The International Language of Onomatopoeia

(Or: Would a duck by any other quack sound as sweet?)

There are certain things in life that people often take for granted. The sun rises and sets. Santa will only leave gifts for good boys and girls. Grass is green. The sky is blue. Dogs bark, birds tweet… They do, don’t they? Well, maybe where you come from, but not in China.

What sound does your dog make? Woof? Bark? In China, the word is wang (1st tone, in case you were wondering). Admittedly, the issue of whether this is standard mutt-Mandarin, or the local doggy dialect remains unclear. If you brought your non-Chinese dog to China it is possible that the poor thing would stand no chance of communicating with its oriental canine cousins.

But the story doesn’t end there; dogs are not the only creatures with a language barrier to overcome. In fact, even the humble frog would have trouble chatting around an average koi pond on Chinese soil. While you may have previously thought it common knowledge that a frog communicates solely in ribbits, as you have probably now guessed, this is not the case in China. If you absolutely must imitate the Budweiser frogs while in the PRC, please ensure that the standard call of gua gua is used at all times, in order to avoid any confusion that may arise.

The confusion extends further into the animal kingdom. A patent worldwide shortage of farmyard translators has ensured that livestock destined for a future outside their home countries’ borders are in a constant state of bewilderment. Pity the poor sheep of the English-speaking world; There cries of baa baa simply don’t cut it once they’re past Chinese passport control, and are instead drowned in a sea of mie. 

But it is not all bad news. In fact, for cats with an international inclination, relocating to China would likely cause a minimum of disruption, having to cope with only a change of accent rather than a different language. (Go on, try to miaow with a Chinese accent.)

Confusing as this all is, the level of education among China’s non-human population demands respect – it is apparent that animals of Chinese origin are clearly familiar with the rules of standard Chinese and always use the right one of Mandarin’s four tones.

As a sad footnote, after extensive research, it has proven nigh on impossible to ascertain the sounds made by particularly Chinese beasts like the giant panda (ooh, is it a bear, is it a raccoon?) and the common or garden dragon.

Desperate to communicate with Chinese animals? Click here.

Birds of a feather

There are things that I've come to understand about China. People will never believe that I like spicy food. People will respond to my spoken Chinese with mime. Mashed potato will always be served cold, surrounded by a moat of milk, with coloured sprinkles on top. I accept these things and try not to let them get me down.

But there are other things, things that I don't think I'll ever understand. I've already written about one such example, when landlords actually raise the rent after apartments have been sitting empty for months, to recoup the money they've already lost. This seems an unusual business decision to me. But there's another one, a more obvious and highly visual one, that I'm sure many others have noticed...

If you need to buy some flowers in Xi'an, where do you go? Flower street, of course. What about a neon sign for the front of your shop? Head on down to neon sign street. Desperately need some goldfish? Simply take a bus down to goldfish street and ye shall be rewarded. I can't help but wonder.... is it really a good idea for stores that sell identical items to be located right next door to each other in a single long strip? Often, they have exactly the same prices too. Where is the competition? How can that be a good business idea? I've heard that if a couple of similar shops, nearby to each other, seem to have a good business, then that just encourages many others to open identical shops next door.

A sign-making shop, next to a sign-making shop, next to a...

Doesn't this just dilute how much money is being brought into the available stores in that particular identi-shop strip? Once the saturation point has been reached there simply won't be enough business/money to spread around... right? Whatever happened to finding a gap in the market? Wouldn't it make more sense to find out where there are NO florists, and open one there? Well, not in China.

Six florists in this photo, but there are plenty of others nearby

The thing is, this Chinese system doesn't seem to work.... so why does it persist? 

Luck.

It's all about how lucky you are. If business is poor, the store makes a loss and has to close, then what is the cause? Location? Lack of advertising? Wrong product or pricing? Nope - the guy just wasn't lucky enough. So, sure enough, another one will open in its place a few weeks later, opened by someone that believe they will be luckier than the last one. And so the cycle continues.

There seems to be a general belief that the path to riches goes something like this:

1. Open a shop (preferably selling little crappy things that nobody really wants, which are really cheap, and can only possibly yield a profit of 1 RMB.)

2. Plan is complete - you are rich.

There are no possible alternatives or deviations from this plan. At least, not in the minds of the myriad shop owners, and potential shop owners, of Xi'an. Did you have any idea that is was so simple? Let's all go and open stores in a shopping mall right now! Oh wait, you probably shouldn't bother, since they're all empty caverns...

Play, Setup, Scene, Spanial

English is fashionable in China. It has been for a number of years, and the trend is likely to continue. English words adorn many items of clothing, and translations from the original Chinese often accompany things like shop names and descriptions of food items. If it doesn't have abc on it, it just aint worth having.

I know, I know, Chinglish is an easy target. And there is already a great wealth of it available on t'internet for your viewing pleasure. But I've already largely resisted the urge for several months, and I've collected a few pictures that unreasonably amused me...

This is the menu page of a some random DVD I saw a few months ago. (You can assume that this isn't from a 100% legitimate copy of the film...) I was rather hoping that selecting the fourth option would translate the entire thing into woofs and barks, but sadly this was not the case.

This is an entry in the menu of a restaurant I often go to. I believe the translation should be something along the lines of a 'bull's penis cut into the shape of a flower', which isn't necessarily much better than what the menu actually states... but there's just something about the wording that puts a smile on my face:

Not in my family it doesn't

I imagine that many of these low-budget translations stem from the use of internet-based translation software by someone who has little or no knowledge of English... Here is an interesting illustration of what can happen when quality control really goes out the window - found in large writing on the front of a shop, somewhere between Taiyuan and Beijing: