URLLesson Introduction
“The greatest danger could be your stupidity.” “Hell is paved with good intentions.” “Magic time is created when unconventional person comes.” Where can such sage wisdom be found? Confucius? The Analects? Nope. Fortunate you are amongst eaters if you even get a fortune cookie at the end of your ‘Chinese’ meal. Learn about how un-Chinese these Chinese cookies really are, in this podcast.
johns says
June 11, 2008
A good place to get your fortune cookie fortune without gaining weight is to click on this site:
http://www.fortunecookiemessage.com/index.php
clay says
June 11, 2008
I thought this was so interesting when i first came to asia as a 14 year old. i couldnt believe the chinese restaurants in singapore didnt have fortune cookies!
from what i have discovered online, two people claim the cookie.
#1 A Chinese immigrant, David Jung, living in Los Angeles and founder of the Hong Kong Noodle Company invented the fortune cookie in 1918.
#2 A Japanese immigrant named Makoto Hagiwara invented the fortune cookie in San Francisco in 1914. He was the designer of the famous Japanese Tea Garden in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco.
either way, it was born in Cali... not China.
changye says
June 11, 2008
Let me "PROUDLY" tell you that fortune cookies are originated in (起源于) Kyoto, Japan, and the guy who introduced them to the US first was also Japanese.And that is why you can’t find fortune cookies in Mainland China.
Strangely enough, I’ve never seen them in Japan either, which I suppose has something to do with the food sanitation law or something like that in Japan, perhaps. Just a guess. Anyway, I've finally found a creation that Japan can boast to the world!
clay says
June 11, 2008
changye,
looks like you and california courts are in agreement. wikipedia states that there was a court case in '83 to settle this, and hagiwara is proclaimed as the inventor.
also, on the way to work this morning i noticed the use of 正宗 zhèngzōng on a couple of restaraunt signs. I had learned 地道 dìdao to mean genuine/authentic, but after going over this lesson, the word was fresh in my mind and i saw it all over the place.
dedsall78 says
June 11, 2008
I have a couple of questions relating to the expansion selection.
What are the differences between these two sets of sentences. Or do they have the same meaning in this case?
来这里你可以吃到最正宗的新疆菜.
vs
来这里你可以吃最正宗的新疆菜。
我喜欢吃咬起来脆脆的苹果。
vs
我喜欢吃脆的苹果。
I don't quite get why 到 was used in the first sentence and wonder if there would be any difference if it was omitted in this case.
As for the second one, I don't really understand why 咬起来 was used. Is it just for emphasis?
Thanks.
derek says
June 11, 2008
A question on 3 related words:
幸运 xing4yun4 - good fortune; good luck;
命运 ming4yun4 - destiny; fate;
运气 yun4qi5 - fortune; luck;
幸运 has a positive meaning, but 命运 seems to be more negative, at least in the contexts that I have seen it, but I am not sure if it can be used positively. 运气 seems to be more neutral, for example:
你的运气不好.
你的运气很好.
or
你的命运很惨.
你的命运很光彩.
Can anybody confirm this?
changye says
June 11, 2008
Hi Clay,
Is it technically possible to automatically show an English translation / pinyin pop-up for all the Chinese characters used in comments here, just like in your posting, or entries in John's blog? It's a question that has long been on my mind.
faithjie says
June 11, 2008
hi dedsall78,
I don't think there's difference between two sentences in both cases. As a native speaker, I alternate between two versions.
changye says
June 11, 2008
Hi Clay,
Thanks for the pleasant information. Now let’s make it this way. That Japanese guy was a kind of “Steve Jobs” (斯蒂芬·乔布斯) in the fortune cookie world, and the Chinese immigrant was, of course, “Bill Gates”(比尔盖茨). Deal?
As for 地道 and 正宗, I think that the former one is “real, genuine”, but the latter seems to be something a little more “real, and traditionally authentic” in my understanding. I think that they are usually interchangeable.
hancock says
June 11, 2008
John,Clay anybody
I would like to hear a lesson about spelling B's.
clay says
June 11, 2008
changye,
yes there is... kinda. our academic staff all have it. when you hover your mouse over the words, you get a translation. the main issue is that it is meant for english to chinese, however it does have chinese to english, but i have found it is not very accurate. yet, having something is better than nothing i suppose.
http://g.iciba.com/
monica5 says
June 11, 2008
Another good lesson!
I´ve never seen this "fortune cookies". Is it possible to find them in Shanghai?
Hi Clay, it was a pleasure meeting you yesterday, as well as all the staff...I hope I´ll have the chance to visit you again.
Monica
monica5 says
June 11, 2008
..i meant fortunate cookies ^^
clay says
June 11, 2008
moniken,
thanks for stopping by! No, you will not find fortune cookies in shanghai, at least to my knowledge. It would be a novel idea though, an american style chinese restaurant here in china with fortune cookies, general tsao's chicken, and sweet-n-sour pork with that awesome fluorescent sauce.
i need some investors...henning says
June 11, 2008
clay,
noooo...
Please don't introduce that garbage to China.
Actually I found "western style" Chinese food in China once. In a "hip" (and cheap) self-service all-you-can-eat restaurant in Beijing mostly frequented by kids and teenagers. Alongside really bad "sushi", sausages, sugary (!) Pizza, American cake, and coffee poisened with overly high sugar doses. I was actually asked if this was "Really the food you eat in Germany?".
guolanusa says
June 12, 2008
derek, I'm hardly the best candidate to respond, but I'll give it a shot (with help from a Chinese friend).
I think you are right regarding 幸运 and 运气: "你的运气真好" means the same thing as "你很幸运".
However, 命运 seems to be a completely different idea...I think you can't relate it so strongly to 幸运 and 运气. While they are talking about luck, this word is talking about destiny (although one's "destiny" could be described as "lucky"). 命运 is neither a positive nor negative word in and of itself, although, as you noted, it's often used to express a person's negative fate. It's also used, though, when talking about the person you fall in love with, so that's at least one common positive use.
Hope that's helpful, and I hope others correct any mistakes I may have made!
john says
June 12, 2008
changye, you asked:
Yes, it is. We are looking at this possibility already, but first there are some rather pressing bugs that need to be sorted out...
john says
June 12, 2008
guolanusa,
Thanks for the input. Jenny is one vacation right now. Let's see what other native speakers have to say... Connie? Jiaojie?
lujiaojie says
June 12, 2008
derek：
你的运气不好.
你的运气很好.
你的命运很惨.are correct.
你的命运很光彩. is a little bit weird.
You can say: 你的命运很好。
命运 aslo can be used positively.
For 命运, we often say 命. em: 你的命很好。
命运 means luck or unlucky in a long period.
so 你今天运气真好 is OK , but 你今天命运真好 is weird.
sh2008 says
June 12, 2008
it is a good time!
channa says
June 12, 2008
you guys realize that you have entitled this lesson 'fortunate cookies' and not 'fortune cookies,' yes?
clay says
June 12, 2008
yes
hitokiri6993 says
June 12, 2008
There's a restaurant here in the Philippines which sells fortune cookies. I laughed so hard when I received: " Confucius say: You go to jail, bad boy!" Must have been an April Fools gag.
channa says
June 12, 2008
oooooooh, 3 hours later I finally get it. 'Fortunate' as in '幸运,' 对吧?
tommyb says
June 12, 2008
故 事 好 笑
funny story
A lot of folks here in the states dont eat the cookie, they just break the cookie to read the fortune.
penben says
June 12, 2008
I once got a fortune in a fortune cookie that stated "You will buy new clothes." I was thinking they must have really wanted to be right, so they picked something that almost had to happen.
jiarenlun says
June 12, 2008
I'm curious about how Jenny pronounces 肯定赚钱 (kĕndìng zhuànqián) at the end of the dialogue. It seems like it might be a device to clarify the pronunciation or flow of the words?
rachida says
June 12, 2008
hello everybody,
that is interesting, my friend told me about those cookies but i never thought that it was a japanese idea at the first , good to know now, however i'm wondering if there is a way how to write the pinyin with the tones without using the Numbers, i mean just how we write pinyin as we write chinese using pinyin ( kind of software). thanks :)
a1pi2 says
June 12, 2008
Fortune cookies in America often include lucky numbers you can play on the lottery. I recently saw cookies which tried to teach Chinese as well. On the back of the fortune it said something like "Today's Chinese Lesson: 很好 (hun how) means 'very good'."
Maybe CPod can work with Kid Genius (a.k.a. Steve Jobs) to develop an edible wireless memory device. Think flash RAM + RFID made out of glutinous rice. You could have fortune cookies which beam podcasts into iPhones.
How wonderful would it be to finish a meal and crack open my cookie to hear "大家好！我是Jenny!"* streaming from the iPhone I cannot afford to buy? I could then safely eat the cookie, podcast and all.
* Note that fortune cookie fortunes are invariably wrong, so I'd be likely to get an Advanced lesson even though I'm barely Intermediate (properly determined and certified by John's Test-o-Matic.) If I went to eat with a Chinese friend she would certainly get a Newbie lesson. It so often happens that someone else at your table gets the fortune you were really meant to have (which is why I refuse to eat fortune cookies with Changye's chubby dog!)
wolson says
June 12, 2008
你说怎么意思？幸运饼干错错了？
是亵渎的！幸运饼干是都对好的！
What do you mean? Fortune cookies wrong? Blasphemy! They are always correct!
sallybr says
June 12, 2008
Just wanted to add that it is not only a North American thing
fortune cookies are common in Brazil, every Chinese restaurant serves them at the end of the meal. I was shocked to learn they are originally from Japan, and unheard of in China...
:-)
Live and learn! (Great lesson, I loved it!)
pinkjeans says
June 12, 2008
It's interesting that only in Chinese restaurants in Western countries, these fortune cookies seem de rigeur. I've noticed that when these are served at the end of the meal, the adults would be interested in their "幸运" and the kids would munch greedily at the actual 饼干. A non-Chinese Chinese tradition, these things! 不是真的中华传统！
Loved the lesson!
petuniaz says
June 12, 2008
I love collecting the little fortunes and have a zillion in a box somewhere. I want to make a paper mache mask out of them, and almost have enough. Won't that look funny?
Some of them have Chinese language lessons on the back.
kriss says
June 12, 2008
We've got fortune cookies at the asia supermarkets in Berlin - but those aren't only selling chinese products.
Anyway, great lesson - I've got so much to learn... :-)
kesirui says
June 12, 2008
Actually fortune cookies were originally made in the U.S by a Japanese man living in California that during world war II did not want to have a "Japanese" tea house, but a "Chinese" one to avoid being persecuted by anti Japanese Americans.
Fortune cookies were created by him to serve along with tea (the paper fortunes inside were added later.)
user19008 says
June 12, 2008
加拿大也有
ulver684 says
June 12, 2008
I love fortunate cookies, they are so delicious and my fortune is fine!
leolee912 says
June 12, 2008
hi,everybody,i'm chinese boy--leo,can i make friends with you,please add me leolee912@hotmail.com
s0395617 says
June 12, 2008
西红柿，薯和番茄有什么不同？而，ketchup怎么说呢？当我去麦当劳时，平时用"西红柿酱",但我也不知是不是对的？多谢，弗朗克
Are xi1hong2shi4, fan1qie2 and shu3 for tomato synonym, or is there a context in which to use one or the other? What's the correct translation for ketchup? When going to McD, I always ask for xi1hong2shi4jiang4 and get what I want, but my translator (Lingoes) suggests tiao2wei4fan1qie2jiang4. Thanks, Frank
leolee912 says
June 12, 2008
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derek says
June 12, 2008
lujiaojie, guolanusa
Thanks, that was very helpful.
I have never eaten fortunate cookies. Never seen them in Australia. Sounds like I am missing out on a tasty treat.
changye says
June 12, 2008
Hi a1p2,
I agree with you. Edible fortunes are just great. You can enjoy it twice, both fortune-telling and eating it, unless the fortune you’ve picked is terribly bad. I believe that my chubby dog would definitely love them, regardless whether the fortune is good or bad.
By the way, one thing has been on my mind since I heard of Fortune Cookies a few years ago. Is it OK to put anything not edible in cookies, especially in a lawsuit society such as modern USA? I’m afraid that a fortune might stick in the throat of an “unfortunate” guy.
jennyzhu says
June 12, 2008
I've always had the firm belief that fortune cookies will sell in China, especially if it's about horoscopes. It really gets young consumers. It\s a popular marketing strategy for food products. And i have an even firmer belief that flash cards fortune cookies is a great idea. But I seem to be alone in my thinking on both accounts.
ryjo says
June 12, 2008
There's a book that came out back in March called The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food. I believe it deals with the Chinese immigrant experience in the US by tracing the history of the development of Chinese food over here. I haven't read it myself, so I can't vouch for it, but it sounds intriguing. The author is Jennifer Lee.
I saw fortune cookies at a restaurant in Xi'an about 8 years ago, but have not seen them in China since...though I never thought to ask. Anyway, if you do decide to market them in China, Jenny, I'm all for the flash card fortune!
rayu says
June 12, 2008
I'm glad that ryjo mentions The Fortune Cookie Chronicles book. I haven't read it yet myself, but it's on my list to buy soon, and I've seen a number of reviews and articles related to the book too. This was just in the Los Angeles Times earlier this week:
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-then8-2008jun08,0,4339233,full.column
And, though I haven't browsed it in a while, here's Jennifer's blog website related to the book:
http://www.fortunecookiechronicles.com/
changye says
June 12, 2008
Hi ryjo and rayu,
Thank you for the interesting website and book “The Fortune Cookie Chronicles”. I found a very interesting article about the origin of fortune cookies on the site. I didn’t know that completely, but there still is traditional “fortune cookie” in Japan!
http://www.fortunecookiechronicles.com/2008/01/16/fortune-cookies-are-really-from-japan/
lujiaojie says
June 13, 2008
s0395617:
西红柿 和 番茄 一样。
ketchup 可以说 西红柿酱，也可以说番茄酱。
薯：
红薯 hóngshǔ sweet potato
马铃薯 mǎlíngshǔ potato
rachida says
June 13, 2008
Please is there anyone who could help me find a way to write the pinyin tones without using numbers? i need it, some kind of software or program that i have to download.
thanks.
sushan says
June 13, 2008
There are definite regional aspects to the names of vegetables. in Xian I saw 西红柿 but here in Sichuan it is always 蕃茄 fānqié for tomato and 蕃茄酱 fānqié jiàng for ketchup.
Potatoes locally are 土豆 tŭdoù or yang yu (no idea of characters for that one) but french fries are 薯条 shŭtiáo.
emcgraw says
June 13, 2008
Such a fascinating phenomenon.
If it wasn't mentioned before, check out the January 16th New York Times article written by Jennifer Lee. Nice background thus far about the fortune cookie, which claims it was actually created in Japan in the late 1800's, not in the U.S:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/16/dining/16fort.html
anzhiru says
June 13, 2008
Rachida
There are lots of fonts out there which do the tone marks as accents. You can try
http://www.namkung.com/zev/TimesPinyin.html
This link also has links to other useful places.
cajunlowkey says
June 13, 2008
my non-chinese friends here in the states are incredulous when i tell them that you can't find fortune cookies in China. I am equally incredulous when they say they went to the greatest chinese restaurant, based on fried rice and sweet and sour pork. It's a little sad-a lot of people here know only about buffets and take-out type places.
wolson says
June 13, 2008
cajunlowkey says
It is really sad that few Americans really know how Chinese food can taste. As I tell people, I can not go to an American Chinese restaurant for at least a month after I return from China because the food is so bad.
While there are a few exceptional Chinese restaurants in the United States, most should be called "lajidian" or 垃圾店 and should display this on a prominent sign so as to forewarn people who have had the real thing.
notinks says
June 13, 2008
Who writes the fortunes in fortune cookies, I wonder???
a1pi2 says
June 14, 2008
>>It is really sad that few Americans really know how Chinese food can taste.
Let's be fair--Western food in China isn't fantastic.
In Seattle, Chinese restaurants have two menus--one in English, one in Hanzi. I have had restaurants refuse to serve authentic dishes to me--fish head soup, for example--because they believe I won't like it. Just being able to read Hanzi doesn't qualify you to order real Chinese food.
This is not to say that the Chinese dishes are as good as you can get in Shanghai, because they certainly are not. But "American Chinese Food" is it's own, distinct (and disgusting) beast.
tvan says
June 14, 2008
To follow up on a1pi2's comment, like all cuisines, Chinese cooking morphs to suit local ingredients and tastes. I've had some really delicious "Cantonese" food in Ventiane that included enough thai chilis to knock the socks off 90% of Hong Kong'ers. Likewise, a San Francisco restaraunt used to carry an apple pie with traditional (i.e. U.S.) filling and a Chinese pastry crust.
It may not be "authentic", but overseas Chinese cooking has its strengths as well as weaknesses... as this lesson points out.
daihwa says
June 14, 2008
Growing up, I knew fortune cookies weren't really Chinese because my parents always had to point it out when we ate out. They thought it was lame of the Chinese restaurants to take something American and try to pass it off as Chinese.
Meanwhile my parents stuff our Thanksgiving turkeys with fried rice. Go figure.
billm says
June 14, 2008
Don't get me started about the awful Chinese Food here in the US (but I eat it fast food Chinese at least once a week). Every restaurant has to have some Szechuan (that's the way it's spelled here....we mangle this pronunciation...seems Sichuan would be easier) dishes. Order Chow Mein….there are no noodles (want noodles, order low mein).
Lately I've been seeing fortune cookies that have a fortune and also have a section below with "Learn Chinese". The characters are traditional. The pronunciation is not putonghua...maybe it's Cantonese pronunciation. Then on the back side there are lucky numbers.
No mention of the "in bed" game --?
Most interesting fortune:
"You have many friends due to your flexible nature --"
Not sure what it meant.
jamestheron says
June 14, 2008
Billm, I've only heard East Coast people say Chow Mein isn't noodles. I recall a co-worker once complaining he can never find real Chow Mein in California, you know with bean sprouts and no noodles.
A friend once picked up two packages of fortune cookies at a factory in San Francisco's Chinatown. One had somewhat "x-rated" fortunes and one had "g-rated" fortunes for his family and mixed company. Turns out these were mislabeled and both had the risque ones. It was a little embarrassing.
billm says
June 14, 2008
jamesthron,
You are probably right about the Chow Mein noodle problem being an East Coast thing. I know for Boston Chow Mein is no noodles. I was just at a fast food place in St. Louis...no noodles. I'm going to be in Houston Monday...I'll check it out.
brendaninaus says
June 14, 2008
What do you mean Australian Chinese restuarants don't have fortune cookies!?
They are not universal in Australia, but some certainly have them.
notinks says
June 15, 2008
Having worked for years part time in a U.S. Chinese restaurant, I want to say in defense of "Americanized" Chinese dishes: almost any time a food crosses cultures it will be changed - call it a culinary Law of Relativity. To expect an American pizza in Italy, a Philly cheese-steak in Idaho or a Peking Duck in the States is unrealistic. Even when food crosses provincial lines in China it is changed. Sichuanese restaurants in Shanxi have modified their dishes to the extent they know it will increase their appeal in Shanxi. So I am learning to think of American Chinese as it's own category. Thus at better U.S. restaurants I can enjoy what they offer without constantly comparing them to "what they should be".
wolson says
June 15, 2008
notinks says
3 hours ago
“… To expect a Peking Duck in the States is unrealistic. …”
“ So I am learning to think of American Chinese as it's own category. Thus at better U.S. restaurants I can enjoy what they offer without constantly comparing them to "what they should be".”
I actually did find Peking Duck in Philadelphia that would compare favorably with the Peking Duck at the Qian Jude in Beijing.
I would have to agree, American Chinese is its own category. Still when I see 麻婆豆腐 (ma po toufu) on a menu, I want to be able to taste the 花椒(huajiao). If there isn’t any in the dish, then it just can not be 麻婆豆腐!
theblindseer says
June 15, 2008
Fortune cookies used to be more common in Australia, less so now but you will still find them.
jiarenlun says
June 16, 2008
notinks,
Looks like we missed the job opening - but maybe it would be better for them if they contracted out the fortune writing?
http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/06/06/050606ta_talk_olshan
pulosm says
June 16, 2008
billm,
That's funny considering the fact that "mein" means "noodle" (of course, it's spelled to match the Cantonese pronunciation).
Trust me. In California, you can find all kinds of awesome Chinese food. I would take California Chinese over soaking-in-grease Mainland food ANY day of the week.
One thing that's hard to find is "zha mantou" that they have in Beijing. Delicious deep-friend mini-mantous that you dip in condensed milk. That stuff is SO awesome.
Oh, and what's the sticky potato or apple dessert that comes out super hot, covered in sticky carmel-like goo, and you have to dip it in water to cool it quickly before eating it? I recall it has the word "si1" in it (like silk strings). It wasn't my favorite dish, but I must say, I haven't seen it here. Probably because most of the food is southern Chinese or Taiwanese.
changye says
June 16, 2008
Hi billm,
＞ Most interesting fortune:
＞ "You have many friends due to your flexible nature --"
＞ Not sure what it meant.
Ironically enough, most Asian people who learn English probably understand well what the fortune means, simply because they, me included, often write such funny English! Actually, I wouldn’t notice that the sentence is funny, unless you said “not sure what it meant.” What the fortune "wants to tell you" should be “you can make a lot of friends because of your sociable personality” or something like that, though I’m not so sure if this English makes sense for natives!
billm says
June 17, 2008
Changye,
The English is Ok on the fortune. We have a game we play where we add the words "in bed" to the end of the fortune. This game is for adults only. Oftentimes the fortune becomes very funny when the 2 words are added.
In recent years, I think the writers of the fortunes caught on to the game. Some add 2 dashes for the words "in bed" at the end. There is a lot of double entendre in the fortunes these days.
Flexible nature "--" could be taken to have more than one meaning.
Best regards, Bill M.
changye says
June 17, 2008
Hi billm,
Thanks for the good “bed” time story. Anyway, it looks like how to read the fortune “properly” is beyond my English ability. It must be more difficult to read than TIME magazine.
billm says
June 17, 2008
Changye,
Very funny response. Your a good teacher and a fast learner.
I had to check if TIME Magazine is still in print. It's gone way down hill with the growth of the internet.
notinks says
June 17, 2008
Blue Jay,
Thanks for the link to that article...another mystery solved.
pchenery says
June 22, 2008
Surprisingly, the worst Chinese food I ever had was in a 中餐馆 in Hong Kong.
And they didn't even have the decency to give us 幸运饼干.
wolson says
June 23, 2008
This weekend I had some surprisingly good Chuan Cai in at the Middle Kingdom in Ann Arbor! It had been recommended to me by a friend when I was in Chengdu. And he was right! If you like mala, this is the place.
If you go, order off the the Chinese menu, not the American one!
tvan says
June 23, 2008
wolson, don't see myself going to Ann Arbor any time soon, but its encouraging to hear that genuine mala is appearing in the states, rather than the watered down Canto version.
mongo says
July 1, 2008
> Clay, Is it technically possible to automatically show an English translation / pinyin pop-up for all the Chinese characters used in comments here...
try Popjisyo.com ...
lmcsawy says
July 3, 2008
With friends and family, whenever we read the little paper in a fortune cookie, we always add "under the sheets" at the end of the phrase that is written. It makes it so funny in many cases.
For example, taking from the top of this lesson, “The greatest danger could be your stupidity, under the sheets” or “Hell is paved with good intentions, under the sheets" :-)
xiaohu says
July 27, 2008
Over here in LA we have a popular morning radio show, and they're always doing stupid sketches, which of course I'm a big fan of, the sillier the better.
One of the DJ's got a fortune that was very unusual and disconcerting, because it was NEGATIVE.
They were trying to get the the bottom of the fortune cookie connundrum by calling the company that makes the fortune cookies, of course the guy answering was an actor pretending to be Chinese and then procedes to bash all the "stupid gwei lo" 鬼佬 because they don't know anything about Chinese culture.
Pretty ironic that most Chinese have never heard of Fortune Cookies. (Ha ha!) Maybe before they write another sketch concerning Chinese, they'd better do some research first.
So I didn't quite catch the "default" term for Restaurants in China because Jenny stepped on John's line. Is it 饭店 or 饭馆 or 菜馆?