User Comments - bill
bill
Posted on: Lao Wang's Office 10: Lao Wang Plans to Sue
April 17, 2009 at 4:02 PMI had to laugh when I first heard 法庭 for a court of law. In English it sounds very much like "farting!" This makes a nice pun for the bi-lingual, and goes right along with the use of 狗屁.
Bill
Posted on: The Bride Makes Soup - 新嫁娘
April 15, 2009 at 6:19 AMAfter listening to this poem, I imagined myself as the husband of the new bride, and that I approached her, and took her hand to comfort her. It was damp and cold in contrast to her lovely, almost porcelain-like skin.
It then occured to me that there are so many learned rituals in life that we undergo and that bring us pain. And that furthermore, that lives are dedicated to learning and obedience to teachings, and rituals. That the acquistion of knowledge is admired and at the same time often sinks us into a quagmire.
Yet, one does not learn to be wise. Rather, my train of thoughts took me to the realization, that wisdom comes from unlearning. Unlearning the customs, rituals, and beliefs that lead us to be harmful to one another, to our enviroment, to other living things.
It's interesting where these little poetic jewels can lead us. They are really a gift to be cherished.
Bill
Posted on: Guilin Mifen
April 14, 2009 at 3:43 PMFun video. I'd like to have a bit more of Connie spliced into the stories.
Bill
Posted on: Two Poems about Music -- 弹琴 and 听筝
April 8, 2009 at 5:40 AMAgain, one cannot help but be charmed by these poems, poems written to be played on a third musical instrument, the human voice.
As we traverse the 唐诗 lanscape in a time machine with pete as our guide, I'm struck by what lies on the poetic horizons as we look both forward and backwards in time: Poetry seems to be the universal music of our humanity.
A poem can be as simple as a falling leaf like a haiku or as complex as a symphony by Beethoven as are the epic poems.
They share the same muses and are timeless.
Bill
Posted on: Dropping and Losing 丢, 弄丢，丢掉
April 4, 2009 at 4:48 PMFirst, superb 请问.
Second, with respect to 把. I see it as simply turning what it modifies into the object of the verb that follows.
In English we'd say, "The airport lost my luggage."
Subject verb object. In Chinese the object can appear before the verb:
航空公司把我的行李弄丢了
Airport 把 my luggage lost. The 把 simply makes the noun it modifies the object of 弄丢.
Note that in latin based languages, e. g., French, Italian and Spanish, objects and indirect objects when expressed as pronouns come before the verb.
French: Je le veux. I it want, or I want it.
Spanish: Yo lo quiero. I it want, etc ...
Literal translations are useful to get the grammatical templates embedded in ones memory.
This becomes very automatic with familiarity.
Ah well. It's Saturday morning. Time to get on with it.
Bill
Posted on: Which Finger?
April 4, 2009 at 12:48 AM我不喜欢暴力. 我没听了这个课.
Given the choice of violence or non-violence, why would one for "educative purposes" choose violence?
Do I see a tear dropping from Buddha's eyes? Or, is it 雨纷纷 ... an echo from the past.
Bill
Posted on: Tomb Sweeping Festival -- 清明
April 1, 2009 at 4:07 PMPS> Why did the comment code change \"its\" to \"it\\'s\"? That's very bizarre. BUG?
Also, I didn't get the 15 minutes to edit this time.
Bill
Posted on: Tomb Sweeping Festival -- 清明
April 1, 2009 at 4:05 PMThis poem is so elegant in its simplicity and profound in its meaning, it's depth. It's what I call an iceberg poem.
Funny, a dear friend of mine, who lives in China, sent me this same poem a few days before this lesson appeared. We were discussing this coming weekend. The subject of her message was:
清明时节雨纷纷
and I thought she was worried about rain (-:
I'll always remember that line, always ...
Bill
Posted on: The Magic Word 把
April 18, 2009 at 5:21 PMAs I see it, the 把 way of handling direct objects is much more intuitive, more natural, than the "constructive" English grammar that forces the direct and indirect objects after the verb.
English always seemed topsy-turvy to me. Mandarin gets it just right with the 把＋direct object+verb way of describing the real world time sequence of direct-object/verb interplay.
It's the only language I know of that can place a noun direct object before the verb. Latin languages do permit personal pronoun and pronoun objects before the verb. Je le lui donne. Literally, I it him give. English is of course, I give it to him.
Bill