MetaFilter posts tagged with Chinese

I Hate Karl Marx

seemoreglass — Fri, 07 Jun 2013 13:33:54 -0800

Your bronze head will be smashed to pieces and recycled into bicycles in Hunan province.

Ni haor Kair Lanr, ni de Putonghuar tin haor!

dubusadus — Fri, 10 May 2013 04:43:28 -0800

Phonemica is a project to record spoken stories in every one of the thousands of varieties of Chinese in order to preserve both stories and language for future generations. (via) TV Tropes has a good primer. "My Mother's Fur" is a short short-story about language and family.

Tiger moms, you are doing it wrong.

kanuck — Wed, 08 May 2013 13:05:32 -0800

Amy Chua's anecdotal "tiger mom" manifesto meets some peer-reviewed data-driven research. Oh snap! Compared with the supportive parenting profile, a tiger parenting profile was associated with lower GPA and educational attainment, as well as less of a sense of family obligation; it was also associated with more academic pressure, more depressive symptoms, and a greater sense of alienation. The current study suggests that, contrary to the common perception, tiger parenting is not the most typical parenting profile in Chinese American families, nor does it lead to optimal adjustment among Chinese American adolescents. tl;dr summary via Slate's Paul Tullis. Previously: [1, 2]

The Complicated Chinese Family Tree: A Video Guide

milquetoast — Tue, 23 Apr 2013 09:23:17 -0800

The Complicated Chinese Family Tree - Cantonese Version! Or, if you like, the original in putonghua. (This previous post may be of some assistance.)

Masters of making you cry

ctmf — Sun, 10 Mar 2013 12:53:14 -0800

The Chopsticks Brothers (筷子兄弟) [Google translated bio] are Xiao Yang and Wang Taili, Chinese indie musician/filmmakers making internet short films which generally function as extended music videos for their original songs. Old Boys (42 min, english sub) October 2010 [Youku copy] - over 52 million views Short video on YouTube, english subtitles The Winner (english sub) 5.5 Million views in first 3 days 15 million + view on this copy on Youku Father (June 2012) has alternate versions of the film for sons or daughters As yet, no English subtitled version seems to be available, but it's still worth watching. Father/son version Father/daughter version

The Balinghou

zarq — Thu, 07 Mar 2013 12:50:29 -0800

Generation Gap: "The parents of China’s post-1980 generation [the bā líng hòu (八零後)] (themselves born between 1950 and 1965) grew up in a rural, Maoist world utterly different from that of their children. In their adolescence, there was one phone per village, the universities were closed and jobs were assigned from above. If you imagine the disorientation and confusion of many parents in the West when it comes to the internet and its role in their children’s lives, and then add to that dating, university life and career choices, you come close to the generational dilemma. Parents who spent their own early twenties labouring on remote farms have to deal with children who measure their world in malls, iPhones and casual dates." Further Reading: * China Research Center: China's 80's Generation Working for the Future * New York Times: A privileged generation in China performs well in crises

Beyond untranslatable words

Lorin — Sun, 03 Feb 2013 17:15:39 -0800

In 1995, an Atlantic story on the first Chinese translation of Ulysses closed with the offhand remark that "no one in China is offering to translate Finnegans Wake." Today on the (day after the) 131st anniversary of his birth, James Joyce's famously difficult work is a bestseller in China.

More "Oriental," like the one in Seinfeld

Mchelly — Sun, 20 Jan 2013 07:25:35 -0800

Why Everybody Films at the Same Damn NY Chinese Restaurant. You know, the one that doesn't actually exist.

Convoy Conquest!

threeants — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 18:15:36 -0800

Tireless eaters Jenne and Miko set out to try every restaurant along San Diego's Convoy Street. (via Projects) THE RULES 1. We'll be covering Convoy St. from Clairemont Mesa Blvd. to Aero Dr. We'll go down the west side of Convoy first (north to south), and then we'll go up the east (south to north). 2. We must order at least one of the server's recommendations. 3. We can only choose to skip a restaurant if we have both eaten there. 4. We are allowed to skip chain restaurants. 5. If food is not the main business of the place, we do not have to go there (e.g. bars/karaoke spots that serve food). 6. If we would like something sweet after the meal, we have to try the dessert places/cafes in order. 7. We are not allowed to look up reviews beforehand. They've already eaten almost seventy meals as part of the project, sampling items ranging from transcendent honey toast to curry stew that "tasted exactly like the powdered cream of chicken soup we used to take on backpacking trips."

A Chinese Princess and a magic well

infini — Mon, 24 Dec 2012 11:17:35 -0800

Historically, the city states of the Malay Peninsula often paid tribute to regional kingdoms such as those of China and Siam. Closer relations with China were established in the early 15th century during the reign of Parameswara, founder of Melaka, when Admiral Zheng He (Cheng Ho) sailed through the Straits of Malacca. Impressed by the tribute, the Yongle Emperor of China is said to have presented Princess Hang Li Po* as a gift to Mansur Shah, then Sultan of Malacca (+/-1459 AD). Tradition claims the courtiers and servants who accompanied the princess settled in Bukit Cina, intermarried with the locals and grew into a community known as the Peranakan. Colloquially known as Baba-Nyonya, the Peranakan or Straits Chinese, they retained many of their ethnic and religious customs, but assimilated the language and clothing of the Malays. They developed a unique culture and distinct foods. Nyonya cuisine is one of the most highly rated in the South East Asian region, considered some of the most difficult to master but very easy to love and enjoy.

Dark Field Microscopy

lemuring — Mon, 17 Dec 2012 05:48:19 -0800

I did not know the incense storing temple,

I walked a few miles into the clouded peaks.

No man on the path between the ancient trees,

A bell rang somewhere deep among the hills.

A spring sounded choked, running down steep rocks,

The green pines chilled the sunlight's coloured rays.

Come dusk, at the bend of a deserted pool,

Through meditation I controlled passion's dragon.

Stopping at Incense Storing Temple, Wang Wei (699-759)

Nutmeg: smells of holidays from a history of battles and massacres

filthy light thief — Fri, 30 Nov 2012 11:30:22 -0800

This unassuming, feel-good spice "has been one of the saddest stories of history," from the gruesome, grisly tale of how the Dutch tortured and massacred the people of the Banda Islands in Indonesia in an attempt to monopolize the nutmeg trade. In the first century A.D., Roman author Pliny speaks of a tree bearing nuts with two flavors. Emperor Henry VI had the streets of Rome fumigated with nutmegs before his coronation. In the the sixth century, nutmegs were brought by Arab merchants to Constantinople. There was competition between Muslims and Chinese over control of the Indonesian spice trade, but life was good for the islanders, as nutmeg takes very little effort to grow. The islanders had do little but watch the nutmeg grow, collect it from trees and take out the nuts and trade them for food, cloth and all the things they needed with Chinese, Malay, Arab and Bugi spice traders.

It's no exaggeration to say that the hunt for nutmeg helped build the modern commercial world. In 1453, the Ottoman Turks conquered Constantinople (modern Istanbul), embargoing trade across the sole sliver of land through which a few merchants had evaded the Arab-Venetian spice monopoly and forcing Europeans to find new eastern trade routes. Columbus sailed the blue Atlantic looking for a passage to India; and Vasco da Gama rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1497, his men charging on to the shores of Kerala crying, "For Christ and spices!" The Portuguese military genius Afonso de Albuquerque annexed the Indonesian Molucca islands, of which the Bandas form part, in 1511. The fortresses he built there established and then consolidated a Portuguese monopoly over the world's nutmeg that lasted almost a whole cushy century.

Then on December 25, 1616, Captain Nathaniel Courthope reached Run, an island in the Banda Islands, to defend it against the claims of the Dutch East India Company. Though Asian traders had long known of the "spice islands" and the Portuguese were the first to Europeans to claim the islands, a contract with the inhabitants was signed accepting the James I of England as sovereign of Run island. As a result, Run is considered to be the first English overseas colony. This was just the start of the spice wars in the Banda Islands, pitting the native people and some British forces against the Dutch, who subjected Run to four years of siege. The battles and disputes over Run and the other nutmeg-producing islands came to a close in 1667, when the Treaty of Breda saw the Dutch with control over Run, and the British getting New Amsterdam, which became New York. The British had diminished the importance of the Banda Islands by planting nutmeg trees in Grenada and Zanzibar, which also decreased the price of the costly spice. The former is still a major producer of nutmeg, where they grow in abundance. Thanks to modern cultivation, you can make many, many foods with nutmeg.

Typical Pentagon boondoggle

theodolite — Thu, 11 Oct 2012 13:27:39 -0800

The Global Language Online Support System (or GLOSS), produced by the Defense Language Institute in sunny Monterey, CA, offers over six thousand free lessons in 38 languages from Albanian to Uzbek, with particular emphasis on Chinese, Persian, Russian, Korean, and various types of Arabic. The lessons include both reading and listening components and are refreshingly based on real local materials (news articles, radio segments, etc.) rather than generic templates. Important note: level 1 is considered "low intermediate" and assumes a basic knowledge of the language. For more elementary lessons, or if you just prefer your US government-produced language courses with a groovy 1970s vibe, try the ever-popular FSI Language Courses.

Kung Pao Chicken

Egg Shen — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 16:20:29 -0800

Ding Baozhen (1820-1886) was a governor of Sichuan province during the Qing dynasty. The emperor bestowed upon him the title Gōng Bǎo - "palatial guardian". He supervised the reconstruction of the Dujiangyan Irrigation System. But he achieved immortality through the dish named for him: Kung Pao Chicken. Fuchsia Dunlop, whose recipe was chosen to accompany the NPR story, has a nifty blog. (previously)

Water buffalos in Yunnan

mark7570 — Tue, 28 Aug 2012 04:55:26 -0800

"Our bull is very strong, so let's call him Optimus Prime." A look at the sport of water buffalo fighting in southwest China. (Don't miss the video on the article page.)

Square Word Calligraphy: English that Looks Like Chinese

jef — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 21:56:12 -0800

English that looks like Chinese. "At first glance, Square Word Calligraphy appears to be nothing more unusual than Chinese characters, but in fact it is a new way of rendering English words in the format of a square so they resemble Chinese characters. Chinese viewers expect to be able to read Square Word Calligraphy but cannot. Western viewers, however are surprised to find they can read it. Delight erupts when meaning is unexpectedly revealed." (Britta Erickson, The Art of Xu Bing.) "At first glance, Square Word Calligraphy appears to be nothing more unusual than Chinese characters, but in fact it is a new way of rendering English words in the format of a square so they resemble Chinese characters. Chinese viewers expect to be able to read Square Word Calligraphy but cannot. Western viewers, however are surprised to find they can read it. Delight erupts when meaning is unexpectedly revealed." (Britta Erickson, The Art of Xu Bing, as quoted in Language Education in China by Agnes S.L. Lam, Hong Kong University Press, 2005, viewable in Google Books). 1. Xu Bing's original project from 1994. Can you read it? 2. Omniglot has a variation on the system which was apparently developed by David B. Kelley in 2012 in order to use more Chinese-like elements. As noted on the Omniglot page, the process here is reminiscent of Korean Hangul writing, which combines a elements from a phonetic alphabet into square block characters.

No Place For Your Kind

6550 — Tue, 14 Aug 2012 17:49:00 -0800

No Place for Your Kind Photojournalist Tim Greyhavens documents sites of anti-Chinese violence in the American West around the turn of the last century. NYT blog post on the project.

Welcome to The Long Wall of 10,000 Li

zarq — Sun, 22 Jul 2012 15:20:17 -0800

The Great Wall of China (長城) took 2000 years to build, and stretches for 5500 miles. Yet pictures of that wonder of the world in popular media are typically restricted to the tourist-visited sections closest to Beijing. (There are several sections of the wall near that city.) Kuriositas has gathered some images that present the Wall from other areas.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

gman — Thu, 05 Jul 2012 05:56:32 -0800

Mike McHenry has posted several photo pages of the Chinese firecracker and firework labels he's been collecting since 1968.

Where should we go tonight?

2bucksplus — Wed, 20 Jun 2012 15:25:26 -0800

David Chan has eaten at 6,090 Chinese restaurants. He's eaten at more than 300 Chinese restaurants in New York alone and visited every state. Here's his list of the top ten Chinese restaurants in America, all of which are in California, most in Los Angeles. Chan has posted reviews and restaurant news to Chowhound as Chandavkl since 2000.

"What appears as discipline or “tough love” from one perspective often appears as abuse from another."

the man of twists and turns — Mon, 07 May 2012 11:50:30 -0800

On Tiger Moms: "What the controversy surrounding Chua demonstrates, however inadvertently, is that parenting techniques are always grounded in basic assumptions about the way things are and what matters to us. And they are always guided by some answer to the most fundamental of ethical questions—how to live?" Via The Point Magazine, and, previously on Metafilter, Amy Chua's original article: Why Chinese Mothers Are Superior

The Chinese Typewriter

Trurl — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 18:12:06 -0800

As you can see, the [Chinese] typewriter is extremely complicated and cumbersome. The main tray — which is like a typesetter's font of lead type — has about two thousand of the most frequent characters. Two thousand characters are not nearly enough for literary and scholarly purposes, so there are also a number of supplementary trays from which less frequent characters may be retrieved when necessary. What is even more intimidating about a Chinese typewriter is that the characters as seen by the typist are backwards and upside down! The influential author Lin Yutang received a patent in 1946 for his "Mingkwai" [clear and quick] model - which could produce 90,000 words with 72 keys. Stanford professor Thomas S. Mullaney's work-in-progress on the history of the Chinese typewriter is being blogged here.

Or understand the deliciousness that jiaozi has

Trurl — Tue, 14 Feb 2012 19:28:08 -0800

You can make jiaozi. But you can't make it like this . The word jiao zi has a fascinating history where it has taken on different meanings throughout the centuries. The end result is a multi-definitive term which does not simply mean dumpling, but is symbolic of the way money is viewed in the Chinese culture.

A dance for spring

of strange foe — Sun, 22 Jan 2012 15:09:04 -0800

Here's a dance performed by Yang Liping and her niece Cai Qi at a Chinese New Year gala recently. It's called "Spring" and will likely mark the end of a celebrated career. Yang Liping (杨丽萍） is perhaps most famous for her gorgeous arm movements in the Peacock Dance (雀之灵), and here's one more dance performed entirely in silhouette called "Moon". (MLYT)

Extrinsic Flavours!

awfurby — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 18:30:55 -0800

Thinking of visiting Melbourne? This video will help you make your decision! (SLVimeo)