Same thing, different names

[skylee]

MOOC - 大規模網上開放課程。大規模開放在線課程。線上開放課程。網路開放課程。磨課師。

[Kobo-Daishi]

Jellyfish.

I'd known 海蜇 from having read many Chinese restaurant menus, over the years, with the characters.

But today I came across this old June 8, 2013 Taipei Times article titled "Competition entry pokes subtle fun at President Ma" about a subtle dig at Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou hidden within an entry for a poetry competition.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2013/06/08/2003564286
 

 

The message, which reads diagonally through the poem, says: “Ying-jeou, you jellyfish brain (英久[九]妳這個水母腦).”

The message intentional or otherwise is hidden within the poem diagonally like in those "find the word" word games we had at grade school here in the US.

https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&biw=1024&bih=516&q=find+the+word+game&btnG=Search+Images

https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&biw=1024&bih=516&q=水母&btnG=Search+Images

https://www.google.com/search?tbm=isch&biw=1024&bih=516&q=海蜇&btnG=Search+Images

As you can see from the Google image searches, no Chinese dishes are found under the "水母" entry, but, quite a few are found under "海蜇".

I quite like eating jellyfish. The crunchy chewiness of the dish.  

Kobo.

 

Edit: Water mother should be easy enough to remember.  

[skylee]

This has been discussed on the "Random new word of the day" thread.

 

Door hinge - 合頁。合葉。鉸鏈。門鉸。

[mouse]

Is it 羡慕妒忌恨 or 羡慕嫉妒恨？When searching online it seems the latter is preferred, but I've only encountered the former in the wild.

[Kobo-Daishi]

My Same Thing, Different Names is talcum powder.

I've been downloading The Simpsons animated TV series with Chinese subtitles and came across this scene.

Homer swallows 爽身粉.

Talcum powder is also 滑石粉.

I know both the characters 爽 and 滑 well from my daily reading of this Hong Kong girl's daily Facebook food posts.

She posts on everything she eats. Breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, and dinner. She usually dines out, but, her favorite is her "lao ma"'s home cooking. I wonder why she calls her "lao ma".

Everything is so 爽.

I guess there is only so many things you can say about food.

And 彈牙. I guess that's the Chinese equivalent of "al dente".

Kobo.

[tooironic]

Yeah, talcum powder is a good one. It is called 撲粉, 滑石粉 or 爽身粉 depending on who you speak to.

[OneEye]

sunflower: 太陽花，向日葵，or 香蕉

 

(reference)

 

Also, apparently 向陽花、葵花, etc.

[Takeshi]

Sorry to bump this but just a story to tell.

 

mayonnaise - 美奶滋。蛋黃醬。沙拉醬。沙律醬。

I had a hilarious exchange with a restaurant worker the other day when I wanted some mayonnaise for my chips. I tried to ask if they had mayonnaise, first in psuedo-English by asking if they had mayonnaise醬, then they were like "you mean 沙律醬?", and I said no to it (thinking it meant salad dressing), and tried explaining that mayonnaise was white and made out of eggs. In the end, they didn't know what it was and then I ended up just eating my chips plain because I don't like ketchup.

Then the other day I say someone dump a huge bottle of 沙律醬 into the dispenser and when I looked at the bottle I was like "that looks a lot like mayonnaise, wait, does 沙律醬 actually mean mayonnaise in Chinese?". So then the next time I tried some 沙律醬 with my chips and it tasted like mayonnaise but was a little off.

Then I found out about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salad_cream

And I theorized in my mind that that 沙律醬 I had must have been not mayonnaise exactly but actually salad cream. (The translation makes sense then anyways.)

Now I saw this thread and I hear it's supposed to be a translation for mayonnaise.

I wonder many things now.

[tooironic]

Funny story Takeshi. This translation of mayonnaise is one of many examples where the Chinese have tried to adopt a meaning-based translation - as opposed to transliteration - at all costs. The results to a native speaker of English can be unexpected.

[skylee]

airport - 機場。空港。航空站。

[skylee]

Single lens reflex (SLR) camera - 單鏡反光相機。單眼反光相機。單反相機。單眼相機。

[Jon Lee]

food-cai, fan

drive- kai chr, jia chi

handsome- shuai, ing jun

beautiful- mei li, piao liang

you- ni, nin(though "nin" is for respectable persons)

 

Hope I taught something useful...

[skylee]

drive- kai chr, jia chi

I suppose Jon Lee meant "kai che" and "jia shi".

[tooironic]

fire escape: 太平梯 (tàipíngtī), 逃生梯 (táoshēngtī), 消防梯 (xiāofángtī)

 

[skylee]

fire escape: 太平梯

This reminds of -

Morgue/ mortuary - 太平間。停屍間。殮房。

[lingo-ling]

建築 architecture or building

建築物 building

 

Actually, it's one of my language peeves that the Chinese like to use 建築 to mean "building", because of the ambiguity. 

 

But it's their language...

[Lu]

building - the act of constructing something

building - the result of the construction, a physical object

 

English is so confusing!

 

TBH the Chinese in this respect used to confuse me too, until I realised Dutch does something similar (bouwen = to build, gebouw = 'construction-ing' but actually means 'building' (the object)) and then I found it quite neat.

[tooironic]

Though I find 樓 to be more commonly used in conversation than 建築物.

[skylee]

In the weather reports in HK, what is called 霧霾 in Mainland China is called 煙霞 when it happens in HK. 煙霞 is a very beautiful term but in this context it could be a bit misleading.

[JYLIN]

mainland China /Hong Kong

Strawberry ：草莓/士多啤梨

freezer /refrigerator: 冰箱/雪櫃

air conditioner :空調/冷氣（冷氣機）

Electric motor :馬達/摩打

Tomato :馬鈴薯，土豆