User Comments - bodawei
bodawei
Posted on: 闪婚
October 31, 2010 at 4:34 PMHi modernnomad
Not sure if you mean the dialogue - the pdf link is at the top of this page. I just checked it; works fine.
If you mean a transcript of the discussion in the lesson - ChinesePod does not provide transcripts of discussion for any lessons. Any 'lesson' transcripts are written by a couple of poddies and posted from time to time. Obviously they don't do them all - just as the spirit moves.
Posted on: Fasten that Safety Belt
October 31, 2010 at 4:29 PMHi evelyne
You must enjoy China to have visited 3 times but you seem to be suffering some culture shock (not at all uncommon for people visiting China.) You seem to be overwhelmed by what you see as excessive danger, uncleanliness, threats to your health, and what you see as a lack of concern about the standard of living. You would like to change things, or at least have the Chinese change themselves, to behave in ways that are more consistent with your way of life. Not surprising.
I don't know that I am helping much, but I think that learning about the local culture does help in resolving some of these fears. (This is not to say that Chinese society is not itself evolving.) Sometimes when we see things just from our perspective we miss important things, possibly come to wrong conclusions. Sometimes our own cultural perspective actually gets between us and the facts.
There are a few things that you say that I understand perfectly, and there are other things that don't gel with my own experience - I would be interested in your views (on reflection):
'at full speed' - in my time in China I have come to understand that in fact traffic speeds in China are significantly lower than in Western countries. The Chinese drive at speeds well below your home country (I am assuming you are from France?), both in built-up areas and on the open road. This is for a combination of reasons - traffic congestion, sometimes poor roads, lack of roads, some of it is cultural.
'the police which is omnipresent' - if you check the facts on police numbers, I think you will find that Western countries in general have police forces that are significantly larger than China, per capita, something like a factor of 10. That is, taking into account the size of the population, Western countries have about 10 times as many police as China. Many visitors to China seem to form an impression of a large invasive police force - I wonder if this impression is formed by Western media before visitors arrive in the country? Our expectations of a overbearing police state are established in the media - the reality can be quite different.
'not even looking at the traffic lights' - in my city here in China motorists seem much more likely to not run a red light than in my home country of Australia. I am always impressed how people slow down and stop at a red light - Australians tend to speed up and try and beat the light.
'how can they let things happen' - China is a big country. An overbearing all-controlling approach to government would not work. China's administration is highly decentralised.
Certainly China is in many ways a physically dangerous environment - however I find people much more risk averse than in my home country of Australia.
Hope these couple of observations help ..
Posted on: Fasten that Safety Belt
October 31, 2010 at 4:25 PMYour intuition about driving behaviour when seat belts are available is probably correct - the research in this area suggests that people act with less care if they think they are given some protection. Studies have in particular looked at the use of seat belts, and in the case of car racing the introduction of a range of safety features encouraged more reckless behaviour.
This is one explanation for what I consider careful driving on the mainland - speeds are generally lower than in the West, and there are a range of behaviours that limit the number of collisions at speed. It's self-protection, or self-insurance.
Posted on: Dealing with 管 (guan)
October 31, 2010 at 4:12 PMYeh, my grandmother was a saint too, funny about that. :)
My post was not so much about swearing, as about people (swearing and non-swearing) and why they say things like 'not in front of grandma'. And our relationships with old people.
To answer your question: I think the only time you would really 'not swear in front of grandma' is if you are a swearer and your grandma definitely does not swear and is offended by it (maybe what we call a wowser in Australia). Out of respect you would refrain. This does happen in practice, but generally I believe our children behave much like us, whether they like it or not. So there are swearing families and non-swearing families. In either case there is no need for the 'not in front of grandma' rule.
But when people say 'not in front of grandma' they are usually just making a poor joke. It is a cliche. (No offence meant by the way!)
Don't you just love families??
Posted on: Dealing with 管 (guan)
October 31, 2010 at 12:01 PMNow xiao_phil, why do you assume that grandmas (and grandpas?) can't tolerate swear words? I would think (generally) people who swear when they are young swear when they are old. And people who don't swear when they are young, well I think they may be more likely to swear when they are old because older people tend to lose their inhibitions, don't they?
So where does this cliche (the easily offended older person) originate I wonder, Hollywood?
As a working cliche it is probably fairly harmless, but I would put it down to ageism, to an extent. We make fun of being old because we are a little scared of what that means to grow old. Humour helps us deal with it.
Posted on: Doing Business in the Bath House
October 31, 2010 at 4:11 AMMy guess is that while they mean exactly the same thing, 一站式服务 is a translation of the English expression; that is, derived from English, a borrow-word. But that is pure speculation.
Posted on: Fasten that Safety Belt
October 31, 2010 at 4:03 AMWhat? what? Did someone mention a free meal?? :)
Posted on: Fasten that Safety Belt
October 30, 2010 at 9:39 AMIn China they like to do that in the privacy of their own stations. Humiliation I mean. Not that I have been humiliated there. My dealings with the police have always been very 'civilized'. :)
Yes, well in Australia I imagine they do a reasonable job most of the time, but there have occasionally been a few nasty mistakes.
Posted on: Construction
October 31, 2010 at 11:25 PMHi cowenparkseattle
The characters 集装箱门式起重机 are painted on the crane.
It means 'shipping container transfer style crane'， ie. a crane that facilitates the transfer of containers.
集装箱 jízhuāngxiāng (shipping container/cargo container)
门式 ménshì (switching or transfer style). 门 means 'gate' (through which things are transferred. For example 电门 shì means 'switch'. I think that the 门 on the crane means a 'gate' that facilitates transfer, from sea/river to land or land to sea/river).
式 shì (style, type or design)
起重机 qǐzhòngjī (crane)