User Comments - kdombros

Posted on: Dog Meat and Animal Rights

To link this to hungry traveller... dog meat is not 清真！

I think the general rule with kosher and qing zhen meats is that the animals must themselves be herbivores (and then stuff to do with their hooves whether split or not or something?). The herbivore bit makes sense to me... dogs eat their own vomit, other dogs faeces etc.... rotten stuff...not my cup of tea !

Posted on: Guilin Mifen

LOVE the Aussie accent... funny how comforting it sounds to a Kiwi this far from home :-) Even though the Aussies taunt me mercilessly while I'm living there.  Maybe CPod will broaden some of its translations so its not all American English!

Posted on: The Bride Makes Soup - 新嫁娘

Great poem, really useful as a discussion starter about women's lives -- will definitely use this to talk about mother in laws in a kind of not-too-personal way in my next research interview!

Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Halal

Hi Osckeezee,

I guess with anything it is personal preference in the end, but Hui2 min2 generally refers to the Hui people who are an official minority nationality whose religion is Islam.  HOWEVER, I have met both atheist and Christian Hui, who see themselves more as Hui ethnicity. These people may not/do not have to subscribe to the religious practices associated with Hui culture, such as attending prayers, abstaining from pork and alcohol and other non-halal/qingzhen foods.

In my experience, not eating pork is the single most important factor for Hui -- they may give up prayers, not wear headresses/hats, drink alcohol, not believe in God/Allah,  but will not ever start eating pork. It is considered basically unclean/disgusting, and years of habit are hard to break there. I guess it would be like a Westerner going to Korea and starting to eat dog regularly?

Anyone else got any other opinions?

Posted on: Hungry Traveler: Halal

Hi everyone, from the Hui quarter in Xining, where fen paigu are common but refer to lamb， and 清真qing zhen actually means halal NOT Muslim. Muslim is 穆斯林 mùsīlín or just 回族/民。 Islam is something like 'yi-si-lan jiao 教‘(don't know characters sorry).

Here, qing zhen 清真restaurants are all definitely halal, with no pork dishes served. Some serve alcohol for business however, as the restaurants are frequented by all kinds of people in this multi-cultural and multi ethnic area. Or people buy beer from a shop nearby and BYO. I am very surprised by what Sushan said about 清真 restaurants serving pork in Sichuan. NOne of the ones I have been to in Sichuan have served this, although I generally frequent small family owned 餐厅 can ting.  In 回族 restaurants here, Sichuan style dishes are just cooked with other meats, for example, 回锅肉 hui guo rou is cooked with beef,  ｔｈｅｙ　ｈａｖｅ　ａ　ｓｗｅｅｔ　ａｎｄ　ｓｏｕｒ　ｔｙｐｅ　ｄｉｓｈ　tang su li ji with chicken, yu xiang rou si 渔香肉丝with beef or lamb etc etc.  Many Chinese people cannot taste the difference, since the meat is strongly flavoured with other ingredients. I frequent 清真restaurants not only for research, but also that I　ａｃｔｕａｌｌｙ　ｐｒｅｆｅｒ　ｔｈｅｓｅ　ｄｉｓｈｅｓ　ｃｏｏｋｅｄ　ｗｉｔｈ　ｏｔｈｅｒ　ｍｅａｔｓ！

In Xian, there is a certification scheme where a (government run I　think?) outfit certifies restaurants and factories as 清真. This would be displayed on the restaurant wall.  Havent noticed it here, but should have a look.  In most research Iｈａｖｅ　ｒｅａｄ　ｏｎ　ｔｈｅ　Ｈｕｉ，　ｆａｃｔｏｒｙ　ｍａｄｅ　ｆｏｏｄｓ　ｃａｎ　ｂｅ　ｅａｔｅｎ　ｅｖｅｎ　ｉｆ　ｎｏｔ　ｌａｂｅｌｌｅｄ　清镇 -- as long as they don't contain forbidden ingredients such as pork, certain types of fish and other types of animals forbidden in the qu'ran. 

We also have Salar people here in Xining, who are also Muslim.

Some of my Hui friends will eat at my house, if I cook other than pork (which we don't really eat anyway -- not so popular for kiwis). My pots are therefore not contaminated, which is the main reasoning for Huizu not to eat with Hanzu.It's not that they believe there is any residue necessarily, but it's sort of like eating from a clean dog bowl -- just doesn't quite feel right, even if you know its been cleaned. I've also met Hui young people in Sichuan (not in Qinghai) who eat pork and drink alcohol while at university or livng in the city away from family etc, and then abstain from it on Fridays, at Ramadan, and a few weeks before returning home (so family can't smell it :-)

I have met one lady whose sister in law converted to Islam and married a Hui, she takes her own pots to her parents house to cook when she returns there.  She was able to change her ethnicity to Hui too, which is interesting.

Posted on: Zombies!

It was much better second time round!! Must be right at my level, or at least stretching my vocab in brand new directions! Will have to get an mp3 p

Posted on: Zombies!

Is it just me, or was this a bit of a jump for 'upper intermediate'?? Perhaps just the unfamiliar terminology, but I found it difficult to follow what Jenny and John were talking about in quite a few places.  Anyway, I'll download it and listen to it again a few times til I get it. I think its good though, the principle of stretching you a bit more every lesson.

I think the example sentences were great, but again, I didn't quite follow them because it was a bit quick for me. Perhaps if they were on the pdf as well for later study? I know, I should upgrade to premium but poor student on a budget you know?

Posted on: Reporting a Loss

oh, and I read somewhere that minzu 民族 is actually a transliteration from a Japanese word? Any Japanese speakers to shed light on that?

Pete, why would you prefer race? In English you mean? I thought 种族 meant ethnic group. I like both 民族and 种族 but think they should be translated people group and ethnic group respectively and be allowed to a bit blurrier. Race to me means physical characteristics rather than cultural -- it's a word we avoid in NZ, as physical distinctions should not matter. We talk about bi-cultural relations between Maori and Pakeha rather than bi-racial, because the need for dialogue isn't about physical differences but cultural -- issues in cultural preferences in healthcare and learning etc etc.

I also like 大族 because it also removes some of the specifically racial overtones.But I guess sometimes the physical differences of race come to mean that people of that race come to share similar experiences (of discrimination) that leads to a shared culture based on race.  There is a lot of research that shows racism, sexism, and ethnocentrism lead to the minority/excluded group developing similar characteristics, so using the word culture just obscures the racist processes involved?

Sorry thinking-while-typing, way off topic!!

Love the quote, will have to find that!!

Posted on: Reporting a Loss

I can't find it now, but once I remember seeing a website with a counter counting how many people had become Chinese nationals (ever). It was up to about 3000 at that time (2004). So I guess not many people do, mainly because China does not allow dual nationality -- you have to give up your other nationality to become Chinese.

Posted on: Reporting a Loss

You should not always translate 民族 in english with the word "nationality". Simplification never helps in politics.

 

"Nationality" is used in the Stalinist sense, it's the official translation of minzu. There is a specific socialist definition of nationality that Stalin came up with which the Chinese government used to identify the official minorities 少数民族。 From memory there is meant to be a shared geography, common descent/ancestry, common language, and common culture incl religion. Clearly not all shaoshu minzu fit this, the decisions on which groups to include were of course political decisions. 400 groups applied, and 55 official-ised.

The history of the 'nation-state' is fairly recent (the idea of a state where people are all one 'nationality') and a bit of a fiction really. That's why we've developed the terms ethnicity to deal with multi-ethnic nations, the meaning of nationality has had to change.