User Comments - aert
aert
Posted on: A Present from Santa Claus
December 24, 2007 at 11:51 AMMerry X-mas everyone FYI, in Holland "Sinterklaas" (Santa Claus) is not the same person as the "Kerstmannetje" (Little Christmas man). The latter is known, but plays no further role. Sinterklaas comes on Dec. 5th, not from up north but from Spain, riding a white horse and accompanied by his servant "Zwarte Piet" (Black Peter) who carries a sack with ginger-nuts which he throws around for the children. The sack also contains presents for the kids who have been good, and Zwarte Piet has a birch rod for the bad ones (I've never heard of it being used). Sinterklaas is dressed as a bishop (which is why some ultra conservative calvinists object to this children's holiday). The pair ride the roofs at night putting gifts down the chimneys, just like the other Santa Claus. Dec. 5th has become a family holiday, everybody making presents for the others, often including self made poems, mostly satirical, addressed to the recipients who read them out causing great hilarity. Families with very young children are often visited by Sinterklaas and Zwarte Piet in person, and I still remember the day I recognized a neighbor's face behind the false whiskers and beard and for the first time discovered that things "ain't necessarily so".
Posted on: A Present from Santa Claus
December 24, 2007 at 9:52 AMHi Dukey13 My dictionaries give three basic meanings for guāi:(1) obstinate, (2) crafty, clever, (3) "good" (about children). In this lesson it occurs with (3).
Posted on: Handsome Boy
December 23, 2007 at 11:51 AMHi Changye Thanks for your diligent research, which I appreciate the more as it was done in the state designated by the word under discussion. I looked up Oshanin's translation in a Russian explanatory dictionary, but it gives exactly the meaning "hangover", referring specifically to "the morning after the night before", and not to other effects of alcohol. The more immediate effects vary from person to person, most feeling happy, but some becoming aggressive, still others bursting out crying. I can find an English expression for the second type only: "he is quarrelsome in his cups". In Dutch we have shorter expressions for the 2nd and 3rd type only, clearly because they are conspicuous deviations from the first, which has no such name and is taken for granted. The modern meaning of jiǔbēi would be something like "alcohol-related mishaps", which to my feeling does not cover hangovers as these are not mishaps but natural and foreseeable occurrences. In my experience vodka imported from Russia (Stolichnaya, Moskovskaya) is the best to minimize them. I will try and find out what the poets you mention have to say. Also Li Bai, who should be an expert.
Posted on: Handsome Boy
December 22, 2007 at 4:56 PMHi Jenny In the comments to lesson #0703 (Nov. 18) the notion "hangover" came up. I had forgotten there was a Dutch word for it, and apparently there was no Chinese one. Today I came across the word jiǔbēi (with the bēi of "sad" as in bēiguān "pessimistic"), the last item under jiǔ "wine" in Oshanin's Chinese-Russian dictionary (item #1932) which he translates "pohmélye", the Russian equivalent of "hangover". Perhaps the word has gone out of use. I wish you and all your colleagues at Chinesepod happy holidays with plenty of jiǔbēi in the other sense and a minimum of the above one.
Posted on: 被逼的
December 21, 2007 at 8:00 PMHi Changye Old cartoon: two hikers, having lost their way in the Swiss snow mountains lie there exhausted, and a Saint Bernard, casket of rum tied to his collar, is just coming to their rescue. "Look!" says one, "There's Man's Best Friend, and he has a dog with him too!"
Posted on: A Taxi for Tired Feet
December 19, 2007 at 4:55 PMPS. I forgot to mention that the first part of the Russian course gives an extensive account of the zhuyin, but further fortunately uses the traditional script.
Posted on: A Taxi for Tired Feet
December 19, 2007 at 4:39 PMHi Auntie68 and Changye I read the Wikipedia article(and a few others) on the Chinese (simplified) script. It was a surprise to me that the simplified script is also used in Singapore and Malaysia. And the discussion on the for and against was quite interesting. As a whole, though, the article is a bit sloppy. Besides minor errors it completely ignores the fact that Chinese is not just a language, but a family of mutually unintelligible languages, united by a for all intelligible script. So "alphabetisation" is simply not an option. French and Italian are both written with the Latin alphabet, but they can't read each other's books. They can read each other's numerals 1 2 3, etc. but wouldn't understand the spoken forms. Now if you want the considerable advantages of an alphabet, then you must "latinise" one of the languages and teach that language in all the schools. In the Soviet Union Russian was the lingua franca, and that worked quite well. Even today, when a Kazakh or Chechen is interviewed on the radio, these will speak Russian. They may know their own language, too, but the interviewer doesn't. The Chinese have known for centuries about a simpler "phonetic" way of writing because of Buddhist scriptures, but the whole idea could simply not be used in China as a whole. I started five years ago with a German course of the classical language, and then continued with a two-volume Russian course of the modern language, the first vol. published before, the second after the simplification, so I have a smattering of both scripts, and on the long run would like to learn both of them.
Posted on: A Taxi for Tired Feet
December 18, 2007 at 2:30 PMHi, Auntie68 and Changye I have a very good book published by a Russian named Sher in 1968 "What one must know about Chinese writing". He tells you everything and gives also a list of simplified characters, from old to new and vice versa. But he does not answer the "unicorn" question. My guess is that a comprehensive Chinese-Foreign dict. simply will have to list the discarded radical, or take rather inelegant recourse to radicalless characters. I don't know where dr.Du got his replacement of the deer radical by the fish one in the 4-character expression for "very rare". I also read about the discussions at the time the simplification was proposed. Both for and against had good arguments. Against was of course that you are cutting people off from a 4000 year old literature, which as an unspoken language led a life of its own. For was that you want to reduce analphabetism.I would have voted for the latter, since those who want to can take the trouble of learning the traditional symbols in addition to what they had in school. But I can well understand your regret, Changye. In Holland we have a spelling reform ca. every 25 years, and I make no effort to adhere to the latest style. I was surprised, Auntie68, at your description of the Singapore situation in critical times, and will read the Wikipedia article when I am through with today's advanced lesson. I thought that outside the PRC they stuck to the traditional script. Before I joined Chinesepod I read some stories about "Justice Bao" published in Singapore in the simplified script, but thought this was for commercial reasons. They have an English translation, which saved me a lot of time.
Posted on: Automated Phone Recordings
December 17, 2007 at 1:54 PMgoulniky, thanks for the info. Meanwhile in connection with sīsī I looked for more "buzzing" words that are reduplications: shāshā (simplex "sand"), sèsè (simplex "ancient string instrument"), there may be more of them.
Posted on: 定做的噩梦
December 25, 2007 at 1:07 PMHi Changye In the hangover discussion you said that "It is true that drinking causes sorrow and woe". I am well acquaited with "the sorrow sitting at the heart of things" (J.H. Wheelock). Should it hit you while drinking or the morning after, rest assured that you are greatly appreciated by a widespread community, see Conversations "Heathen's Greetings", where Patty, too, gets special attention. All the best to you, and if the American advice "take it easy" is ineffective, then there is the other one "grin and bear it".