User Comments - bodawei

Posted on: Renting an Apartment through an Agent

房 fáng has several meanings, one is 'room'. Here it rolls off the tongue - it looks like a collocation to me.

There are several words for 'room'.

Posted on: Love Tangle 9: The Divorce

In China there is a site with feature length films that play without interruption after perhaps a minute delay at the start! (And we do not have the fast China Telecom option - we pay the minimum.) I have never seen anything like that in Australia.

Also, I just tried the smh player I referred to - a two minute news report plays fine here in Australia. In China I can't get them to play properly - 3 seconds at a time, 30 seconds or so buffering. Agonising, I never bother now.

For a series try 真爱之百万新娘

Plot: 真爱之百万新娘/百万新娘讲述了本剧借由一个女人从平凡人家嫁入豪门为长媳之后面对的所有问题，揭示出大家族中一段段剪不断、理还乱的恩怨是非。本剧以女主角坎坷的经历讲述了两代间的恩怨情仇、豪门的争权夺利以及曲折的感情发展，而她也同时成为家族内部斗争及商场利益争夺战的关键人物。也就是说，不只要处理好家庭内部的所有关系，还要协助公公、丈夫应对商场上的尔虞我诈，正当所有责任都加诸在身上时，孩子又不识趣地来报到此时的要如何完美地尽到豪门长媳的责任呢？

Posted on: Love Tangle 9: The Divorce

Hee hee - maybe the GFW slows things down. Actually in China they seem to have mastered the download problems - even modest Internet speeds offer quick and efficient viewing. Whereas I usually cannot get a short news report on the smh site to play in China. Maybe the the magic is in the player (the Chinese sites use their own players). I will send a PM about sites and shows.

Posted on: Love Tangle 9: The Divorce

The advantage of the 'real' thing is quantity - there are countless thousands of episodes and new ones constantly in production. You can watch on the Internet, buy the DVD sets or even watch on TV! There are several popular genres - for a start:

- family drama. General all purpose - you recognise these by the existence of evil mothers-in-law and at least one poisoning per episode, or one latch-key kid getting into trouble.. :)

- family drama. Comedy - it's got to have at least one fat kid in it.

- traditional costume dramas (the stories are usually well known)

- political/history dramas

- 武术　

- 'lose the way' morality tales (I pointed to in a post above)

- police dramas

- 西游记 (a genre of its own - there are thousands of versions)

The difference between a 'soap' and other forms gets a bit blurred, also between serials and films. War is also a very popular genre, but they usually come as discrete films rather than serials. Films are sometimes split, at least into two.

Posted on: Chinese Fruits

I agree a great list! There are lots of local variations of course, eg. several names for potato. 洋芋 yángyù (potato) is the more common term where I live.

Other notes on above list:

菌 jùn (mushrooms/fungus)

苦菜 kǔcài (bok choy – a larger version of 青菜)

Also, what is normal or common in one part of the country may not be in another. I attach a few that are common in the South-West of China. They may sound esoteric but they are common here:

瓜尖 gua jian (pumpkin shoots)

蚕豆 cǎndòu (broad beans)

凉拌薄荷 (mint)

凉拌蕨菜 juecai (bracken, fern)

百合 bǎihé (lilies)

板栗 bǎnlì (chestnuts)

蕉花 jiāo huā (the flower of the lady finger banana)

鱼腥草 yǔxīngcǎo (scientific name Houttuynia Cordata)

裳梨花 shanglihua (an edible flower)

魔芋 mo yú (taro)

海菜 hǎicài (edible seaweed)

Note: 酸淹菜 suānyāncài (pickled vegetables) or just 腌菜 yāncài is 泡菜　pàocài elsewhere.

Posted on: Renting an Apartment through an Agent

I am doing my duty again, reminding poddies that this dialogue is written in a Shanghai (price) context. I have a foreigner friend who rents a perfectly okay, quiet, two bedroom apartment with a 'Western' bathroom (eg. 坐的 toilet) for 800 RMB per month. Ten minutes by bus to the city centre.  This represents more the average for China, for those who are interested in averages and how most people live.  5,000 RMB per month is roughly twice the annual salary of a university lecturer with a doctorate in the city where I live.  

Posted on: Love Tangle 9: The Divorce

比如一届节目叫‘迷途’，它认识吗？ 每天播一个道德剧。很有意思 。。

Posted on: Chinese Fruits

yes, 青枣 (but it is surely not related to dates as we know them in the West).

PS that link does not seem to work for me.

Posted on: Chinese Fruits

Hi alexlexilu

We have the 'little green apple looking fruit' - I think it is an apple (or pear?) variety - it does not strike me as a plum - but as you say it has a seed like a plum seed in the middle. Delicious.

Generally there is a much greater variety of fruit in China than we have in Australia, and generally the fruit tastes better. Big generalization - but it is seasonal, and does not get transported great distances or refrigerated for long periods. Where I live. In Shanghai and other eastern seaboard cities this Western-style industry is developing. (Australia has been lending its research know-how to the fruit and veg industry - this has its pluses and minuses.)

But also the price of fruit varies enormously from very cheap to very expensive. About a month - 6 weeks ago in SW China cherries were about 50 or 60 RMB a kilo. This doesn't stop people buying them - people are very serious about their food in China.

Posted on: Chinese Fruits

杨梅 yángméi I would put roughly in the middle of the strangeness spectrum of Chinese fruit, and only because we don't see them in the West. The taste and texture is not strange - a delightful fruit that I commonly have on 'corn paste' for breakfast. (I just blew the 'not strange' vibe.)

Definitely to the right of杨梅 are 柚子 yòuzi (close to my heart as it is the first thing I ate in mainland China) - dictionaries call them 'pomelos' which we don't have in Australia. They are rather like grapefruit in taste but the texture is quite different. These are another classic breakfast fruit, but they appear in a hundred different dishes. I have seen each 'cell' of the fruit separated (painstaking work for the cook). And柚子茶 one of the best ever teas, when mixed with grated orange peel and honey.

Note on 荔枝 lizhi (lychees) - they are sold tied like bunches of flowers. This slows down the decay process, but they still last only a couple of days where I live. (Difficult to eat? I don't follow that discussion at all. Shanghai people happily crack the husks off nuts with their teeth - normal people need to break them with a hammer. Lizhi have soft skins that break easily.)

I would like to hear other poddies views on stranger fruits.