bar” has different meanings.  What we would call an “internet cafe” is, in direct Chinese, called a “net bar”:  wǎng bā.  The word wǎng literally means “net,” such as a fisherman would use to catch a fish or the string cylinder in basketball.  So in Chinese, if you want to go to a bar, you have to specify a “liquor bar” or the taxi driver won’t have a clue what you mean.