Punishing errant husbands (China / Hong Kong)

Came across a joke in a mainland Chinese magazine about a wife punishing a husband by making him kneel on the TV remote control.  Every time the channel changes, he gets whacked.

This reminds me of a Hong Kong Cantonese movie I saw in the ‘60s.

The first time the husband came home late at night from a drinking session with his mates, he found the lights blazing and his wife waiting on the sofa.  He got a telling-off.

The second time he came back late, the wife was sitting up in bed, feather duster in hand, thwacking it on the blanket as she ticked him off.

The third time, the wife had drawn a chalk circle on the floor, and he was made to kneel within the circle, while she slept on.  If she woke up in the middle of the night and found he’d dozed off in the circle, she’d thwack the feather duster and order him to get back to the kneeling position.

The fourth time, he had to kneel on an abacus within the circle.  This made it difficult for him to nod off.

The last time, he had to kneel on the abacus within the circle, and hold a full chamber pot on his head.

(China / Hong Kong)

Machine translation: 01 (Slovak to English) (London)

A Slovakian ex-student’s mother had come to London to visit him for a week.  He had a full-time job, so I offered to spend time with her.  She teaches cooking back home in Slovakia, so I thought I could cook her some simple stir-fried dishes to demonstrate how simple and versatile stir-frying is, as practically any permutation is possible.  

In addition to the practical demonstration, I thought I’d also tell her about some basic principles: the different ways of cutting up the ingredients (e.g., cutting across the grain, apart from the obvious slicing, dicing, etc.), when to add which ingredients to the wok (e.g., crunchy bits first to cook longer, leafy bits at the end for a short blast), the food therapy properties of the ingredients (e.g., wood ear for cholesterol).

Since I only know three words of Slovak (“hello”, “yes”, and “thank you”) and Emilia’s English is lower beginner level, communication was not easy.  It then struck me that I could use my laptop and call up googletranslate in two windows: one for English to Slovak, and one for Slovak to English.  It’s not ideal, but would get a lot more across.

As Central Europeans are known for their foraging, I thought I’d teach her some dishes involving dried mushrooms and dried wood ear*, which are two common ingredients in Chinese cooking.  Surprisingly, she’d never heard of wood ear (which is a tree fungus), and did not recognise it when I showed her some.  So, I thought I’d start by telling her what it’s called: 木耳 mù’ěr (“wood ear”) in Chinese, Jew’s ear** in English.

The googletranslate conversation continued with Emilia asking questions: how long to soak the dried Jew’s ear for, how to cook it, what other ingredients to use with it, etc..  At one point, googletranslate showed up “dried synagogue” in English!

*木耳 mù’ěr, Auricularia auricula, family Auriculariaceae

**[from my Apple Mac built-in dictionary] Auricularia auricula-judae, family Auriculariaceae, class Hymenomycetes.  ORIGIN: mid 16th cent.: a mistranslation of medieval Latin auricula Judae ‘Judas's ear’, from its shape, and because it grows on the elder, which was said to be the tree from which Judas Iscariot hanged himself.

(London, 2012)

Problematic surname (London)

A new student turned up one day to join the evening classes.  As he was not a beginner, I had to assess him so that he could be placed in the appropriate grade, so I went through the usual list of questions, starting with personal information.

I asked him:  nǐ xìng shénme / “you surnamed what” / What is your surname?

(“shénme" is often pronounced “shěme” as a shortcut.)

I heard him say: wǒ xìng shěme / “I surnamed what” / What is my surname?

I wasn’t quite sure what to make of his answer: was he trying to check that he’d heard me correctly?  There was no other explanation for his reply.  

So, I decided to confirm my question: nǐ xìng shénme.

Back came the same answer from him.

This went on for a few more times, and I was starting to think he’d gone mad, not knowing his own surname.

It then emerged that his surname was Shama’a.

(London, 1990s)

The Lebanese surname "Shama'a" (شمعة) is of Arabic origin, meaning "candle" and is a metonymic occupational name for someone who makes or sells candles.

How to get adults to eat their food (UK)

My first professional interpreting assignment was during my third year as a BA student, in 1980.  A textile factory in China had bought machinery from a firm in north England, and although the contract included servicing, the Chinese side decided to send over four people to learn how to fix minor technical problems so that they wouldn’t have to wait for a British engineer to go out.

The British side had booked the delegation into a five-star hotel, converted from a manor house sited in acres of grounds complete with oak trees and grazing black and white cows, and a French chef.

At the delegation’s first meal, I noticed that they hardly touched their lunch.  I’d helped them order from the menu: all Western food (grilled steak, beef stroganoff, lasagne, chicken Provençal, Lancashire hotpot), served with the usual potatoes (chipped, or mashed, or roasted) and vegetables (boiled french beans, carrots, peas).  They were, however, individual portions, so that each person had his/her own dish, e.g., the person who’d chosen chicken Provençal would just have chicken Provençal.

I decided to try something different, and had a private chat with the chef.  We would still order five dishes, but could the kitchen present the food in a Chinese way:  serve the meat (cut up into small pieces) and vegetables in separate dishes, substitute the potatoes with rice, and place all of them in the middle of the table so that everyone could tuck in?

The group polished off all the dishes, and at every subsequent meal, too, for the rest of their fortnight’s training.

(Accrington, Lancashire, England, 1980)

How to beat the pickpocket (Morocco)

An English assistant editor I used to work with on The Heart of The Dragon, Andy, was in Morocco.  He had been warned about pick-pockets, so he left his hotel room one morning with his trouser pockets stuffed with toilet paper, neatly folded like paper money.  

On the bus, he left a hand feeling his upper legs, but pretended he hadn't noticed.  When the man got off the bus, Andy followed him.  The man went into an alleyway to check his pickings.  Andy stood at the corner, peeking round.  

After the man found that his pickings were just wads of toilet paper, he looked up to see his victim watching him.  Talk about adding insult to injury!  

*Andy is the protagonist in my blog "How to do business" [in Turkey].

(Morocco, 1970s)

How to backfire swearing: 2 (Singapore)

During a family gathering with my siblings on my recent trip to Singapore, our reminiscing unearthed the story of my father’s swearing, which I’d forgotten about.

In the three southern Chinese dialects that I can (sort of) speak (the Teochew/Cháozhōu 潮州 dialect, the Hokkien/Fújiàn 福建 dialect, and the Cantonese/Guǎngdōng 广东 dialect), one way of swearing at the other party is to say, “F..k your mother!” which is very insulting.

When my father got angry with us (the children) one day, he used this phrase.  We laughed at him, “But our mother is your own wife!”  So, he abandoned that phrase.

The next time he swore, he chose an alternative, which is the Teochew equivalent of the English “son of a bitch”.  The Teochew version is: 狗種仔／狗种仔 “dog breed child/children” (i.e., not human breed).  We laughed at him, “But we are your children, so you’re calling yourself a dog!”

He gave up swearing altogether after that.

(Singapore, 1960–70s)

How to backfire swearing: 1 (London)

When I was working on the Channel Four series The Heart of The Dragon in the early 80s, there was suddenly a spate of phone calls with the caller using obscene language (“Do you want to f..k?”).  One call even had a little child, who seemed barely able to speak (probably aged five), asking the obscene question, obviously being prompted by an adult in the background.

My response to the first call was stunned silence, not knowing what to do.  After a couple more, I decided to take action and went out to buy a whistle, intending to blow the whistle really loudly down the phone line.  Unfortunately, the nearest available whistles were from a children’s toy museum (Pollock’s Toy Museum in Scala Street).  Being toys, they all had a low muffled sort of pitch to them, nowhere near shrill enough to deliver a shock to the perpetrator.

I went for Plan B.  The next time the call came and the question was put to me, I said, “Pardon?” innocently.  The caller was tricked into repeating his obscene question, thus making the obscenity lose its impact.  After a few more “Pardon?”, he twigged and rang off in frustration with the parting shot, “Oh, f..k you!”  It felt so good to have the tables turned on him, with him being the flustered one.  The calls never came again.

 (London, 1983)