funny questions you face.

[zozzen]

as a guest in a school with many young kids, i was asked many funny questions by these curious students. some of them really amazed me because i never expect a kid to talk about it.

a 10 year old kid asked if i bought shares of the china insurance ltd and gave the exact figure about how much it has risen over the past year. one of another young kid warned me to be careful with the bubble burst, especially after olympics in 2008.

another of the same age wondered if i married. when i said no, they were surprised and told me their future plan for marriage. they said most local henaneses married at early age, or they would face family pressure. ' i dont want to be pregnant when i am 40. this is dangerous for women.'

some questions are not as mature as these. they asked me how many 'billion' i have as they assume we should be super rich. another girl assumed that i have met many superstars and pop singers, as i live in hong kong.

do you see any interesting questions in china?

[gougou]

Interesting!

I was stunned the other day: a friend was buying a voice recorder, and I stroke up a conversation with the sales clerk. She asked me where I was from, to which I replied Germany. So she goes: "Oh, Germany. So, how long do you cook your eggs?"

After I had stopped laughing, she told me that she had read a book that said that Germans would be watching the clock while cooking their eggs (which by the way is true).

I've also gotten the more cliché ones, like whether in Germany we have beer coming out of the taps. These you get in the US as well, though

This thread also reminds me of an all-time favorite of mine, loosely related. I was walking down Wangfujing, when this girl comes up to me:

She: "Hi, do you speak English?"

gougou: "Sure."

She: "You are student?"

gougou: "Yeah."

She: "Me too. Where you from?"

gougou: "Germany."

She: "Oh! Err... Do you speak English?"

Didn't stay around long enough to see whether she would be repeating the entire thing...

[muyongshi]

I've also gotten the more cliché ones, like whether in Germany we have beer coming out of the taps. These you get in the US as well, though

What??? You don't!?!? Well see if I ever go to Germany now...

It's not so much a funny question but the one I get all the time is "Can I have a conversation with you?" My response is go learn a little tact and then we'll talk...

I did have a cab driver that once asked if "So, I hear all Americans are large..." I think you can figure out what he was asking about...

[roddy]

"How many hours did the boat from England take?"

On national stereotypes, I like the way that taxi drivers hold that the English are a) all gentlemen and B) warmongers who should get out of Iraq. Presumably we hold doors open for ladies while invading.

[Lu]

Kid started talking to me in a bus station. He started out in English, but when he ran out of that he proceeded in Chinese. I replied in Chinese as well. After a few questions (what's your name, where are you from) he asked if I could speak Chinese. In Chinese. After just having had a conversation in Chinese.

[Senzhi]

I get this one daily ...

Chinese student: "Do you love your country?"

Me: "Do you love yours?"

Chinese student: "Of course !!!!"

Me: "Well, so do I. Of course I love my country!"

Chinese student: "Then why do you come to China then?"

[muyongshi]

Since most Chinese students want to go overseas you can always come back with "Would you like to live overseas?" And if they say yes then say "but I thought you loved your country?"

[Xiao Kui]

I'm about as Caucasian as they come, with grey-blue eyes to boot, but I've gotten this question twice:

Who is Chinese, your father or your mother?

And I've been asked 3 times by Chinese if I was Korean. Either I'm starting to appear Asian from living here so long, or a significant number of Chinese think Korea is somewhere in Europe. And people say Americans' sense of geography is bad!!!

[zozzen]

it seems to me kids today love to ask questions about economy.

'what is the currency in hk?'

'hong kong dollar'

'oh hong kong dollar has depreciated a lot and rmb is more valuable'

'yeah, rmb keeps the pace of appreciation and everything is more expensive than ever'

then the kid said 'well i would prefer to earn british pounds. that is very expensive now'

perhaps they are also facing pressure to keep up the living standard of other riches. everytime they see any new things of me, the first question is usually 'how much is it?' how much is the portable gaming console(nds), your bag, your listerine mouthwash, mobile phone and even the cigarette i smoked in my room.

[simonlaing]

Sometimes I get questions about things that don't really exist in the US.

How much does a foot massage therapist/Bicycle repairman/bike parking lot attendant make in the US?

How much does a baozi cost in the US?

Are the bicycle police as rude in America as China?

Do you go back home for Spring festival each year?

Have fun,

SImon:)

[Xiao Kui]

Sometimes I get questions about things that don't really exist in the US.

here's one:

I'm an accordion major, and I want to keep studying - how can I get into grad school in the states?

Though accordionists certainly exist in the states, I doubt whether there is a PhD. program tailored for accordion teachers.

[simonlaing]

Sometimes I get questions that show their completely believe country stereotypes

What are british men such gentlemen?

How can anyone have an argument in the US if everyone has a gun?

Why are Black people so good at basketball?

Will I fall in love when I visit France, you know french men are very romantic!

(from a man)

I am going to Thailand for a holiday. How can you tell the difference between a woman and a transvestite?

People are funny.

have fun,

Simon:)

[Lu]

I'm about as Caucasian as they come, with grey-blue eyes to boot, but I've gotten this question twice:

Who is Chinese, your father or your mother?

Same here. Am tall, white, sort of blond, and green-eyed, and yet several people have asked me if I was half Chinese. Do I look half-Chinese, I asked in amazement. No, but you sound so Chinese when you speak Chinese, so we thought you must be half Chinese.

And geography is also always interesting. Many people just assume that Holland speaks English, but some know better. Holland... you speak Portugese there, right? (from two different people. One other guy thought it was Spanish. I seriously wonder how on earth they get to that connection)

[heifeng]

hmmm, lu sounds like she could be the twin i never knew I had over in taiwan (separated at birth of course and you were sent to live in holland~or vice versa~ i suppose hehe)

So, do you ever get asked if your hair is real or what you ate to grow so tall? I get asked the second question alot by mothers in the supermarket with their kid:mrgreen: My response: yogurt (mengniu and yili can thank me later) Occasionally I get asked about my parents' height.

edit~ i finally thought of the funniest question i ever got asked...ok, I do get asked about hair and eyelashes quite a bit, but the one that took the cake was about variation in the color of body hair on people who are blond. It became quite an intense conversation since this lady very much wanted to know details and had already observed that sometimes blonds have blonde/whitish arm hair, maybe even eyelashes, so she wanted to know about the rest. We also touched on the topic of albinos, etc...I'm telling you, she was loaded with questions...

[fanglu]

Holland... you speak Portugese there, right? (from two different people. One other guy thought it was Spanish. I seriously wonder how on earth they get to that connection)

I guess its not entirely impossible that this could have been the case, in a totally different universe.

Link

[Lu]

Yeah, that, and the Dutch were in Taiwan after the Portuguese and at the same time as the Spanish. But anyone who knows his history well enough to know all that would also have some idea of geography. (And be too well-educated to be a taxi driver, as a friend of mine here remarked when I told him about this.)

I do get asked if the curls are real (which they are :-) ) and how tall I am, and then either they know or I tell them that the Dutch are the tallest people in the world, and that in Holland, a woman of 1.80 is not that tall. They can hardly believe that, and the longer I'm here, the more trouble I have believing it myself.

[muyongshi]

Dig up an old thread to put this is...

The questions wasn't as funny so much as the logic behind it:

(conversation between me and taxi driver)

So is China's 气候 better than the states?

(being nice) Oh, it's about the same....

But you have 黑人?

So what does that have to do with anything?

Well, for them to 晒成 that 样子 your 气候 must be pretty bad!

*trying not to laugh- ummm no! It's because of genes, their descendants (majority) came from Africa.

Oh so they were born that way!?!?

Yes....

[skylee]

trying not to laugh- ummm no! It's because of genes, their descendants (majority) came from Africa.

You mean ancestors, right?

[muyongshi]

That's what I said

[jbradfor]

Not nearly as funny as others' experiences, but the one that stands out in my mind was being asked -- IN CHINESE -- whether I can use chopsticks, and then being asked in amazement where I learned to use them. I wanted to reply "the same place I learned to speak your language!", but just replied in that in the USA, most people can use chopsticks.