Random new word of the day

[Tomsima]

犯賤

 

means 'do something you know you shouldn't do/behave badly even though you know its bad behaviour'

[Jim]

眼线

 

usually a police informer though it came up in the context of a political informer during one of the campaigns in the context I came across it.

 

[Tomsima]

燒炭

 

Literally means 'burn/make charcoal', bumped into it on 圓桌派, it was used in place of 自殺 when suicide was committed by carbon monoxide poisoning. 他燒炭了 is thus mutually understood to mean 他自殺了

[Publius]

3 hours ago, Tomsima said:

it was used in place of 自殺 when suicide was committed by carbon monoxide poisoning.

This usage originated in Hong Kong. I'm not sure how widely understood it is outside the Cantonese-speaking region.

[Tomsima]

That makes sense, the guests were 馬家輝 and 梁文道, I think it was actually 竇文濤 that used the word, but he likes to use Cantonese words sparingly when he has guests from the south

[Jim]

勤行 qín háng  --- a collective noun for the catering and hospitality trades, seems to be a bit old-timey now but occasionally in use

http://www.zdic.net/c/4/3d/94197.htm

[anonymoose]

琴行 qín háng  --- a collective noun for the musical instrument trade, or more frequently for shops selling musical instruments

https://zhidao.baidu.com/question/338788623.html

[Flickserve]

硬膜外镇痛

 

if you are in labour, you could try asking for epidural analgesia.

[Lu]

俄罗斯方块 Tetris

 

As seen in an interview with Zhang Yueran: 就像玩俄罗斯方块时，屏幕总有被砖块填满的一刻，但终归还有墙壁倏然下落，豁然开朗。 Initially I was debating whether I should look up which game this was or just read on, but then I read the rest of the sentence and I just knew. As far as I can tell from a very quick Google search, it's the official name too.

[sekkar]

43 minutes ago, Lu said:

俄罗斯方块 Tetris

 

Good one, made me want to look up other titles. 

 

吃豆人 Pacman

[sekkar]

Not really a word, but I didn't see a "random phrases" thread.

 

雪中送炭少，錦上添花多。

 

In the context I read it, it was used to describe the situation where when things are going well you have lots of people trying to 拉關係. But as soon as things go bad then there are no help to be found.

[Lu]

健在 jiànzài to be alive and in good health. Respectful way to ask if someone is still 活着.

 

A Chinese tourist asked me this about the previous Dutch queen. I initially didn't understand her and then replied that 对，她还活着. Got a friendly but very clear correction that when you're talking about queens, you use 健在 not 活着.

[roddy]

众筹, zhong̀choú. Crowdfunding. As in, the forums membership crowdfunded Roddy some lessons in typing pinyin.

[Tomsima]

love this thread, so good for context.

 

I am still in awe of my chinese interpreter 同學 who can just understand shíyòng as 食用 'edible, consumable' without any stress. You've got a split second to react and theres me thinking 實用？I must have heard the tones wrong as it makes no sense in this context....

使用？ Nope....

施用？

適用？ 

試用？

 

oh damn its 食用, well I guess I've gotta just get that drilled into my 'shi' yòng list 

[Alex_Hart]

Variants of this have already been mentioned in the thread by skylee who said 

Quote

被自殺 (bèizìshā) - a death claimed to be a suicide by the authorities

 

and by roddy who said 

Quote

河蟹 héxiè, river crab - but I came across it in the context of 被河蟹, which seems to be 'be blocked, closed down' - eg:

  Quote

今天死活打不开AT论坛，是不是被河蟹了？有哪位知道不？谢谢。

  Quote

www.blogger.com 终于也被河蟹了

and also here which has a nice little story about Internet censorship in China, with a happy(ish) ending.

Would be interested to hear if anyone knows the origin of the usage.

Wait, seems to be a typo / variant of 被和谐? ie. Oh well.

1

This article mentions several different versions of this use of 被 used by netizens which I had not heard of and were kinda interesting, including

被旅游 "to be touristed"; literally to be taken on a vacation by the authorities in order to get you away from big events, also perhaps a bribe to keep you quiet

被漏税 "to be tax-evaded"; when you're arrested for tax evasion (presumably you have not actually done any tax evasion)

被自杀 "to be suicided"

被嫖娼 "to be johned"; to be framed as someone who visits prostitutes 

被和谐 "to be harmonized"

All of these terms refer to when someone is forced to do something (or framed) by the authorities. There is apparently quite a large list of them beyond these. I really love these sorts of online slang in Chinese, simple yet creative.

[889]

Did we mention before 被高速, "to be HSR'd"?

 

https://wapbaike.baidu.com/item/被高速

[Publius]

種草 , zhong4cao3, "weed planting" -- nah, not that weed...

種草 means to enthuse about a product, especially online, arousing other people's interest in said product.

草 is a metaphor for the desire to buy and own something -- quite apropos because once it takes root, it's hard to eradicate (or as a great poet put it, 野火燒不盡、春風吹又生) and that itch, that tingling feeling only grows uncontrollably.

種草 was first coined and used on cosmetics forums, and I suspect often in the passive 被種草. Two related phrases are 長草 and 拔草. For more explanations, see http://www.cim.chinesecio.com/hbcms/f/article/info?id=7735ad57159643919b96f93e5be6dd77 (in Chinese and Japanese)

 

EDIT: Added some usage examples

《舌尖3》开播，全民被种草了一口锅！朋友圈第一批代购已诞生

为什么你这么容易被种草？我们认真地研究了「种草心理学」

[889]

The New York Times is running a story about OFO's financial problems, and quotes a migrant worker who raised a fuss trying to get his deposit back. According to the Times he said, “It was never about the money, I just needed to vent.”

 

So how do you vent in Chinese? It would be quite useful to know sometimes.

 

EDIT: Looking at an online dictionary, always a good idea, shows 发泄.

[Jim]

11 hours ago, Publius said:

種草 , zhong4cao3, "weed planting" -- nah, not that weed...

種草 means to enthuse about a product, especially online, arousing other people's interest in said product.

草 is a metaphor for the desire to buy and own something -- quite apropos because once it takes root, it's hard to eradicate (or as a great poet put it, 野火燒不盡、春風吹又生) and that itch, that tingling feeling only grows uncontrollably.

種草 was first coined and used on cosmetics forums, and I suspect often in the passive 被種草. Two related phrases are 長草 and 拔草. For more explanations, see http://www.cim.chinesecio.com/hbcms/f/article/info?id=7735ad57159643919b96f93e5be6dd77 (in Chinese and Japanese)

 

Wonder if there's any link to "astroturf"? 

[imron]

1 hour ago, Jim said:

Wonder if there's any link to "astroturf"? 

That was my first thought as well.