User Comments - aprilwhite

Posted on: Is China Scary?

"The Bush administration made plans for war and for Iraq's oil before the  9/11 attacks, sparking a policy battle between neo-cons and Big Oil..."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/newsnight/4354269.stm

Posted on: Is China Scary?

"In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military- industrial complex." -- President Dwight D. Eisenhower Farewell Address (January, 1961)

That's a pretty reputable source.

"American Halliburton has won a lion's share of US contracts to rebuild Iraq, a fact that has itself created a fair amount of controversy due to the firm's close connections with leading members of the George W Bush government.

"US Vice President Dick Cheney was formerly Halliburton chief executive." -- BBC News,  23 January, 2004

That's another one.

The problem with the "They didn't want to win in Vietnam" theory is that there's no point giving soldiers "military training" if you don't want them to win.

The problem with the "When did they rebuild Vietnam?" counter argument is that the U.S. lost in Vietnam so there was no profit to be gained from rebuilding the country.  Also, President Johnson most definitely did want to end the war because he was a member of the Democratic Party and he would have prefered that the money spent on the war in Vietnam instead be used to fund his anti-poverty legislation.

Posted on: Singapore

I went to Singapore in 1992 after only having studied a year of Chinese.  It didn't help my Chinese much because everybody could speak English.  I practice speaking Chinese everyday here in Taichung, although some people have complained that they don't get as much chance to speak in Taipei.  It depends; if you're only just beginning then people won't understand you and they won't be able to talk to you: I noticed that when I first came to Taiwan.

I liked Singapore a lot: my only complaint was that the TV stations all signed off around midnight and there was nothing for a jet lagged person to watch.  How things have changed!  HBO, Cinemax, ESPN, Nickelodean, MTV Asia, AXN Asia all come from from Singapore now.  We can get them all here in Taiwan by satellite.

I'm afraid I was on a budget when I was there and I didn't try any of the local food: all the restaurants were very expensive so I ate a lot of fruit and I ended up losing a lot of weight.  Actually that was a good thing. :) 

Posted on: Is China Scary?

Yes, misterjess, I agree, the U.S. is also scary.  Both the U.S, and China have nuclear weapons but the U.S. is the only country to ever use nuclear weapons.  The U.S. has also started a lot of wars, starting with the War of 1812, the Mexican-American War, the Spanish-American War and the latest Iraq War.  The U.S. has also invaded Panana, Grenada and Afghanistan, although support for the War in Afghanistan was pretty much widespread.  Other wars the U.S. have been invloved in over the past hundred years include the First and Second World Wars, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War and the NATO bombing of Serbia.  China, on the other hand, has been involved in far fewer wars this past century, including a border war with the Soviet Union, defensive wars against Japan (including WW2) and the civil war that followed WW2. 

The U.S. has the death penalty; China has the death penalty.  Taiwan feels threatened by China but Cuba has felt threatened by the U.S. and Iran and North Korea have valid reasons to feel threatened by the U.S. after George W Bush called Iran, Iraq and North Korea an "axis of evil" and then invaded Iraq.  The U.S. even had the Civil Rights Movement in the 60s which can be compared to the situations in Tibet and Xinjiang with the Tibetans and Uighers.

The only thing that the U.S. has that China doesn't is freedom of speech, including the freedom to demonstate.  Oh and the U.S. has a multiparty system that allows one party to peacefully take over the reins of power.  It seems to me that if the CCP wanted a presence in Taiwan then it would have to allow the KMT to have a presence in Mainland China: you'd have defacto unification if both sides of the Taiwan Strait were to elect the same party.  But the CCP isn't going to risk giving up power in China so instead they resort to intimidation.  That's scary.  And it's supposed to be.  Ultimately, this does the CCP more harm than good, just as George W. Bush's comment to the effect that "if you aren't with us then you're against us" did the U.S. more harm than good.

Oh there might be less crime in China.  I don't know: the melamine scandal would have to be considered a crime and it wasn't a small number of people who were involved as the Chinese government originally claimed.

Posted on: Regional Accents Part I

If anybody can answer these questions then I would be very grateful.  Should we be able to tell the difference between people who speak different dialects when they speak English the way that we can tell if someone is French or Italian?  For that matter, can Chinese speaking people tell where a foreigner is from just based on his accent when speaking Chinese?

One difference not covered yet is the Taiwanese way of pronouncing laoshi (teacher): I've heard it pronounced laosu.  There's also a town near Taichung called Tanzi and I've heard it refered to as Tansu.  I've even heard Taiwanese people refer to wushi (fifty) as wusu.

Even more common is shuo (speak) being pronounced as shou or Duoshao? (How many?) as Doushao?  You can notice this easily in Elva Hsiao's You Make Me Wanna.  Of course, I wonder sometimes if in songs the pronunciation isn't effected by the fact that the songwriter needs to rhyme certain words that don't rhyme in standard Mandarin.

I have asked people here about accents and they tell me that there are actually two different accents or, perhaps more accurately, a continuum from the North to the South with the Southern accent being more pronounced compared to standard Mandarin.  A good example of this is the pronunciation of Tainan which is actually pronounced like Tailan by people in the South.  This is very confusing of course: when I was told by a kindergarten teacher that she was taking her students to "Tailan" I was very impressed indeed and wondered if they all had their passports and visas ready! 

Posted on: Regional Accents Part II

I wonder if the lack of distinguishing between s and sh has anything to do with the influence of Japanese: after all, some people here pronounce shan (mountain) as san.  I even had one person "correct" me.

http://www.pinyin.info is a good reference for this topic.

Posted on: Is China Scary?

miantiao,

You're insane.  Like I said, I only signed on here yesterday and since then I've had nothing except abuse from you.  You obviously don't like people expressing their opinions.  That is scary.

Posted on: Not So Silent Night

daizi,

Good idea celebrating Isaac Newton's birthday on December 25th!  It always makes more sense to celebrate the birth of somebody who actually existed!

Posted on: Amusement Park

miantiao,

Actually, the landmass including Europe and Asia is called "Eurasia".  There's no confusion there.  On the other hand, when you lump all of Asia together when you actually mean to say "East Asia" then that is simplification and ignorance personified.  Don't forget that Pakistan and India make up most of South Asia, that Kazakstan and Uzbekistan are part of Central Asia and what we call the "Middle East" is really Western Asia.

Posted on: Is China Scary?

I personally agree with Singapore's Senior Minister Lee Kuan Yew.  Is China scary?  Absolutely.  So the solution was to form the ASEAN block and thereby avoid seeming small and insignificant in comparison.  When China, Japan and South Korea joined with ASEAN to become ASEAN plus three (in 1997), Lee recommended having India, Australia and New Zealand also attend and it became the East Asia Summit (in 2005).  Current Taiwan president Ma Yingjiu speaks of Taiwan one day being in a "common market" with Mainland China.  Presumably like minded politicians in the region see a European style East Asian union as the ultimate solution to any perceived threat from China (which does have 1300 missiles pointing at Taiwan), just as the European Economic Community was seen as the solution to Europe's problems.  (When people in your neighboring countries are your highest source of trade income, you don't go to war with them!)