User Comments - tvan
tvan
Posted on: Is China Scary?
October 16, 2009 at 11:44 AM@changye, ”一山不容二虎“还是“一山不容二公虎”？
@mark, 我同意你我们美国人长被媒体误导。不过哪种媒体？ 左派的媒体还是右派的媒体？保守的还是自由的？CNN 还是 Fox News? 而且独裁主义的政府最讨厌的不是美国媒体，是西方的媒体。所以是法国右派的媒体还是德国保守的媒体还是奥国土著居民合法权利运动的媒体，等。
Posted on: Going to the Dentist
October 15, 2009 at 1:16 PM@changye, 在大陆的大城市我同意你。但我觉得乡下没有那么幸福。
Posted on: Going to the Dentist
October 15, 2009 at 3:24 AM自己删除的。
Posted on: Getting Nationalities Straight
October 15, 2009 at 3:07 AMHi @borisvt,
Just a friendly reminder, in newbie lessons you should include pinyin and English. BTW, there is a website that recommends that English learners come to this web site to find exchange partners, so please go easy on these kids. They just want to learn English.
Posted on: National Day
October 15, 2009 at 2:52 AM雙十節是台灣的節日不是大陸的。台灣也過植樹節，文藝節(May 4th movement)，禁煙節(Burning of Opium during Opium War ala Boston Tea Party)，國父誕辰紀念日(Sun Yansen's Birthday)，台灣光復節(Return of Taiwan to China by Japan)。因為大陸強調毛澤東和共產黨的成績，好像他們忘記不少自己的歷史。還好台灣人能記得,能保存中國正宗的歷史！
Posted on: The Guanxi Myth
October 13, 2009 at 2:30 PMI found the point about how guanxi relates to your relative positions enlightening. It sounds somewhat like the old (B.C.) Roman concept of clientela and patronus.
On a side note, how old of a term is 后门？ I heard and used it frequently back in the early 1980's when you had to deal with a different type of imperial (or at least imperious) bureaucracy. Does anybody know if the term originated during the Communist era or does it have older origins?
Posted on: National Day
October 12, 2009 at 7:53 PM@ricardo, thank you for introducing me to the word "democide" contained in your web link. It turns out to be a word used by one author to describe any deaths caused by a government either intentionally (e.g. Stalin's purges) or through incompetence (e.g. Great Leap Forward). The word isn't in any dictionary. Personally, I prefer more precise terms. It seemed to be a device for the author to generate provocative statistics than anything else.
I recently stood in a long line in front of the SF embassy getting a Visa. I had several chats with Chinese around me. That particular group seemed pretty happy with the anniversary and parade. The term 自豪 used in the lesson came up frequently.
Posted on: National Day
October 7, 2009 at 4:16 AM@carlos_in_irvine, it appears that this is also true in the States as well. I've also had occasional problems accessing the site over here. I'm still getting the blocked message, so who knows?
@tal, maybe they ought to change their name to KFD (Kentucky Fried Duck)... though I can't say that they eat much duck over here.
Posted on: Farewell, Sweet Pete
October 7, 2009 at 4:13 AMamber,
I'll second bababardwan's greeting. Hope all is going well. It was very gracious of you to wish Pete well. No surprise there of course!
@wchan, 好久不见。
Posted on: Kaixin Wang Farm Thieves
October 25, 2009 at 3:47 PM@changye, 很有意思。我以前认为 “他让我气死了” 的翻译是，"He made me mad!" 另一方面”他被我气死了“的反义是 ”I made him mad!" 但你说的都是一样的。
我同意 @lynnx，“气死我被叫简练.” I often hear this said as a joking response to being teased.