User Comments - nevermind
nevermind
Posted on: Superman
March 22, 2008 at 3:21 PMCan 崇拜 be used in a religious context, or does it express a kind of fanboy attitude? Is 超级 very informal? (The English equivalent is, so I'm wondering whether it has the same colloquial connotation.) Would fei1chang2 be a more formal alternative?
Posted on: Track and Field
March 16, 2008 at 3:59 PMIn the sentence, 昨天我参加了田径比赛。, does canjia imply that you were a spectator or a participant? ("attend" can be slight ambiguous)
Posted on: #41
March 16, 2008 at 2:01 PMHuh? Since when? My notebook plays all kinds of DVDs, even ons from Pakistan and Uruguay. I've have never heard of DVD drives being region-coded.
Posted on: #41
March 15, 2008 at 9:59 PM"Almost all dvd players have a multi-region hack code, " The easiest (and legal...) way to watch CHinese DVDs is using your computers to play them....
Posted on: MSN and QQ
March 15, 2008 at 9:53 PMWell, you're right, but what about the key-phrase greeting?
Posted on: Getting Nationalities Straight
March 15, 2008 at 9:51 PMWhy is "tooth" used for the countries on the Iberian peninsula, anyway? Does 欧 really mean "vomit"? I've never seen it in that context. My dictionary doesn't list it either. As far as I know, it's a not-so-common surname, as well as the term for Ohm (as in resistance). It does look like a person in front of a toilet already containing vomit. Perhaps I have too vivid an imagination.
Posted on: MSN and QQ
March 15, 2008 at 8:59 PM"(88 also means bye bye)" In Germany, using this abbreviation would be a rather foolish idea. Could get you in real trouble with the authorities.* (However, I doubt they monitor QQ. Though that's not such a strange notion - I heard they passed a kind of monitoring act permitting storing all virtual data of their citizens for some months in order to counteract terrorism) *(Why, you might wonder. Think hard. What's the 8th letter in the alphabet? Who had these initials?) :-P
Posted on: Getting Nationalities Straight
March 15, 2008 at 8:49 PMWell, they certainly had a huge number of characters to choose from: They could have used characters like 麦 (wheat) [In fact, this one does appear in 丹麦 Denmark]; 每 (well, the american dream is supposed to include everyone); 没 (but the US IS a country); 媒 (a negotiator/matchmaker? hmm....); 酶 (enzyme), 眉(eyebrow - we raise it sometimes, but apart from that...) 魅 (demon- won't comment on that); 镁 (magnesium); 梅( the US isn't exactly famous for her plums); 妹 (big brother would be more appropriate than little sister), 霉 (bacteria); 媚 (charme - that's a nice one); 煤(coal); 浼 (ask a favour); 昧 (conceal - great one for the conspiracy theorists amongst you); 莓 (strawberry - nice tongue twister: you might end up with several pounds of berries instead of plums) 玫 (rose) 糜 (wasted) 湄 (edge) 镅 (funnily enough, that's the character for americium) all of these have a "mai/mei"-sound. I reckon 美 is the most favorable one. (And good heavens, I wasn't aware that I know so many characters...) With so many characters having similar sounds, how do the Chinese make sure modern transliterations are homogenous?
Posted on: Getting Nationalities Straight
March 15, 2008 at 7:21 PMSo, country names belong to one of these groups: 1 They're a transliteration: Aodaliya (Australia); Jianada (Kanada), Libanen (Lebanon), Yiselie (Israel), Nuowei (Norway), Yilake (Iraq), Asebaijiang (Azerbaijan), Wanuatu (Vanuatu) 2 They contain a syllable of the original name: Faguo, Deguo, Meiguo, Yingguo (?any other ones?) 3 They're a meaning compound (more or less): Zhongguo (China), Riben (Japan) Which country names doesn't follow either rule? (Sorry I couldn't give you the tones on these, just use the online dictionary recommended above, if you'Re really from Azerbaijan etc.)
Posted on: Describing Athletes
March 22, 2008 at 4:36 PMDoes 发达 carry the meaning(s) of "sophisticated", or is it somewhat limited to "developed" or "intricate"?