meaning of 拧巴

[randall_flagg]

Hi there!

Would anyone care to enlighten me on the meaning of the word

拧巴 ？None of my dictionaries lists this word. I have done some research, but find it unsatisfactory.

http://zhidao.baidu.com/question/40592359.html?fr=qrl&fr2=query&adt=0_204

I am reading 我叫刘跃进 by 刘震云 and he uses this word all the time (in certain chapters)

Like 幽默和不幽默的人，是两种动物。 拧巴还在手，人不幽默， 作出的是幽默。 （And, as you can very well see, the author uses commas in a rather creative fashion, much different from, say 余华）

Thanks,

Randall

[roddy]

I heard the word in 梦想照进现实, and I seem to remember that alongside the script (used to be linked from that topic, but it's dead now) a number of invented words were listed, one of which was 拧巴。 Your link and this make me think it wasn't so much invented as dragged out of dialect, but it's not surprising it's not in the dictionaries. Yet.

[skylee]

Take a look at this -> 中國流行語：擰巴

[randall_flagg]

Thanks! So, would anyone care to venture a translation into English?

[studentyoung]

拧巴还在手，人不幽默， 作出的是幽默。

拧巴还在于，人不幽默，做出的事幽默。

http://cache.baidu.com/c?m=9f65cb4a8c8507ed4fece76310409f3c0e54f73c6195c7150885ce178e2206031c37fee474794c1993922f3160e81923b9ab6a6530772ab590c88a4ed9ac955c2d9f27432a5ad91f069644ef9d4932b0278729eab81897ad803084dfa4c4de2444ba23120a8be7fd5c1762b978f1642692d58e3e114810cbfa416fe828073e9e5357c647ee90427906f1e1ab5d5bb22cc7101780dc44a73e63a265a1086f2153d04da67c553131905857f8534c0285ea2df05b0a5752b35fb2c9d6c0ea5ffddafd409eedb8de&p=9933f916d9c414ff57e9c2355f&user=baidu#baidusnap0

The kink lies in that a man without any sense of humor does something quite humorous.

拧巴的意思应该是指人被其他物体缠绕后，不舒服的感觉。比如，这衣服我穿上去，拧巴的很。有时也指两个人肢体纠缠较劲。比如，你们这两个淘气小鬼不要拧巴了！

如果说是近义词的话，纠结或纠缠比较相近吧

http://zhidao.baidu.com/question/47501302.html?fr=qrl&adt=0_217

Cheers!

[L-F-J]

pretty good too: http://zhidao.baidu.com/question/40592359.html

seems in most cases equal to 别扭, "awkward", "embarrassing", etc..

刘震云 talks about it in an interview here, toward the end: http://ent.tom.com/2007-11-30/000E/28853096_03.html

[skylee]

studentyoung, thanks so much for pointing out that it is 在于, not 在手.

When I read #1 I thought, "wow mainland writers are really sophisticated (莫測高深). I can't even understand what they write". It did not occur to me that it was a typo (I guess I was just not sensitive enough with the simplified script).

[HashiriKata]

studentyoung, thanks so much for pointing out that it is 在于, not 在手.

I'd say the same to studentyoung! There seems to be a typo in here, too: "作出的是幽默。" Let's rip randall_flagg apart for the crime s/he's committed, shall we?

[randall_flagg]

Well thank you, student young! I feel a bit stupid, but I don't care! I'm just happy that this sentence is finally making sense. You don't know how many times I'd looked at that sentence before, no I idea how I could miss that. I guess I have all the 拧巴 s in the book figured out now.

Again, thanks everybody for their input!

Randall