Random new word of the day

[imron]

Or the turkeys that US presidents pardon on Thanksgiving. Apparentely they all die not long after being pardoned, simply because they've been so fattened up that they are really unhealthy.

[roddy]

安大略, āndàlüè, scratched my head a bit as I knew it was a Canadian province, but couldn't figure out which one. It is, of course...

Ontario

[roddy]

几几年, when asking for a year. Not sure I've ever noticed that before.

[skylee]

I've been invited to a Christmas gathering. And reading the address I was worried as there is a character in the address that I had never seen before, and I did not know how to pronounce it or what it means. But it is used in an address so obviously a lot of people know this word.

The word is 乪. And the name of the place is 大乪. The host told me that the Cantonese pronunication of the character is the same as 屐 / 劇 (kek6). According to information on the internet the Mandarin pronunciation is nang2.

[roddy]

脱北者 - a refugee from North Korea. Thanks to the BBC.

[heifeng]

I'm going to add the surname 庹tuo 3 EDIT: duplicate character for post #816zhwj but I'm going to keep it here anyway for a refresher

Bumped into it in this article 北大教授：庹部長，請用文明說服我！&

庹震熟諳傳媒運作 「手伸很長」

Here is more from Baidu:

关于庹姓起源，一说出自熊姓，一说出自度氏，一说源于田氏。大多分布于四川、重庆、湖南、湖北、贵州、云南、河南、陕西等省。庹姓名人古有明将领庹守珍、庹守珠、庹五常等，近当代有庹文升、庹震、庹纯双、庹宗华、庹宗康、庹通等。

[roddy]

I'll add an odd one (for me), 兀

[Meng Lelan]

post 1306 blazed holes into my retinas.

[imron]

兀

You need to read more 金庸. He likes to use 兀自 a lot.

[heifeng]

More Surname fun, as found on my latest 朗读 post here

靳Jin4

翟 Di2 or Zhai2 which according this Baidu Link: 由于各地方言不同，翟姓形成了两种读音，居于北方者读（Dí 音狄），迁居南方者读（Zhái 音宅）

[skylee]

I know someone whose name is 翟, romanised to Chak (zaak6 in jyutping) based on its Cantonese pronunciation. The other pronunciation in Cantonese is dik6.

[roddy]

勾兑, gōuduì, to blend - as in whisky.

[li3wei1]

支吾. CCEDICT has two definitions for this, depending on pronunciation:

zhī wu: to respond evasively or vaguely/to elude/to stall

zhī wú:to resist / to deal with

As if it's not hard enough having two definitions, very different but which can substitute each other in some sentences, we have this:

支支吾吾: zhī zhī wú wú to hem and haw / to stall / to stammer / to mumble / to falter

So, when you duplicate it, the tone comes back, but the meaning stays with the unstressed version. Jukuu and Nciku only recognise and give examples for the first definition.

[skylee]

小龍年 = 蛇年 = the year of the snake

I had never heard of 小龍年 before.

[skylee]

Artichoke has always been 朝鮮薊 or 洋薊 to me (actually in my mind it is simly artichoke). But the other day I learnt that someone had made up another name for it, and it sounds quite nice. Take a look at the picture.

[li3wei1]

魔咒 mó zhòu 'a magician's spell'.

Would this have anything to do with the etymology of mojo? Most etymologies point to African languages, but maybe a) it went China to Africa to English or b) it didn't come from Africa at all or c) it came both ways and was reinforced.

[skylee]

It doesn't have to be from a magician. A witch's spell is also a 魔咒.

[li3wei1]

another theory I neglected: it could be an import into Chinese from Africa or some other language.

[rob07]

孤 (gu1), special first person pronoun for feudal warlords. Also means "solitary, isolated, alone". So if you are so powerful you are in a class of your own and therefore too special to say 我 like everyone else, you say 孤 (unless you are so powerful you make yourself emperor, in which case you should then say 朕).

Caught my attention, because the effective meaning is basically the same as the "royal we" - ie: the Queen of England uses "we" instead of "I" to refer to just herself, but the literal meaning is the opposite.

Not sure how strict the protocol is around when it should be used. In Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Cao Cao and Liu Bei, the founders of two of the three kingdoms, became autonomous princes (王) at around the same time and started using it then. The founder of the third kingdom Sun Quan started using it around then as well, although he was then technically only a marquis (侯), did not become a prince until much later and the rank of marquis was nothing special at that time. Sun Quan was not an ordinary marquis though, he was at that time a peer of Cao Cao and Liu Bei in terms of actual power and territory autonomously controlled, but unlike them did not have any sort of claim to rule all of China. Cao Cao's claim was based on controlling a puppet Han Dynasty emperor and the seat of the Han Dynasty government and Liu Bei's claim was that he could trace his ancestry in the male line back to Liu Bang, the founder of the Han Dynasty. Neither Cao Cao or Liu Bei used 孤 for long, Cao Cao died soon after becoming a prince and Liu Bei soon upgraded himself to emperor, and therefore subsequently used 朕 rather than 孤.

[skylee]

You might also wish to take a look at 寡人 and 孤家寡人 as well.