I had been thinking I could improve my Chinese in order to be able to talk about math, but today it went the other way around!
We have some new student teachers at the school, and one of taught me the following Chinese, using the following Maths:
The word “curse” was from a previous joke/conversation. The word “excited” was from how I tried describe how I felt after the math lesson 🙂
Do you remember this ‘mystery soup’ from the International Women’s Day post?
dessert plate, including a mystery soup
When we walked around the courtyard before Women’s Day dinner, Wang老师 had commented on the bamboo shoots. I said I had eaten some with my friend Pan in Nanjing. They’re very good, and I told her about a funny incident I’d had the previous weekend regarding bamboo shoots: I had asked Pan what they were called. “Baby Bamboo!” she and her friend decided to translate it into English (similar to Baby Spinach). “婴儿竹子 (ying1erzhu2zi)” I replied, combining the Chinese words for ‘baby’ and ‘bamboo’. Pan stopped with her spoon halfway to her mouth, looked at me, and said, “Now, that’s just creepy.”
During Women’s Day dinner, I went up to the buffet to gather my dessert-plate. I added to it a small amount of a strange, but sweet-smelling soup. The soup seemed to have Zaozi, little “Chinese dates” that are like tiny, softer apples, in addition to some thin, wrinkly, yellow-white things. I wondered if it was jellyfish, but the texture wasn’t like jellyfish…
“Oh, what soup is that?” Wang老师 asked when I returned to the table. “I have no idea!” I replied. “Is this Zaozi?”, I asked, pointing to the date-like fruit. She said yes. Ok, one down…
“Oh,” she said, indicating the suspected non-jellyfish, “These are 银耳. 白木耳, Like 木耳, but they’re white.” 木耳 mu4er3 (tree ear) is the name of a mushroom commonly used in Chinese cooking, so called because it’s thin and folded, like an ear. The new food seemed to have two names: 白木耳 and 银耳. I understood the 白木耳, a white tree ear, but the 银耳 pronunciation, and therefore meaning, was just escaping me. I tried to repeat it, unsure if the first syllable was a 1st or 2nd tone: “ying2耳 还是 ying1耳?” I tried.
Wang老师 kind of froze with her cup in her hands.
“银！yin2!银色的银!” she corrected me. Oooh.. silver. The things were called “silver ears” even though I thought the color seemed more like soft yellow-white than silver. ‘Silver’ is yin2: ‘yin2耳’. I had said ‘ying1耳’.
“Baby Ears!” Wang老师 cracked up, and so did the rest of the table when she translated the situation 🙂
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