User Comments - auntie68
auntie68
Posted on: 东京
February 6, 2008 at 11:39 AMYikes, uncle, I think I was unclear! Sorry! My point was actually that I get the feeling that many Japanese people know A LOT of English, which they've studied in school, even if they may be modest or shy when approached by a foreigner. And instead of becoming ever more "Oxford" in one's diction, in the quest to communicate, maybe foreigners should consider making some effort to speak English in the way which their interlocutors may be used to hearing that language, ie. with something of a Japanese accent. Thank you so much for your warm CNY wishes! I wish you the same, from the bottom of my heart! Much love to you and Patricia -- Auntie
Posted on: 东京
February 6, 2008 at 12:37 AMbobyoru, if you like chinesepod.com, you might enjoy the format of englishpod101.com (*NO affiliation with chinesepod), which is specifically geared to help Japanese people polish their English. But to be totally honest, your English is already very clear and polished. In fact, it's great. I like the point you raised. How to transliterate Japanese names into Mandarin can be tricky. My student and her little sister are being raised in Singapore. The sister's name, Ruuri (瑠璃, in kanji), doesn't raise any eyebrows whatsoever in Japan. It's not a particularly exotic name. I understand that this character combination is also known to anybody with a knowledge of bunraku (文楽; classical Japanese puppet dramas). But SO many of her schoolteachers in Singapore are convinced that it's a mis-spelling of 琉璃 (liu2li5), a famous kind of pottery glaze, which characters they have never ever seen used in a name before. Ultimately, some teachers even managed to pressure her mother into writing her name as 瑠莉 (liu2li4) instead, because the 莉 is more common in Chinese girls' names. Sigh... This attitude of the teachers dismayed me because, unlike Japan or Korea, China and Singapore don't have an official list of approved Chinese characters that parents have to comply with when registering their child. I think the list in Japan is called the人名用漢字 (jinmeiyoohanji) list? I wonder whether CPOD could consider a lesson on the language connected with choosing a Chinese name for your child. Eg. difficulty level of writing, balance, harmony with siblings' existing names, reasons for choosing this character rather than another. I hear that in the PRC, it is sometimes possible to guess when -- approximately -- a person was born, based on the style and feel of his name characters... Thanks to all for being so enormous patient with me. Happy Lunar Year again...
Posted on: 东京
February 5, 2008 at 10:53 AMOf course, it is also possible that the Japanese people we were speaking to just felt less self-conscious because they were thinking, "God, her English is even worse than mine! Oh man!". But when I had to ask for directions etc, in Tokyo, as a teenager, an "Excuse me, please?" would send Japanese people running, whereas a "So-rii? Pu-riizu?" ("Sorry? Please?") didn't seem like the attack of godzilla, and they would stop to help.
Posted on: 东京
February 5, 2008 at 10:30 AMIn a language emergency, try to stay calm and remember that many Japanese -- including schoolchildren and older folk -- have actually studied an astonishing amount of English, formally, in school. A dear former boyfriend of mine, who grew up in Japan and was fluent in Japanese, stopped me in my tracks once by explaining patiently to me that it is possible for an average Japanese person to study English for ten years having only ever heard the language from teachers who all pronounced it in romaji (Japanese hanyu pinyin). If you've ever had the chance to observe how seasoned expats speak to non-international Japanese people in Japan, you may know what I mean. My ex-boyfriend knew how to sound like he was speaking Japanese, when he was actually speaking English. After years of struggling to communicate in English with my student's Japanese grandfather, I tried speaking to oji-san in English as if all my words had been written down in romaji. Suddenly we understood each other! No more stress. But you have to be very careful when you do this, so that nobody (accidentally) gets the impression that you are taking the piss. On my business trip to Nara, I tried speaking to very young schoolchildren in English in this new accent of mine, and ended up being mobbed everywhere by gleeful -- and very confident! -- little kids who were keen to give their English a workout. Believe me, a seven-year-old Japanese schoolkid knows A LOT of English words... Hope nobody was offended by this (potentially un-PC) perspective. Sorry changye!
Posted on: Hiring a Courier
February 5, 2008 at 9:40 AMDear uncle changye, According to this wikipedia article, it is estimated that the dabbawalas make only one mistake per 16 million deliveries: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dabbawala I wonder whether our inspiring friend Chand might have anything to chip in on this topic. Chand-哥, what do you say? Anyway, happy Lunar New Year to all! I won't be be so busy this year, so will be lurking on CPOD. You have been warned!
Posted on: Hiring a Courier
February 4, 2008 at 12:47 PMDear changye, the local courier system you describe seems to work as brilliantly as the "dabbawalla" system in Bombay, which faultlessly delivers 100s of 1,000s of home-cooked meals each day, from the hands of the housewife (it's her own tiffin box! she cooked the meal with her own hands!) to the correct husband's office. And after lunch, they return the right box to the right housewife! I understand that most of the dabbawallas are illiterate, using their own secret chalk markings to keep track of the tiffin boxes as they are whisked -- by train, by bicycle, and/or hand-carried -- to their destinations. Incredible. And of course, like in your local China system, there's no question of a receipt of any kind... because they never get it wrong! This Auntie loves the power of the simple, time-tested system. Once, as an playful experiment, she sent a postcard to some friends in Italy, with no address, merely the name of the recipient ("Frankie C."), and the town name. It was safely delivered within 7 days! From Singapore! Not only that, my simple message on the postcard was disseminated to the entire village and the 周边地区. It's not only in small southern Italian towns; I can think of a "sestiere" (or two) in Venice where a postcard with no address would still find its way to the rightful recipient. Bravo!
Posted on: All You Can Eat and Drink
February 4, 2008 at 3:21 AMHello nicolas. I think that in 素菜, the 菜 actually means "dish or type of dish" rather than "vegetable". As in 你喜欢吃中国菜吗? ("Do you like Chinese food?"). So the expression emphasizes the fact that it is a dish which is vegetable-based (素 su4), as opposed to meat-based (荤 hun1). In 蔬菜, the 菜 literally means vegetable, so the meaning is more like "fresh vegetables" or "green vegetables". Hope this is helpful to you!
Posted on: 东京
February 3, 2008 at 1:07 PMP/s: My ageing brain-cells tell me that the unforgettable shrine may have been Heian Jingu (THE h.j.), which I had first visited as a teenage tourist, but I am not sure. I was always the worst kind of junior employee, never ever knowing what was going on (not a clue! never!), always just trying not to be scolded by my bosses, and perpetually counting the hours until the after-work drinks with other equally junior employees.
Posted on: 东京
February 3, 2008 at 12:56 PMUncle changye, Nara was amazing. The business trip I mentioned was co-organized by some really great people from UNESCO who were experts in conservation. This Auntie was really, really fortunate to be a "bag-carrier"/ "all-purpose gopher"/"scullery maid" at that conference. The high point of the event (for me) was a night when we went to a shrine (name forgotten by this careless Auntie) after dark to watch a shinto ceremony involving flaming pine branches, the wonderful smell and sight of pine sparks against the night, and lots of very happy Japanese people. During one day-time, we were taken to a traditional conservation site where -- we were told, and I managed never to forget, that -- local skilled craftsmen are perpetually rebuilding an intricate replacement wooden shrine for a structure which is restored every 60 -75 years by the local Nara people. Uncle changye, I know that my memory is hazy and probably defective, but that is what I seem to remember. To me, it was amazing, unforgettable, especially since I had visited Nara as a teenager the usual way with about a million Japanese tourists, ie. buying all kinds of touristy deer souvenirs, watching schoolkids feed all kinds of junk food to the poor deer, and ooh-ing and ah-ing at the "Chinese"-style sculptures... I'll never forget my first (and only) return visit to Japan as an adult. Mr Stunt Toddler has made a good start in his young life. Besides his two Japanese girlfriends, his "principal" girlfriend is the cute "girl next door", born within days of him, who was an actual cover girl (-baby?) for a local mother+child glossy magazine. Their nannies arrange frequent play dates, and I am told that there is never any hair-pulling, mugging behaviour, or extortion between those two young people... not yet.
Posted on: 东京
February 6, 2008 at 11:48 AMP/s: Today, the eve of the Lunar New Year, my mandarinistically-challenged surprised his adoring grandmother in the best possible way by greeting her Chinese colleagues politely with a very nice and clear, "恭喜！ 恭喜！”, with one hand clasped nicely around the other in the right way. Looks like his very expensive pre-school fees are already paying off! Yay!