I was brought up in a Cantonese/Hokkien dialect speaking family, that is why I don’t speak Mandarin very well. I couldn’t read nor write them neither – and this pretty much includes my own Chinese name. It’s a shame… I know, but I’m sure there are plenty more people like me out there. A banana dude — yellow outside, white inside.
I’m about to relate a couple of embarrassing incidents that took place during my trip to China a few years ago
Incident #1
I was approached by a Chinese tour guide (let’s call her – CindyCrawford) about something. When CindyCrawford came up to me, I had just descended from a climb up to The Great Wall. It was a very cold afternoon *The conversation was reproduced based on my memory and limited knowledge on Mandarin, slight discrepancies are expected*:
CindyCrawford : “Ching wen … xiang mien hai you mei you ren?”
(translation: Excuse me, is it still cold up there?) — as per what I understand from the description.
Me : “errr… uuhh… yeah… xiang mien ‘quite’ ren …”
(translation: errr…uhhhh … yeah .. it’s quite cold up there..) — That was my half assed Mandarin. I was rather surprised, it’s fucking cold down here, for sure it would be colder up in the mountains. Maybe she just wanted to start a conversation, I thought.
CindyCrawford :[confused look] “Ni you mei you kan tau tha men ? [some sign language] .. ren?”
(translation: You seen them? Cold?) — Oh, she’s probably asking me if I’m cold … awww.. how sweet of her…
Me :”Oh… yeah… xiang mien hen ren … [show her a shaking hand sign]… xie xie”
(translation: Oh..yeah.. it’s very cold up there… thanks) — it was about 5 deg C up there. It’s fucking cold.
CindyCrawford : “Pu se .. wo se wen ni… ni you mei you kan tau tha men .. [pointing at tour bus .. then camera]?”
(translation: No, I’m asking you, have you seen them [pointing at tour bus .. then camera]) — something is not right. She was not asking me if I’m cold.
Shit, that was when I saw where did it all go wrong… She was actually asking if I have seen those people from my tour group, and whether they are still all up in the mountains. I apparently mistaken the word “ren” as COLD instead of PEOPLE. So, the whole thing was a boo-boo. She wasn’t concerned about my welfare after all. Fuck. It was downright embarrassing. I replied her back in a broken Mandarin (& plenty of sign language) that ‘those bastards are still climbing the fucking steep Great Wall, and The Great Wall sucks’.
Incident #2
Inside the tour bus:
Tourguide : “announcing through loudspeaker] “Wo men xien cai yau chue kan cak cik.”
(translation: we now are going to watch fried chicken) — again, as per what I understand from the description
Me :”What the fuck!? We are going to watch fried chicken??? What’s so different about frying chickens in China???”
My comments triggered a commotion of hysterical laughs from the entire tour group.
Again, the word “cak cik” the tour guide meant was ACROBATIC PERFORMANCE. I mistaken it as FRIED CHICKEN. Apparently, ‘fried chicken’ is pronounced as chaaaaa cheeeeeee .. the vowels are pronounced longer. To me, it sounded all the same.
For example, stars .. is called “xing xing” … which also shares the same pronunciation for gorilla & faith. Pardon me but, the meaning for all the 3 words here are all very different from each other, and it would be catastrophic to make any mistake on that :P
But then, ironically, it is part of my job nature to deal with Taiwanese suppliers almost everyday… and I don’t have any problem in communicating with them at all. Apparently, they could understanding the word “fuck” very well, and I guess that’s all it takes for them to understand a scolding or two.
