User Comments - RJ
RJ
Posted on: Making Soup
January 21, 2013 at 11:13 AMEvidently in China you can slurp, chomp, or drink your soup from the bowl, but whatever you do, dont blow on a spoonful to cool it off. Its rude. Anyone else have this experience, or was I just with a tough crowd?
Posted on: The Wives of Gay Men
January 20, 2013 at 5:27 PMAmen. As a student of Chinese, I prefer a more literal translation. I can paraphrase the English myself.
Posted on: Goodbye to a Co-worker
January 20, 2013 at 4:54 PMactually we use both colleague and co-worker in the US but colleague is usually used in academia or a more formal setting. Professors have colleagues while ditch diggers only have co-workers. Zed on the other hand is probably virtually unknown in the US and maths would mystify many.
Posted on: A Visit From Superman
January 20, 2013 at 3:58 PMKudos to Jenny for being such a gracious host and to Baba for proving one can teach oneself Chinese, with the help of the internet alone. I caught two interviews this week. Baba, and Lance Armstrong. I have to say I found the Baba interview more interesting. Im just wondering if Baba uses any performance enhancing drugs to master Chinese, and if so, where can I get my hands on some.
Posted on: New Traffic Regulations
January 18, 2013 at 11:45 AMI have seen entire families on scooters as well as entire warehouses worth of merchandise or scrap on bikes, and they will yell if you have a passenger on your bike rack? I have seen refrigerators, stoves, (both on one bike), entire pigs, and scrap plastic bundles the size of school buses, all on bicycles. Its like cirque de bike in China. Its amazing what you can do when you have to.
Posted on: The Wives of Gay Men
January 18, 2013 at 10:58 AMslang or not, there is no discussion of "beard" or facial hair in the Chinese text. This translation is just wrong. Its like they changed the text and forgot to update the translation.
Posted on: Arrival in Jizhou
January 16, 2013 at 10:36 PMuntil then here is the order:
1- Arrival in Jizhou - 639
2- Missing Persons in Jizhou- 654
3 - Familiar Face in Jizhou - 671
4 - A Jizhou Child's Warning - 688
5- An Anonymous Tip in Jizhou - 699
6 - A Jizhou Identity Revealed - 716
7- Jizhou Mental Breakdown - 738
8- The Final Jizhou Pieces - 751
Posted on: No Tip?
January 16, 2013 at 11:08 AMCooks are not exposed to the public, and this is a skilled job. Some cooks make very good money. This position is also protected by min wage law. Wait staff have a wage min about half the ordinary min wage because they are expected to make money from tips. Tips can be quite lucrative and most waiters and waitresses would not trade a regular wage that the restaurant would give for what they can make in tips. Most places in the US, if your party has more than 6 or 8 people, the tip is automatically added to the bill at a predetermined rate. Usually 20%. Dont know why it evolved this way but it would be hard to change now. Tips used to be tax free but now they are subject to income tax as well, but its hard to verify the amount. Waiters at high end restaurants make very good money and would fight hard to keep their tipping arrangement.
Posted on: Wang Feng & “Beijing Beijing”
January 16, 2013 at 2:03 AMAwesome song. I like it more every time I listen to it.
Posted on: Making Soup
January 22, 2013 at 11:40 AMHmmm, the answer you got, that "no one would ever do that" kind of tells me its not exactly considered acceptable. Maybe rude is the wrong word here but evidently its not done, and by doing so you are considered odd. Are Americans the only ones impatient enough to gently blow on hot coffee or soup?