This posting is quite a bit lower on the true Chinglish and higher on the odd signs discovered in our travels. We are so used to Chinglish now that we barely recognize it anymore in daily life.
The sign below is, however, Chinglish to the core. I think that I know what 'conscribe' means, and I know what "wasn't born to follow" means, but together I have no clear idea what this means.
It was on the front doorpost of a clothing store near our apartment if that helps. Maybe the Chinese underneath can explicate it, but I am rather ignorant about that.
Below is a sign from a restaurant in Kunming, Yunnan Province. The restaurant served a famous local dish "crossing the bridge noodles". But the sign is a little odd.
As the customer, I expect the cooks to mind the soup. Do I have to do everything?
They even expect me to mind my kids. The spelling is a bit off, but I was a little offended by the lack of confidence the staff had in me.
But really, couldn't you put that anywhere? Isn't it a bit like a sign that says "keep breathing"?
Below is another Kunming sign. It comes from a shoe store in the city center, in fact it is the name of the store.
Employees wear aprons that have this logo printed on them. They looked proud to have them. Maybe they can also walk out of the store and look up at the sign below.
Nothing Chinglish, nor even something you can't find around the world, but the kids could not stop giggling. It dominated the pedestrian mall of the town center. Of course, this is in conjunction with our experience of seeing kids all over China whizzing on the streets, curbs, sidewalks, bushes, and trucks. Today in Xiamen we saw a kid whizzing into an empty plastic pop bottle on a crowded sidewalk. I think that showed good public sense.
Maybe that kid the read the sign below at the New Year Festival in Xiamen.
While I endorse both environmentalism and social morality, the sign seems a little broad. As you might expect it was roundly ignored. Thomas wanted me to take a photo of another one that had litter scattered right below it!
Now below we have a true beauty. Ann brought this home after seeing it on the Lewis family blog. It is now our favorite tissue.
I am all in favor of the power of mind. I can even pontificate on the subtle but clearly present thesis that all is mind. Nothing like finding a little Chinglish and launching right into idealist metaphysics! However, that all seems a bit out of place for a product designed to wipe your bum.
Finally, what would our posts be like without a few menu items. Last Chinglish post I brought you Donald Duck. But here, yes, we have that item that we have all heard about, wondered about, and even feared.
I assure you that we did not order Stewed Dog Meat Pot, nor were we tempted to. If you would like to go to Kunming, I bet they are still serving it.
Still hungry after you've downed a stew of Fluffy and Fido? How about some of these items?
Not sure what some of them actually are, although Deep Fried Locust seems pretty straight forward.
In Xiamen there is a 'delicacy' that we are invariably served called "local seaworm dish". I can stomach a lot but I find this one quite difficult to eat. I have several times been served it first, of course, while the rest of table eagerly waits to get their turn after the honored guest. The worms are served in a gray-green translucent jello. You pick it up with a toothpick and pop it in. It can be hard to chew because the jello is very rubbery and then you can sense a little friction when your teeth cut through the worms. I've wanted to just spit it out onto the table (who cares if I am at a banquet - it's worms!) but I dutifully continue and swallow. The only time I have been able to tolerate it is when it was served with wasabi. You can eat anything with enough wasabi on it.
I'd like to conclude by noting that Chinglish should not be thought of as a one-way street. The other direction, which must amuse Chinese people greatly, is westerners who wear shirts and tattoos with all kinds of Chinese characters on them that say . . . what? Maybe there is an Engl-ese blog by some Chinese in America. I hope that they post a lot of good ones.
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