Category: China

Chinese Mystery Explained: Humorous Names

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Describing my first day of teaching at Tsinghua, I wrote:

The students did brief introductions. Many students appeared to think that one student’s Chinese name was humorous. This was briefly explained to me but I still have trouble believing it.

I don’t remember the brief explanation. At the time I didn’t know that my Chinese name sounds exactly like the word for eggplant, which has different characters. As the Tsinghua story suggests, this isn’t rare. I met a girl whose name sounds the same as China’s ruler. (Different characters, of course.) Anyway, it seems a blessing that my name has a humorous side and perhaps that’s what the parents in this case were thinking.

Assorted Links

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  • “Your body’s resistance to an activity isn’t an obstacle to be overcome, it’s a message that you’re being an idiot, just like when your hand hurts after you punch a wall. The right solution isn’t to start punching the wall harder, it’s to look around for a tool to help you do the job . . . With losing weight, the key is things like the Shangri-La Diet.” Aaron Swartz argues that if something needs a lot of will-power to do, it’s a mistake. I agree.
  • Reed Hundt on “Bandwidth, Jobs, and the Future of Internet Freedom”.
  • Art DeVany interviewed on Econtalk. Agrees with Aaron.
  • In China, “what censored actually means”. “One day last summer, an anonymous member posted something on a Baidu forum devoted to the online game World of Warcraft, and it became an Internet meme: Jia Junpeng, your mother wants you to go home to eat. The cheeky, mysterious sentence received seven million hits and 300,000 comments on the first day. . . . Around the time the post originally appeared, a famous blogger named Guo Baofeng was arrested [by the Mawei police] for posting allegations of an official cover-up in the brutal rape of a 25-year-old woman named Yan Xiaoling in Mawei, a district in the city of Fuzhou. She later died of her injuries. . . . Bloggers began calling on people to send postcards to the Mawei police: Guo Baofeng, your mother wants you to go home to eat. Similar messages sprouted on bulletin-board sites. A few days later, Guo was released.”

Thanks to Evelyn Mitchell.

City Air Makes Free

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“City air makes free” is a medieval saying quoted by Jane Jacobs. I thought of it a few months ago when I visited an experimental private school near Shanghai. The founder of the school wanted to encourage creativity among students, in contrast to the main Chinese educational system with its overwhelming emphasis on memorization. His school was itself an example of city air makes free. There are many factories around Shanghai, filled with migrants from rural areas. These workers moved without official permission, which made their children ineligible for public school. This created a market for private schools, such as the one I visited. The school’s founder was previously a school teacher. The rural-urban migration had made him free to start his own school.

By growing up in a city instead of a village, regardless of what school she attends, regardless of overall economic growth, a Chinese student will have more access to the Internet, much bigger libraries, better teachers, far more students of different backgrounds, far more occupations in action, and a much wider range of culture. Her parents’ increased income may allow her to have a computer. Her family will suffer less from corrupt government officials. The increase in freedom — in opportunity — is profound. Her creativity and productivity will increase because she will better match her talents and her job. This is why Chinese creativity will increase enormously in the coming years whether the education system changes or not.

That such thinkers as Bill McKibben (who doesn’t understand the importance of cities for saving energy) and Jeffrey Sachs (who doesn’t understand the importance of cities for economic development) fail to understand this point shows how non-obvious it is. One more reason Jane Jacobs was a great economist.

“ She and other Chinese I met on my trip had a much broader sense of what was possible, or what they were missing out on, than previous generations.”

The Chinese Military and the Umami Hypothesis

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In an article about China’s military, James Fallows says American forces are much stronger, partly because:

In modern times, American forces are continually in combat somewhere in the world. This has its drawbacks, but it means that U.S. leaders, tactics, and doctrine are constantly refined by the realities of warfare. In contrast, vanishingly few members of the People’s Liberation Army have any combat experience whatsoever.

He could have used the word readiness. One reason I believe my Umami Hypothesis — that we require a steady stream of bacteria in our diet to be healthy — is the underlying logic: That a steady stream of bacteria continuously activate the immune system, keeping it in working order. Without low-level activation, the immune system will (a) react too slowly, causing noticeable colds, and (b) overreact, which causes allergies and other immune system disorders, such as arthritis.

I wonder if the same logic applies in other situations — if a constant low-level threat improves performance. Is Chinese governance better because Chinese leadership feels threatened?

Assorted Links

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Thanks to Carl Hattery.

Learning Chinese (update)

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I’ve spent seven months living in Beijing. Since that started (October 2008) I’ve wanted to learn Chinese. I’ve tried many things. Now, finally, I think I’ve found a method that works for part of it (written vocabulary).

There are four aspects:

Content. I’m learning the basic 800-odd words covered in Learning Chinese Characters by Alison and Laurence Mathews, which are those required by a certain standard Chinese Language test (HSK Level A). I use their make-a-story method for each character.

Study Method. I use Anki. It’s like flashcards, but with a near-optimal mix of old and new cards. Comparison of Anki with similar software. When I used actual flashcards, I didn’t do a good job of mixing old and new cards. I found a Anki deck already made for the Mathews book. The Mathews will be glad to know that the (free) Anki deck plus (free) Anki software make their book more valuable. I constantly consult it for help.

Catalyst. I walk on a treadmill to make studying pleasant.

Minimalism. When I told a Chinese friend I was just learning the meaning of each character, not the pronunciation, she frowned. After that I tried to learn the pronunciation, too. But now, trying to learn the pronunciation at the same time, the whole thing goes too slowly. The pronunciation is much harder than the meaning and less useful. Learning just the meaning is much faster and makes the whole thing seem more doable.

More The origin of Anki-like programs. An approach similar to the Mathews’s.

Assorted Links

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Thanks to Oskar Pearson and Dave Lull.

Two Chinese Idioms

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dao ye. dao means to buy in one place and sell in another (an example of how Chinese has far more verbs than English). The literal meaning of ye is grandpa but it is humorously used to praise someone. The dao ye are people who buy little stuff, such as clothes, in Southern China, where it’s made, and sell it in Beijing. Probably on the sidewalk.

chao fang tuan. Chao means stir-fry (fast cooking), fang means houses or apartments, and tuan means group (of people). The chao fang tuan are those who speculate in real estate. They buy a house or apartment and sell it quickly. “Everyone in China hates the chao fang tuan,” said my friend.

MSG and Nightmares (continued)

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I am staying in a nice hotel near Shanghai. Last night I dreamed that my stuff (suitcase, etc.) had been put in the hallway outside my room. As — in the dream — I was walking to the front desk to complain, I realized I must be dreaming. This couldn’t possibly have happened, I thought. It was that realistic. Later that night I had another mild realistic nightmare — about missing the bus.

I rarely have dreams like that. During the day I’d had a lot more Chinese food than usual. Two big meals. (Lunch, at a restaurant, had included yogurt, incidentally.) Without my friend’s experience I would have never connected the Chinese food and the nightmares.