14
May 2005Of Note
I have enjoyed these recent(ish) entries:
– Tom Vamvanij writes about the term 老外, driving home the point that it does not connote respect. Very interesting discussion ensues. I agree it’s inherently neutral. People that don’t like the term should leave China, because it’s not going away. Don’t miss Todd‘s great comments. He says what I would, but better.
– Speaking of leaving China… Mr. Morris (previously of Brainysmurf.org) says that he’s leaving China for Vietnam, and he is elated: “Why am I elated? Here comes the ironic part. Because I am leaving….”
– Alf is back! He’s in rare form, talking about bad Western music in China. I haven’t seen him writing like this in a loooong time.
– Greg got the last word about the anti-Japanese riots: Things the Chinese Really Wanted to Protest Before They Settled on Japan.
As long as I’m linking to those blogs above, I should mention something about Blogger. When Blogger upgrades, it upgrades its templates too. If you’re using a custom template on Blogger, you don’t get the benefit of the upgrades. You need to modify your custom template to take advantage of the upgrades, or do a redesign based on a new template.
Example: Alf’s blog still uses the old individual entry linking method, and has no RSS feed. Greg’s blog uses the new archive linking method (his blog is newer), but his feeds don’t work. These two blogs would especially benefit from having working feeds, as they are not frequently updated. Blogger can do it for them with a few simple configuration changes.
I don’t mean to just criticise. I’m willing to help with this, of course.
14
May 2005Pinyin Quicktag
I recently stumbled upon a Movable Type hack which creates WordPress-style “quicktags” in the MT blog edit screen. The hack can be modded as well, so I added a pinyin button to automatically wrap selected text with the appropriate span tag and all the necessary attributes (see my entry on Pinyin Tooltips). Then I added some extra CSS to make it look better (and act more like a button).
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12
May 2005Suspicious Skype Issues
For about half a year now, I’ve been using software called Skype to communicate by voice with friends back home. In the past month or two I’ve even gotten my family into it, and we’ve enjoyed an excellent connection (at least as good as long distance phone calls) many times. The really great part, of course, is that it’s completely free. The network connection uses similar technology to Kazaa, the popular file-sharing (P2P) software.
Jump back to several months ago. Major Chinese entertainment portal Tom.com partnered up with Skype. Advertisements for Skype appeared throughout the Shanghai subway system and around town. Tom.com was apparently putting a lot of money into promoting Skype, which, I should remind you, is free software.
My favorite pretty boy is even pushing Skype
Now here’s the interesting part. For about the past 2-3 weeks, I have noticed that I can no longer access Skype.com in Shanghai without a proxy. (Skype.com is accessible in Beijing and Hangzhou, however.) Due to some issues with my Skype installation (which I later discovered was a driver conflict), I wanted to reinstall with the newer version of Skype. Since I couldn’t access the Skype website, my only easy option was to get Skype from Tom.com.
Predictably, it had Tom.com advertising built in, but I was able to install English-mode Skype; I wasn’t forced to use Chinese. Fortunately there seems to be none of the spyware or malware that plagues Chinese software.
Screen capture of Tom.com’s version of Skype
I find it strange that Skype.com should become inaccessible in Shanghai after making a deal with Tom.com. I would think that Tom.com would have the guanxi to protect its partner fromthe chill shadow of the Great Firewall. On the other hand, since the Tom.com Skype page still works just fine, maybe Tom.com is using its guanxi to force Chinese surfers to use its version of the Skype software in order to drive more traffic to Tom.com?
This is all just crazy speculation, though. It’s likely just another case of Shanghai’s fickle internet connection, especially since Tom.com seems to be Beijing-based. I should note, however, that last week when the internet connection in Shanghai was faster than it had been in a long time and even sometimes-blocked sites were loading too, Skype still did not work.
Skype could be a great tool for global communication, and it’s great that many Chinese users are now getting into it. I hope that China doesn’t screw this good thing up.
Update: Isaac Mao was all over this when it first went down. The issue that neither Isaac nor Fons Tuinstra, in his comments, address is why Skype is accessible in other parts of China, but not Shanghai.
11
May 2005eBay and Wordplay
eBay currently has an ad playing on the flatscreen displays of the Shanghai subway system. It shows a series of short Chinese phrases, each followed by a brief illustrative video clip. The phrases are:
– 拍球 (dribbling a basketball)
– 拍瓜 (smashing a cucumber — a typical way to make some cucumber dishes)
– 拍脸 (daubing shaving cream onto a man’s face)
– 拍粉 (powdering a girl’s face)
– 拍被子 (beating the dust out of a quilt)
These images are followed by the phrase “不管你怎么拍… eBay” (“no matter how you 拍… eBay”). I think that’s most of the commercial. I might have missed a little of it, though.
I’m pretty sure the word 拍卖 is never uttered in the commercial. 拍卖 is the obvious 拍 reference — 拍卖 means “auction.” eBay is referring to its various ways to auction items, I suppose.
I find the choice of 拍 objects pretty interesting because none of them are the most common examples. The really common ones would be 拍照 (take a photo) and 拍手 (clap). Of the usages chosen for the commercial, I think I’ve only ever encountered the first: 拍球 (not to be confused with 排球). I think I usually hear 打 used most commonly for the last one.
I also thought it was cool that I could gain a better understanding of the scope of the verb 拍 just by watching a commercial. For me, that sort of understanding is usually gained by discussion with a teacher or tutor.
Why is eBay China advertising on Shanghai’s subways? Well, because it’s engaged in full-on war with Alibaba‘s online auction service Taobao, of course. More info:
– Standing up to a Giant (Forbes)
– Alibaba, EBay Square off (China Daily)
– Jack Ma: Chairman and CEO, Alibaba.com (Asia Inc)
– EBay’s Bid To Regain Its Glow (E-Commerce Times)
(Sorry, not trying to be Danwei.org–don’t expect much more of this kind of “news reporting” stuff in the future.)
09
May 2005Gaijin Complex
Remember Marco Polo Syndrome? Well, Marxy of the excellent Japan blog Néomarxisme has recently written about a parallel phenomenon:
>…all foreigners with interest in Japan hate all the other foreigners with interest in Japan. The Colonialists all like their ex-pat buddies and pubs, but the Japanese-speaking foreigner contingent is in constant battle with themselves, vying to prove linguistic abilities, obscure knowledge, and depth of societal penetration. I call this the “gaijin complex,” and I’m only finally finding my way out of it now after a long period of affliction and convalescence.
It’s very interesting to me that the phenomenon in Japan involves “vying to prove linguistic abilities, obscure knowledge, and depth of societal penetration.” That’s something that few expats in China attempt. Sure, there are those with the obscure knowledge (especially political), but all three?
It’ll be interesting to see what kind of creature the “China expat” evolves into. With China’s continued economic development, will he resemble his cousin in Japan someday?
09
May 2005A Reminder
Sometimes I still ask myself, “Why have I taken my degree in Japanese and chosen to develop my career in China? Why don’t I consider going back and pursuing something in the States?”
Oh yeah, now I remember. Thanks, Monster.com, I’m not so sorry now that I still haven’t removed myself from your job update e-mail service.
Note: Of course, yes, I do love my life in China, learning every day.
08
May 2005The Faces of Shanghai
I found a link to the New York Times Travel Slide Show: The Faces of Shanghai on Micah’s blog. I had seen the link elsewhere, but didn’t bother clicking on it until I saw it on Micah’s blog. He has good “link cred” with me, I guess.
As Micah mentions, there’s definitely a slant to the people who were chosen for the portraits and profiles. To me, the slant seemed a lot like, “the Chinese are no longer the backwards Communists you think they are,” and since there are still people with this misperception, it’s good to keep getting that message out. Whatever the message, and however imperfect, I found the collection really entertaining.
Browsing the photos, it also made me recall that back in the day I once discussed doing something similar with Wilson. Probably out of laziness, I never did. But I’m sure there are other people with nice cameras that could do just as good a job as the NY Times if they wanted to.
07
May 2005Adopte una bitácora
Not long after AP did a story on China which mentioned Adopt a Blog, Italy’s major newspaper Corriere della Sera also picked up the story. That’s likely how Punto Informatico, an Italian site, got word of it. From there, it has spread to the Spanish language blogosphere via Bitacoras.org.
>La iniciativa se llama Adopt a Blog (adopte una bitácora) y persigue crear una ‘red de libre pensamiento’ que permita dar conocer las ideas, las opiniones y el pensamiento de los ciudadanos chinos ‘no alineados’.
Trackbacks show it has spread via at least three other Spanish language blogs (Noticias de Bitacoras.com, SimDalom :: WyP, Arkangel YABlog). It’s pretty exciting to see one’s idea spread and gather support on a global scale (I derive a special pleasure from seeing myself written about in foreign languages, and in this case I can actually read it), but the sad part is Adopt a Blog still isn’t going anywhere. I have not found the sponsor I was looking for.
Of course, Adopt a Blog is not the only hope for free blogging in China, by any means. Others are working hard on a variety of solutions. Adopt a Blog may never really go anywhere, and if that’s the case I’m happy just contributing my ideas, possibly influencing the development in a small way.
Whatever happens, though, I should say to the Spanish blogosphere: Gracias por su apoyo! Estoy contento que el proyecto tenga tanto apoyo en las bitácoras hispanohablantes y espero el día cuando información en China sea libre.
May 8 Update: Isaac Mao reports that Chinese bloggers’ situation is worsening. (Thanks to Gordon for pointing this out to me.)
And, for an alternative view (on why Adopt a Blog is a bad name), you can check out an e-mail I received.
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06
May 2005study make John HONGRY
Since this week I haven’t had to go to work, I’ve used it to buckle down and finish learning the material on Modern Chinese that I need to know for the exam this month. I have to display understanding of this material in order to be admitted for graduate school.
I haven’t finished it yet (working mainly on 现代汉语, a 560 page extremely dry Chinese textbook), but I’m getting there.
One thing I’ve discovered is that putting in about five hours of study a day (reading and writing) really works up an appetite!
The other night when Carl, his friend Drew, and I made spaghetti for dinner, they each had a bowl of it. I had three bowls of spaghetti plus a blowl of salad. The next day Drew and I had 饺子 (dumplings) for lunch: carrot and pork, cabbage and beef, leek and pork, and qingcai and chicken. Good stuff. We each had about 4两 of dumplings. Drew seemed to think it was a good amount of food.
That night when we went to dinner Drew said he was still fairly full from lunch, but I ended up eating way more than any of the other four people at the table. It was a Xinjiang restaurant, so we ate 馕 (Uygur bread), 羊肉串 (spicy lamb skewers), 丁丁炒面 (chopped noodles), 老虎菜 (a sort of spicy salad with tomato, cucumber, and onion), 蒜泥黄瓜 (garlic cucumber pieces), 红烧豆腐 (soy-braised tofu), 酸辣白菜 (hot and sour cabbage), and 大盘鸡 (a chicken and potato dish), washed down with Xinjiang black beer. I guess it was too much food for five people, but everyone else gave up way too fast. I kept eating for about 30 minutes after they had stopped.
If all this studying in the final stretch leading up to my exams is going to make me ravenous every day, I really can’t say I mind at all.
05
May 2005Multisyllabic Hanzi?
Students of Japanese are quite used to characters (漢字) nearly always having multiple pronunciations, ranging from one syllable to five or more. (Example: in Japanese, depending on the context, the character 侍 can be pronounced as ジ or as さむらい.)
That’s one of the areas in which switching from studying Japanese to studying Chinese came as a relief: in Chinese you can be sure each hanzi (Chinese character) has a monosyllabic reading, and 90% of characters have only one reading.
In my studies, I recently discovered that this has not always been the case. My Chinese textbook gives me three examples that were around until 1977, when a character reform had them eradicated.
– 瓩 qiānwǎ (kilowatt); now standardized as 千瓦
– 浬 hǎilǐ (nautical mile); now standardized as 海里
– 呎 yīngchǐ (foot); now standardized as 英尺
Besides their very existence, I found several things about these characters interesting. First, they’re all for units of measure. Maybe at one point people liked the idea of a single character for each unit of measure? Second, it was an interesting evolutionary turn the language was taking. From a student’s perspective, I’m not sure I like it, but it’s interesting. You can clearly see which part in each character represents which syllable. Lastly, it was the government that quashed this fairly recent orthographic innovation in favor of standardization.
Note: You won’t find this info in Wenlin. I got it from 现代汉语 (上海教育出版社, 2004).
2011 Update: The venerable scholar Victor Mair writes about this subject on Language Log: Polysyllabic characters in Chinese writing.
04
May 2005Overtime
As in many Chinese companies, from time to time things get pretty hectic at my company, and people are asked to do overtime. There’s no talk of overtime pay; working overtime is just a periodic necessity in the workplace. Chinese workers don’t even complain about it much.
When I’m asked to work overtime, I make it very clear that I expect that time off in the future. I know I won’t get overtime pay, but I don’t work for free.
The worst is when the middle managers try to plead with you: “just this once. Everyone else has to do it too.” And then there’s the three characters you hear the most that burn more than any others: “辛苦了“. This phrase is meant to acknowledge your hard work and sacrifice, but the reality is that this three-character utterance is the only thanks you’ll get.
At one point I felt bad that, as a foreigner, I was treated differently. Why should I rarely be asked to do overtime when the Chinese workers have to do it regularly? I’m no better than them.
Later, I decided that it is my duty to demonstrate what it is to be a worker from the West. To demonstrate that we really do abide by contracts, that employee-employer responsibilities are not one-way, that employees have power, that time is money, and my time–not just the company’s–is valuable too.
Sadly, none of the Chinese workers could possibly follow my example. They could easily and immediately be replaced. As a foreigner with special skills, I’m in a unique position. I can insist that each and every term of my contract is adhered to. And I can provide an example to my Chinese co-workers that will hopefully leave an impression: this is how it should be.
03
May 2005No More Chinese MP3s!
A while back I made a webpage dedicated to the Chinese song “The Moon Represents My Heart.” I also put online ten different renditions of this song in MP3 format. I thought it was pretty cool to be able to compare them. Aware that the Chinese words on the page would soon have Baidu’s searchbot on my case, I did my best to keep it off my site with my robots.txt file. Looks like that was completely futile.
Teresa Teng’s version of the song was the first to be hammered. I had to replace it with a link to MP3.baidu.com‘s search results to preserve my own bandwidth. Soon, the bandwidth consumed by the other MP3s on that page started creeping up as well. I had to remove Andy Lau’s rendition. Then Lesley Cheung’s. I forgot about it for a while, but if I hadn’t checked my stats in the middle of April I would have exceeded my bandwidth allotment solely because of those MP3 files, as bandwidth consumption had taken another big jump. I removed all the MP3s. I had no other choice.
Lesson learned: do not put up Chinese songs for download. Your bandwidth is no match for China’s web surfing population! (Well, don’t put up popular songs, anyway. Rapping flight attendants might be OK.)
In other news, I recently participated in an anonymous blogging survey for someone’s thesis. I was e-mailed because I was in the Technorati Top 2000. Wow! That kind of surprised me. Top 2000 out of 9,500,068 blogs. Top 2% isn’t too shabby for a niche blog prone to periodic entries as boring as this one.
In case you’re wondering (as I did) where this “Technorati Top 2000” list can be found, it can’t. There’s only a Technorati Top 100 online. The student contacted Technorati with details of the study, and Technorati complied.
02
May 2005老外的秘密
我有一个秘密要跟大家分享。来，靠近点，要认真地听哦！你可能会觉得不可思议，但我发誓我正要跟你说的是实话。我不会骗你的。
是这样：很多老外都会用筷子。不但是生活在中国的老外，许多居住在国外的外国人也会用筷子。我说的并不是亚洲人或者华人，我是指白种人，黑种人等。真的！更令人惊讶的是学会使用筷子吃饭并不是很困难的事情。当然，如果不是每天用筷子的话，这些外国人用筷子的技术没有中国人的好。但会用。
我会用筷子。我的两个室友（都是美国人）会用筷子。我室友的父母刚来到中国了。他们也会用筷子。我的父母会用筷子。我的姐妹也会用筷子。我想应该有一些不会用筷子的外国人，但我不认识他们。
知道了吧？我为什么会暴露我们老外的秘密呢？因为我希望下次你看到一个会用筷子的外国人你不会跟他说，“哇~！你连筷子都会用！你真了不起！”免得被他觉得你大惊小怪。
29
Apr 2005Bollywood Pickup Lines
At my girflriend’s urging I recently purchased my very first Bollywood movie. I only spent 7rmb on it, but watching it was a three-hour time investment. It was with much trepidation that I started viewing Veer-Zaara.
I was pleasantly surprised by what I found. Pakistan was not portrayed nearly as negatively by Indian producer-director Yash Chopra as I had expected, and there were fewer song/dance scenes than I imagined. The story, while not what one would call “realistic,” was not as predictable as I had expected, either. Overall, it was a very enjoyable experience. (Did I mention Bollywood actresses are really hot?)
The part I found funniest were some of the lines in a song called “Do Pal.” The song starts with a line which goes:
> Just for two moments, the caravans of our dreams made a stop
And then you went your way and I went mine.
Caravans of our dreams? Interesting lyrics. I was put on high cheese alert. My vigilance was richly rewarded. I found the following lines of the song especially amusing when I realized that they could be used as pickup lines! Here they are, copied directly from the subtitles, in English and Chinese:
> Was that really you or was it a luminous sunbeam?
那到底是你还是耀眼的太阳鸟？
> Was that you or was that the monsoon of my dreams?
那到底是你还是梦中的季风？
> Was that you or was that a cloud of happiness?
那到底是你还是一片幸福的云？
> Was that you or was that just a fragrant wind?
那是你还是一阵香风？
> Was that you or were those songs resounding in the atmosphere?
那是你还是在空中回荡的歌声？
> Was that you or was there magic in the air?
那是你还是在空中得魔力？
Sinosplice readers, you have a homework assignment. Get out there and use these pickup lines! Then report back by leaving a comment.
Epilogue:
The astute observer might ask, “what is a post about Bollywood doing on a China-themed blog?” Ah, but I saw a pirated Chinese copy of this Bollywood movie, and even supplied some Chinese translations. How clever of me!
Related Links: Veer-Zaara IMDB profile, political effect of Veer-Zaara, alternate translation of the lyrics from which the pickup lined were extracted (it’s called “Do Pal,” fifth song down)
29
Apr 2005Feeds
Yay! Now there’s a Sinosplice page just for feeds! This serves two purposes:
1. You can check for new updates to any of the (semi-)frequently updated sections of this site in one place.
2. You can see all the Sinosplice feeds (RSS/Atom) you can subscribe to in one place.
I expect that this page may become more important in the future, if I’m able to do some of the other things I want to do….
Thanks to Roddy for hooking me up with the necessary PHP script.
28
Apr 2005屁股标准
大家都知道中国人和外国人往往有不同的美丽标准透视。虽然很多美国人认为Lucy Liu很好看，但中国人觉得她一点都不好看。这样的例子很多，其实我对这个话题已经没什么兴趣了。我想说的是屁股的美丽标准。
我觉得中国人评价美女时，最重要的是：人要瘦，脸要美。外国人可能更注意身材，也不喜欢太瘦的。太瘦的话我们说：“she looks anorexic”（看来她得了厌食症）。太瘦就是不健康。当然太胖也不好看。
屁股呢？很多外国人看中国女孩说“they’re pretty, but they have no asses!”（好看是好看，但没有屁股！）。很多外国人觉得屁股太小也不好看。
那么外国人对屁股有什么美丽标准呢？这很难说，但其实我也不用说因为前不久在网上出现了一个非常好的榜样。很多男的都说这是“the perfect ass”（完美的屁股）:
我真的很好奇。中国人对屁股有什么美丽标准？跟我们不一样吗？是不是越小越好？
（注意：“ass”是个不太好的词。“butt”没有“ass”俗，也是屁股的意思。）
28
Apr 2005Micah on Creativity
Just in case it has escaped some of you, Micah is my friend and co-worker here in Shanghai. (If you have a compulsive need to follow “all things John Pasden” (ha!) you should keep an eye on Micah’s blog because my name pops up there from time to time.)
Micah recently wrote a thought-provoking entry on raising children in China as an expat:
> Having gone to Spanish public school for so many years has cocktail party utility, but I blame it for my near-absolute lack of creativity and critical thinking. I just wonder if Chinese school wouldn’t have the same effect on a kid but magnified a hundred times. And even if you think “American parents will mean that the child will be different from their classmates”, well, no matter how much influence you think you have on your kids, the place that you send them for 6 hours of 180 days each year is going to have a strong influence on their mental development.
> The other side of the coin is that not sending your kids to Chinese schools will isolate them from their surroundings in a much stronger way than it would in Spain because the written Chinese language is nearly impossible to simply pick up naturally. And I highly value the cultural education I got from attending a public school abroad, so it is important to me that my kids be culturally conversive (if not fluent) in the country where we live.
A real-life example from my friend Shelley: at one summer camp in China, the teacher was actually dictating to the young kids what color each item should be in their coloring activity. Dissidents were reprimanded.
Through my job I have come into contact with Chinese educational materials for young children which claim one activity which nurtures creativity is allowing your child to color a picture any way he likes. Of course, this one “free coloring” activity is sandwiched between ten other activities which demand strict adherence to guidelines.
It’s not that Chinese education is deliberately against creativity. In fact, they’re always talking about the importance of creativity in education. It’s just that the educators honestly have no clue as to how to foster its development. Like Micah, I find this scary.