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February 07 I hate Valentine's DayI hate Valentine's Day
As soon as I changed my personal message on MSN to "I hate Valentine's Day", lot of people started asking me why I hate it? Well, I've decided to put the answer on my blog as well.
I believe that the whole idea or concept of Valentine's Day is really stupid and childish. Why do we need to specify one day as a day for lovers? Love is forever, not for one day? Why we need to celebrate love on that day? When you love someone forever you are celebrating it everyday. Some people say that this day is for remembering some lovely stories. Who cares about remembering those "lovely" stories of other people? Two people fell in love, so what? I should have my own story.
Some say that it is to confess your love to the person on whom you have a crush. How stupid is that? You'll definetly get rejected if you do that because girls might think that you are just being flirty on that day. I would never do that.
I think this event was propogated by some chocolate makers who just wanted to have a huge sale of chocolates on that day. Nicely wrapped inside a heart-shaped box, so tempting that no one can resist to buy them for their lovers. The chocolate makers must be going really crazy "Profit baby, profit!"
Few months ago, I read an advertisement about a soap. That soap manufacturer advertised by propogating a "Hand Washing Day", I never heard of such a day before. Where did this day come from? How many "Days" are you going to have? As if you never wash your hands and this day is specially for washing your hands. I bet there must be a "Face Washing Day", "Bath Day" (for those who never took a bath in 365 days) and "Bathroom Washing Day" too. How ironic? What is this world turning into?
Someone asked me, ok, if you hate Valentine's Day, then you must also be hating Mother's Day, Father's Day and Children's Day. I told her that in western cultures it is quite common for young people to leave their parents behind and live entierly on their own, and their societies support this infrastructure. For them these days maybe important to remember their parents. However, in most of the Eastern societies, children are very loyal to their parents and taking care of them when they are old is considered an obligation.
For lovers, wedding anniversary is important because it is their special day, it is the day when they got married. Similarly your Birthday is important because it is the day when you were born, so it is your special day. But what's the point of Valentine's Day? Why it has become more important than the Wedding Anniversary?
China and Valentine's Day?
One thing that has alarmed me is that in China, people always turn mad when it comes to Valentine's Day. Some years ago, the concept of Valentine's Day never existed in that country. But now, young Chinese people don't take so much interest in their own festivals as much as they do in Valentine's Day and other western festivals like Christmas. They have all become western wannabes. I'm afraid someday the Chinese culture, traditions and customs will be lost forever, this will make China a very boring place to live. And if there will be any culture left, it will be a mixed and confusing culture. China has already lost many of their customs.
China has a 5,000 years of continous civilization and an amazing culture. Preserving this culture is highly important. Just imagine, if the whole world has same culture, traditions and customs, then the whole world will turn out to be a very boring place. Learning about different cultures and festivals is very good, but celebrating festivals of alien cultures in your own country may sometimes turn out to be very disastrous for the local cultures. But I'm glad that traditional societies still exist in Japan and Korea atleast, and they haven't lost most of their customs.
Lee Kong
李空
August 13 Mind Blowing Opening CeremonyYou can find the original post in Chinese language at the following path:
Mind Blowing Opening Ceremony - Scenes not shown on TV
Mind Blowing Opening Ceremony - Scenes not shown on TV In a large scale event, the role of director in charge of adjusting lenses and positioning of camera is exceptionally important. Good Director may have to accurately position the camera and adjust the lenses to show everyone the best results. As a result, Zhang Yimou's years of painstaking effort was reduced by half. This TV broadcast regretfully didn't entirely show us the magnificient olympic's ceremony that astounded the whole world. Below are the uploaded pictures for everyone to see. Opening ceremony's rataplan, neat! Spectacular! Rising of National Flag,playing of National Anthem  Who saw all the words on TV= =If these pictures were not taken, how would nearly 4000 million people, who didn't attend the ceremony, would've known what's written up there?  On the event of Peach Blossom, director decisively cut a huge close up of Peach Blossom scenery. So whole 4000 million people of the world, only saw what apparently looked like plastic flowers. Then we see the real effect at the spot, true effect！！！ This peach blossom scene was truly rocking！！  Below is the 'Holding in Hand Bamboo made Letters' performance. On TV, broadcasting director took a huge close up, getting an eyeful of the feathers on the pate, seems like a large group of people having shuttle cocks on their head. We see the real effect at the spot.  泼墨写意，画般感觉。而此时我们能在电视上看到的，只有导播切到的脑袋顶端羽毛特写  这个镜头的时候，看电视的人，完全看不到两边的优美陶瓷图画。只给了中间特写，而且是长时间的，完全没有顾忌到两边的整体协调性。  这么美好的角度，这么美丽的场景，你们居然只在女演员脸上打特写，那几个姑娘是好看，但是不能只拍她们啊！电视上没能看到这个场景，太遗憾了  我敢打赌看电视转播的观众，都不知道这幅画原来是这样的  这是太极拳表演变换太极阵，太美了。电视上在给演员们打超近距离面部特写近景  这些笑脸电视里都看不到  鸟巢烟火 连我们精心制作的烟火都没有拍摄出来  _________________ ８．１２影樓攝影活動（Ｆｉｓｈ） http://3photos.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28761 ８．１３影樓攝影活動（Ｃｈｉｎｅｅ） http://3photos.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28728 ８．１４影樓攝影活動（Ｒｏｘａｎｎｅ） http://3photos.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28833 ８．１８影樓攝影活動（Ｃｒｚｔａｌ） http://3photos.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=28809 ----------------------------------------------------------------
You can see more pictures at the following link:
July 30 中巴的未来 友谊的桥梁——巴基斯坦百人青年代表团出发侧记http://world.people.com.cn/GB/57507/7569145.html
中巴的未来 友谊的桥梁——巴基斯坦百人青年代表团出发侧记
2008年07月27日16:54 来源：人民网
7月27日上午，中国驻巴基斯坦大使馆内笑语欢歌，处处洋溢着节日的气氛。因为我驻巴大使馆的外交官们迎来了一群特殊的客人，他们是即将应邀访问中国的巴基斯坦百人青年代表团的全体成员和巴青年事务部的官员们。使馆特别为代表团举行了送行仪式，并让代表团成员们提前体验了中国的饮食文化。 July 27 不法分子设敛财陷阱 短信中奖竟出“百万富翁”I've started learning Chinese on my own few years ago and now I've decided to improve my Chinese through reading news articles written in Chinese language. I would like to post the articles I've read along with their translation, and meanings of some complicated Chinese words. I hope that this blog will help other people who, like me, are also struggling to learn Chinese. I would also appreciate the support of the Chinese people in putting their comments and suggestions about different Chinese words and correcting me where I'm wrong. Because of my poor Chinese I won't be able to translate these articles very well so your suggestions will be highly appreciated.
The below article is about the fraudulent messages received on cell phones claiming that you've won big valuable prizes, but indeed, these messages only lure you into the senders trap to gain wealth my illegitimate means. Sometimes, when you call back on the sender's number, you are stripped of your credit. In other cases, you are only befooled to submit initial cash deposit, tax or postage fee to claim your prize. This article talks about one of such cases.
You can find the below article at http://news.qq.com/a/20031201/000006.htm
不法分子设敛财陷阱 短信中奖竟出“百万富翁”
2003年12月01日06:26
半个月的时间内啥事都不做也能摇身一变当上百万富翁，这种奇遇可不是天方夜谭，南京某高校大三学生小陶就遇上了这希罕事，一不小心就成了“百万富翁”。
连一次体育彩票都没有中过的陶同学日前在半个多月的时间内一口气收到了二十三条手机中奖短信，奖品种类包括汽车、电脑、冰箱、彩电、手机等物，价值金额累计高达103.6万元！接踵而至的一笔笔“飞来横财”让陶同学哭笑不得，因为这一条条极具诱惑力的手机短信只不过是些不法分子敛财的陷阱。 在陶同学的手机上记者看到了三条内容雷同的短信：“尊敬的用户：××集团为答谢广大客户厚爱，特举办手机号抽奖活动。您已获得二等奖，奖品价值××万元，请速和颁奖处联系……”陶同学告诉记者：“其实这种短信诈骗的把戏媒体上早已屡次披露过了，所以我绝对不会上当。在收到中奖短信后我打电话过去一问，对方总是说要我向指定账号汇上几百元所谓的‘邮费’或‘税款’才能拿到价值数万元的笔记本电脑和手机等一大堆奖品，而当我提出用其中部分价值万元的奖品来冲抵区区数百元‘邮费’时，他们却支支吾吾死活不肯答应。”陶同学颇为遗憾地对记者说：“因为我经常能收到这种诈骗短信，我觉得好玩就把每次的中奖金额记在日记本上，前两天我才发现，在11月9日－11月28日期间的累计奖金竟高达103.6万元，光中奖的汽车就有两辆！” 有关专家指出，目前手机短信的发送方式主要有：手机间点对点发送，通过人工声讯台发送，网站发送和网上软件发送。但是，所有短信都得经过移动电信的平台才能到达接收方的手机，因此，从技术上防范和阻止不良手机短信，净化移动通信领域，是我国移动通信部门面临的新课题。（记者/袁扬）（来源：现代快报） -------------------------------------------
Translation
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The law offender setup a trap to accumulate wealth illegally by sending SMS, which to the recepient's surprise, turns out that he has become a "millionaire" by winning a lottery.
2003 12 01 06:26
In half of a month's time become a millionnaire without doing anything, this kind of fortuitous encounter is not a fantasy, somewhere in Nanjing a junior college student Xiao Tao encountered this rare event, happens to be a "millionnaire".
Tao didn't even once won a sports lottery in the 23 SMS messages he received continously few days ago for more than half a month, the kind of prizes included cars, computers, refrigerators, cell phones and so on, worth a total of more than 10,360,000 yuan. Student Tao found the continuous, one by one arrival of "unexpected wealth flying from the sky" both funny and annoying, because these one by one highly alluring cellphone messages were only traps setup by law offenders to accumulate wealth illegally. On student Tao's cellphone, a reporter looked at the content of three identical SMS messages: "Dear User: XX group in order to express appreciation (or thank) for the love of our large number of customers, we have conducted a lucky draw using phone numbers. You have won a second prize, the prize is worth XX ten thousand yuan. Please quickly contact award issuing department......" Student Tao told the reporter: "In fact, this kind of scandal of SMS message fraud, has already been pulished on the media frequently for a long time, so I won't be fooled at all. After receiving the SMS message I called to inquire, they always told me to remit several hundred yuan as the so called 'postage' or 'tax', to recieve tens of thousands of yuan worth of pile of prizes such as laptop computers and cell phones. Moreover, when I proposed to use a portion of prizes worth tens of thousands of yuan to offset trivial hundreds of yuan of 'postage', they hemmed and hawed, simply would not answer." Student Tao regretfully told the reporter: "Because I often receive these messages, I think it is fun so I record the amount of each lottery won on a notebook. Just two days ago I discovered, in the period from 9th of November to 28th of November, the accumulative total prize at the end reached upto 10,360,000 yuan, considering the number of cars won, there are only two."
Experts pointed out, at present, the main ways of sending short messages by mobile are: peer-to-peer SMS system, through information service centers, websites and online SMS softwares. But, all SMS messages need to pass mobile telecommuniation platform to reach the recipient's phone, so technically keep a lookout and prevent bad cellphone messages to purify communications sector, mobile communications sector of China is facing a new problem. (Reporter / Yuan Yang) (Source: Modern Express)
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啥事 [Sha2shi4]
When I was reading this article, I had absolutely no idea of the word 啥事? After inquiring about this from some of my friends I came to know that 啥 is same as 什么 which means 'what' in English.“啥事”这个是口语，表示“什么事” (In colloquial language, 啥事 is sometimes spoken instead of 什么事). 如果说你今天没有做一件事情，
你就可以说“我今天啥事也没做” (If you want to say that today you didn't do anything you may say "我今天啥事也没做"). Other examples where 啥 is used instead of 什么: 干啥呢你? (What are you doing?)
这些人合伙能弄个啥事? (What these people can do by forming a partnership?)
摇身一变 [Yao2shen1-yi1bian4]
I find this word a bit interesting. It means to be transformed into something else. I looked it up in the dictionary and it gave me the meaning "give oneself a shake and change into another form" or "suddenly change one's identity". Now if I break this four character word, 摇身 really means to shake one's body and 变 means 'to change', but many times I'm unable to figure out what does 一变 exactly means or what's the significant of putting 一 over here. As far as I know 一 doesn't only mean 'one' or 'single' but can also be used to express 'whole' or 'complete'. So 一变 means to change completely. 摇身一变 can also be put to mean to turn into something new suddenly or in a flash. Here are some examples:
单车摇身一变电单车 (Change a bicycle completely into an electrical bicycle)
渭南80万农民摇身一变成为产业工人 (8 million farmers in Weinan suddenly became industrialists)
当上 [Dang1shang4]
The word 当上 may often be followed by 摇身一变, e.g. 半个月的时间内啥事都不做也能摇身一变当上百万富翁. I was unable to find this word in my dictionary though, but you can judge from the context that it means 'to become'.
天方夜谭 [Tian1fang1 Ye4tan2]
This word means 'a fantasy tale'. But in this sentence it means 'not very rare', but actually happened. 这种奇遇可不是天方夜谭 (This kind of fortunate encounter may not be a fantasy tale of Arabian Nights). This kind of event is not very rare but actually occured. And who was the one who encountered this event? None other than a Junior College student called Xiao Tao.
高校大三学生
Generally it means Junior College student. If we break this word, 高校 means 'colleges and universities' and 高等学校的简称 (Short form of all high level schools such as universities and colleges). Another word that I found a little difficult to comprehend is 大三, it doesn't make much of a sense on its own and when I first looked at this word I took it as 'big three'. What does it mean after all? Later I came to know that 大三学生 is a student who is studying in third year in a univeristy (大学是四年制，大三学生是指已经读了三年大学的人). So a third year student is a junior student. Chinese language has so many interesting words and those who say that it's fun learning are absolutely right.
一不小心就成了“百万富翁”
一...就... is a conjunction phrase (关联词). Connecting adverbial clause with the main sentence such as "as soon as", "once....", "when"
http://www.gaokao.net.cn/pocket/flash/jfw_pylj.swf (This is for English learners, but I found it funny)
However some argue that 一...就... and "as soon as" don't exactly lie in the same category, check out this link:
一不小心就成了“百万富翁”is a little complex phrase that sometimes can't be translated exactly in English. In order to understand it, one may need to have a good understanding of Chinese culture and emotions of the people. 一...就... here is used in an ironical style. I found out that many Chinese people understood it and found it humorous but failed to express this exact Chinese humour into English. Some said that this Chinese phrase expresses that Xiaotao became a "millionaire" without even knowing it. Well, I found this the best translation that could expresses the irony, because we all know from the context that Xiaotao didn't actually become a millionaire but she was put up in a trap by someone. The "millionaire" or "百万富翁" is a lie. So it may be translated as, 'As soon as you’re not careful, you'll become a "millionnaire"' or 'Once you're careless you'll become a "millionaire"'. The word in double quotes is the key. It's a trap, so if you're not careful or as soon as you become careless, you'll fall into the trap. Don't believe in such fake messages that claim you've become a millionaire overnight by winning a lottery, if you believe them you'll call them back on a number provided and they'll strip you of your money as discussed earlier.
连一次...都...
Even once. 体育彩票
体育彩票 is a sports lottery ticket. To know about the details of the sports lottery, see the links below.
一口气 [yi1kou3qi4]
Means continuously. In the dictionary it shows up 'one breath; in one breath; without a break'. So 一口气收到了二十三条手机 means 'continuously received 23 SMS messages'.
都没有中过的
体育彩票都没有中过 means did not win a sports lottery. Here 中 is used as a verb which means 'to hit' or 'to hit a mark'. There's a word in Chinese 中奖 [zhong4jiang3], which means 'to win a lottery or prize'. Similarly you can say 中彩票, win a lottery and 中过彩票, have won a lottery (过 is used for past tense over here). 没有中过体育彩票 (have not won a sports lottery). You can also say 没有中过的 (have not won) and place 体育彩票 before 没有中过的. So 体育彩票没有中过的 as used in the article above. 连一次体育彩票都没有中过的, have not won a lottery even once. 一次 means once and 连...都 (even) pattern is used.
连一次体育彩票都没有中过的陶同学....
The student Tao who has not won a sports lottery even once...
连一次体育彩票都没有中过 an attributive clause for 陶同学
http://www.nciku.com/search/all/%E4%B8%AD%E5%A5%96
http://www.ctcfl.ox.ac.uk/Lang%20work/Grammar%20database/grammar_database1.htm#The%20lian%20ye%20construction 接踵而至的一笔笔“飞来横财”
This phrase uses two idioms, one is 接踵而至 and the other is 飞来横财. 接踵而至 means a series of things happnened, one after another and another with very short intervals. In other words something happened and another thing followed it. Next, there's 飞来横财 which means getting wealthy unexpectedly. Breaking this word, 飞来 means 'arriving from the sky' or 'flying from the sky' as 飞 means to fly and 横 means, unexpected and 财 means wealth. So it's unexpected wealth flying from the sky. I didn't know what these phrases meant so I logged on the chinese-forums and asked my friends. Here's the link http://www.chinese-forums.com/showthread.php?t=24377.
Now we we are left with 一笔笔, which is little tricky. I think it means many things happened one by one. 一笔 is a measure word and when we say 笔 twice as in 一笔笔 then it becomes one by one. So 一笔笔“飞来横财”can be translated as "arrival of unexpected wealth one by one". 一笔笔 的意思就是 一件接一件 的事情发生; 一个接一个. Many times in Chinese 一只只 is used in Chinese articles, here's an example.
走到店门口，就看见一只只蟹排排开装在盒子里 (Come to the shop, just to see crabs arranged in line one after another inside a box)
There's also a very nice song in Chinese that uses 'one after another' or 'one by one' a lot e.g. 一座座山 and 一片片云. The name of the song is 谁不说俺家乡好 and I've put it up on my blog along with its English translation. Here's the link http://cid-e27f4ac2379f4c00.spaces.live.com/blog/cns!E27F4AC2379F4C00!255.entry
哭笑不得
I looked up this Chinese idiom in a dictionary and it gave me the following translation:
"find sth. both funny and annoying; be at a loss whether to cry or laugh".
看这种节目, 真是让人哭笑不得
Watching such kind of a program, really makes the person to be at a loss wheter to cry or laugh
So 接踵而至的一笔笔“飞来横财”让陶同学哭笑不得 can be translated as 'Student Tao found this continuous, one by one arrival of "unexpected wealth flying from the sky" both funny and annoying'.
极具 极具诱惑力 means 'very alluring' or 'very attractive'. 极具 here means 'deeply' or 'very much', 是特别有, 非常有, 就是诱惑里很大. 极具极其具有.
二等奖
2nd Prize
请速和颁奖处联系
Please contact with the award issuing department as soon as possible. Here 速 means as soon as possible, rapidly, speedily. Here 速 is used as an adverb where as 联系 is a verb. One may wonder why 速 is being used as adverb here then how come it is not followed by a 地. Well I was told by one of my friends that it is customary to use 速 without 地. Chinese people are just used to say it this way. You could also say 请速和颁奖处联系 as 请尽快地和颁奖处联系 but for some adverbs such as 早, 快, 多, 少, 慢 can be placed before verbs without using 地. Take a look at the 4th point of following link to the Oxford University Chinese Center: http://www.ctcfl.ox.ac.uk/Grammar%20exercises/ADV%20de.htm
一大堆奖品
A pile of prizes. 大堆 means mountain or pile.
支支吾吾
支支吾吾 in Chinese means to falter or 'hem and haw' or to hesitate while speaking or deciding about something.
他们却支支吾吾死活不肯答应
Here 却 means 'however'. 他们却 - they however. 死活 means 'life and death' like in 死活问题 (a matter of life and death; a question of vital importance). However, it can also be used to mean anyway, in any case (无论如何); in despite of everything (不管怎么说). So 他们却支支吾吾死活不肯答应 can be translated as, 'they hemmed and hawed, simply not answering. They didn't answer no matter what.
遗憾
遗憾 means to feel pity or regret something. 陶同学颇为遗憾地对记者说 (Student Tao regretfully told the reporter). 就是为了某件事情感到后悔, 或许这件事情是已经过去的事情.
诈骗
诈骗 means to cheat or defraud. So 诈骗短信 is fraud messages.
就 in 我觉得好玩就把每次的中奖金额记在日记本上 means 'so'. 'I find it funny so I record the amount of the prize won everytime on a notebook'. The character 就 has many usages, have a look at the links below:
http://forum.chinesepod.com/viewtopic.php?t=2030
http://www.ctcfl.ox.ac.uk/Grammar%20exercises/Jiu%20&%20Cai.htm http://humanum.arts.cuhk.edu.hk/cgi-bin/agrep-lindict?query=%b4%4e&category=wholerecord http://www.chinese-forums.com/showthread.php?t=3048 http://mirani86.blogspot.com/2008/04/hanyu-notes.html 才
才 in 前两天我才发现 means 'not until'. "Not until two days ago I discovered..." or "Just two days ago I discovered..." or "I just discovered two days ago..."
有关
有关 in 有关专家指出... means 'related', the related experts pointed out...
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谁不说俺家乡好谁不说俺家乡好 This is a Chinese folk song where one describes how beautiful his/her hometown is. I've also put up the lyrics of this song along with its translation. I thought that it would also be helpful in learning Chinese. Just like any other Chinese folk song it hasr really beautiful lyrics.
Lyrics一座座青山紧相连 弯弯的河水流不尽 绿油油的果树满山岗 ------------------------------------------------------------- Translation, phrase by phrase一座座青山紧相连 ------------------------------------------------------------- Here's another video, but only with music. The music is played by an instrument called 笛 (di2) in Chinese, known as flute in English.
Here's the newer version of the same song
Some other video links http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DVkx5Ii6JUY http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XNTkyODU1Ng==.html http://v.youku.com/v_show/id_XMTYzNzE4MzY=.html
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