User Comments - tvan
tvan
Posted on: Pregnancy Series 4: Fetal Attraction
March 23, 2009 at 3:48 AM我不知道燕窝有没有太多的口水 (??), 可是一定有很多的大便。他们先洗才吃吗？还是这算是一种天然的菜？ (Bird saliva, 中文可以较口水马？）
Posted on: Pregnancy Series 4: Fetal Attraction
March 23, 2009 at 3:15 AM在美国我们也有这个风俗，但没那么厉害。我三个孩子都没收到胎教。我的老大也生在台北。我也记不得这种的教育，倒是那是二十几年前，现在可能不一样。
Oh yeah, matt_c, before some Russian goes postal, it's Rachmaninoff! Then again, it's probably originally Cyrillic anyway, so who cares? :-)
Posted on: Dog Meat and Animal Rights
March 18, 2009 at 1:23 PMCPod's done lessons on gun running, drug dealing, sex changes, etc. Personally, I don't plan to have much to do with any of these. However, they are a vehicle to introduce conversational vocabulary. The lesson on Godzilla also covered a rather unlikely scenario, but introduced lots of terms dealing with "huge." Likewise, I doubt (perhaps wrongly) that I will be abducted by Mandarin-spouting alien; but that lesson introduced terms dealing with space and kidnapping.
Posted on: Dog Meat and Animal Rights
March 18, 2009 at 4:00 AMFolks, I understand your feelings but, from where I'm standing, it's pure squeamishness. Most people grow up in the city and think that meat comes in 16 oz. shrink-wrap. Seeing where it comes from at least amounts to an honest choice. Taking the picture down. Eyes wide shut.
Posted on: Sympathy for the Farmers -- 悯农
March 17, 2009 at 12:54 PMsongruixue, yet, depending upon the crop, many get huge subsidies, favored political treatment, special trade deals, etc. They don't call it "farming the government" for nothing.
Sympathy for a U.S. farmer... maybe, but no more than any other small business. Sympathy for a EU farmer... hah! Sympathy for the Chinese peasant... definitely!
Posted on: Reporting a Loss
March 17, 2009 at 3:52 AMchangye, I would tend to agree. It is similar to the concept of Chinese as a language. According to my daughter (linguistics major for what it's worth), the major dialects of Chinese (e.g. Cantonese) could be considered to be different "languages" because they are unintelligible to other speakers.
However, you would need a rather large army to drive the point home, so IMO it's back to Mao.
Posted on: Sympathy for the Farmers -- 悯农
March 17, 2009 at 3:05 AMThe line, "谁知盘中餐，粒粒皆辛苦," is very similar to my mom's old line, "Eat all your food; don't you there are people starving in China?"
I heard it all during my child-raising years, but never knew its origin until now.
Posted on: Reporting a Loss
March 16, 2009 at 1:06 PMI think the words ethnicity and nationality are so vague as to be meaningless. Mao had one thing right; 枪杆子里面出政权. The Scots learned it, the the (U.S.) Indians learned it, the Etruscans learned it, ad nauseum. The Tibetans are part of China because of the PLA.
Kimik, I can't answer your question, but my children (half Chinese) consider themselves Chinese and seem to be accepted as 华侨 by the mainlanders. Of course, that's to their face.
Posted on: Zombies!
March 16, 2009 at 3:56 AMkdombros, if it makes you feel better, I also found a lot of the terminology in this lesson challenging, especially at first go. I confess, I rarely discuss zombies in Chinese or English; but I'm ready now.
Posted on: Pregnancy Series 4: Fetal Attraction
March 23, 2009 at 4:26 AMmikenotinjubei, actually 口水 is definitely the word for human saliva (e.g. when something looks/smells really good 你流口水, or salivate). I'm just not sure if it's the same word for swallows.