User Comments - tianfeng
tianfeng
Posted on: Traveling and Chopsticks
September 22, 2007 at 1:03 AMOn the topic of accents, do people find they have much of an accent when they are speaking Chinese? Are the accents distinguishable for one another. I can tell if a person is Japanese or Korea when they are speaking Chinese usually but I am not sure about western accents. Do Chinese people find there is an American or British or German accents that is country specific when speaking Chinese? I am pretty sure I have an accent but I have never been told that I do. Maybe people are just really polite and don't want to offend me. Has any one here ever been identified by their accent?
Posted on: Personal Questions and Bargaining
September 20, 2007 at 3:40 AMwhat about 十三点 Amber。Is that the male equivalent of 三八. I am not sure, maybe it can be used for both.
Posted on: Drinking Ability
September 20, 2007 at 2:47 AMOne thing that is still open for discussion in all the research I did was why? I found two theories of possible in Sharon Moalem’s book Survival of the Sickest: a Medical Maverick Discovers Why We Need, he contends that it is that the difference between populations method used for water purification methods that caused the genetic intolerance for alcohol. He suggested that traditionally, Asian populations boiled their water to make tea as a way of making it potable. On the other hand, European societies used a process of fermentation to create a liquid that would be free of bacteria and could even be mixed with water as a purifier. He further contended that historically “there was evolutionary pressure in Europe to have the ability to drink, break down, and detoxify alcohol, while the pressure in Asia was a lot less.” This theory at first seems logical, but by looking at it closer, it looks as if it is based more on a simple cultural comparison than on scientific fact. Although he might be right, it is hard to neglect the fact that all Asian cultures had a process of rice fermentation and their own types of alcohol. If half of the people had the ALDH2*2 allele than it would have been strange for them to establish a drinking culture at all. The strength of the “evolutionary pressure” is also questionable and he provides no evidence to back it up. In no other articles was there any collaboration of his theory nor did he cite where he obtained this information. I am more inclined to learn toward this second theory. Raymond J. Peterson of Pennsylvania State University proposed another way to approach this. In his graduate thesis, Peterson contends that given the principals of natural selection, why would a dominant genetic trait that produced toxins in the body survive? There was selective pressure on a population, but that pressure was in Asia and not in Europe and the rest of the world. Increased levels of toxins in the body might have been chosen because they would work to fight off certain types of parasites in the host’s body. That would have been something that would be to the advantage of the people possessing it. There for it would follow the rules of natural selection. Although neither of these theories are more than just speculation, Peterson’s seems to be more likely. Peterson localized his theory to a change in the Asian population over time, rather than a series of alcohol tolerances that were built up everywhere else in the world except in fifty percent of Asia. There are probably a lot more theories out there but I found this topic fascinating. If you are Asian and have this problem, when someone starts badgering you to drink and you recited this back to them they quickly change their tune. Or they will just think, "damn girl I just offered to buy you a drink, I didn't want a genetics lesson."
Posted on: Personal Questions and Bargaining
September 15, 2007 at 10:33 PMI have a good story about the bargaining thing. The fist time I came to Chine I was with my family and my brother was bargaining for a jacket in xuishui back before it was all inside and stuff. He said 280 for one of the knock off columbia jackets and fought with the guy to get in down. Finally the guy says 280 is acceptable and my brother said, well 240. The guy was pissed but eventually he said ok and than my brother said well now i think 200. The guy lost it and told him to get the hell out of there because it was obvious he didn't understand the concept of bargaining. In the end I think he got the jacket for around 200 but the guy was sooooo pissed of he couldn't even talk. I think when I am bargaining I like to find a price I feel that is acceptable. It dosen't have to be the lowest price. I made a lot of friends in Hongqiao that way and after being away from China for 3 years when I came back they still remembered me right away. I hadn't bought anything from them in forever and they didn't try and sell me anything. They had both gotten married and introduced me to their husbands as well as showed me pictures of their new babies. So I think bargaining dosen't always have to be a fight. It can even be a new way to meet people and learn more about China and Chinese people.
Posted on: Death by Ninja
September 13, 2007 at 3:20 AMI really think peters Chinese have improved since the first lesson with the taxi driver. HE seems much more relaxed now. Too bad he is dead.
Posted on: In-Laws and Drinking
September 13, 2007 at 1:15 AMI finally got to listen to the podcast and I actually have a friend from Shanghai whose parents were set up by a match maker back during the 1960's. They were both over 30 and there parents just told them they have to get married to each other. Unfortunately they hate each other now and fight all the time but at least they had a nice daughter and a son. I guess that is something.
Posted on: In-Laws and Drinking
September 9, 2007 at 2:19 AMI actually had a term paper and a presentation on the topic of the "Asian Flush" for my Human Adaptation and Variation class last year. It was probably the most fun i had writing a paper all year. I titled it "One Drink Wonders: The Asian Aversion to Alcohol". It has to do with an allele labeled ALDH2*2 which is dominant and only found in Asian populations. It affects only 50% of the East Asian population. The body needs to find a way to metabolize alcohol after it is consumed. It is a multi-step process where, unlike food and other liquids, alcohol is absorbed directly into the blood stream. It then travels to the liver where it begins to break down. In the liver, the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase or AHD mediates the conversion of alcohol into acetaldehyde. This acetaldehyde is thirty times more toxic than ethanol. After it enters the body it is rapidly converted into acetate and then into carbon dioxide and water. This is the normal process of metabolizing alcohol in a non-Asian person. What happens differently in the Asian population is that the Acetaldehyde is not converted rapidly into acetate and it builds to toxic levels in the body very quickly. This has been studied by the Japanese and Taiwanese extensively. There has also been links to increased levels of cancer due to drinking and smoking with ALDH2*2 allele.
Posted on: Post-Graduation Plans
August 15, 2007 at 4:41 PMjenny, I just graduated and that was my feeling. 刚毕业就毕业，我马上开始我新的生活在杭州。
Posted on: Post-Graduation Plans
August 15, 2007 at 1:51 PM我忘了。南大也是一个名牌大学。
Posted on: Traveling and Chopsticks
September 22, 2007 at 1:06 AMAmber I got the same question last night in my class. I think some times it is hard for some Chinese people to grasp the fact that people with no Chinese blood can speak Chinese well. It is understandable because so few do and China is a country based on racial identity. I have often thought about telling people that I am just to see if they will treat me any differently. It is an experiment I have yet to try.