Category Archives: Chinglish

Day 342 in Beijing: Huh?

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I have no idea what these two posters have to do with each other.

I have no idea what these two posters have to do with each other.

Now, i’m not a surgeon,

I didn’t stay in a Holiday Inn last night,

nor do I really understand laser surgery.

I’m just thinking that

“Safe

&

Profession

&

Ice”

really don’t have anything much to do with each other.

And, I’m thinking, if I ever get laser hair removal, this isn’t the place I’m having it done.

By the way, what does laser hair removal and twins have to do with each other?

The only thing I can figure out is that maybe twins get a volume discount at this place.

Once again, cementing my original statement that this is not the place I’d ever get laser hair removal done.

Day 339 in Beijing: 798 Art District, Part 2.

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One of our favorite pieces of graffiti art,

One of our favorite pieces of graffiti art,

Jill and I continued to walk around and check out the scene.

We were very impressed and noticed a massive building off a side street.

It was totally covered in graffitti and we noticed some other people taking pictures of it.

Being that I work Sunday through Wednesday, we often go places when other people are at work, so the locations are quite empty.

However, there were a lot of people visiting from out of town and so there were more tourists than usual compared to when we normally go sightseeing.

We walked up and notice a few high school aged girls taking pictures and waited for them to finish.

They looked at us and one of them started speaking English and asked us where we are from, do we live in Beijing and so forth.  They were on vacation from their high school and in Beijing only for a few days.

Jill and I have gotten used to being asked these kinds of questions, here in Beijing, and when we travel to other parts of China.

We don’t find it rude but it can be somewhat tiring as we sort of feel as if we are “monkeys in a zoo” and never really allowed to fit in completely.

Even on the subway or walking around beijing, a city of 23 million people, we are often stared at and looked at with amazement.

Now, we are good looking folks, but not that good looking.  Just kidding!

We also realize that expatriates are still fairly rare to a lot of people here and we want to make a good example so that people don’t believe everything they see on tv and that most Americans aren’t running around, shooting each other and dealing drugs.  We are just people who are trying to get along and survive, like most anyone else.

These girls then asked Jill, which I sort of expected, if she would take a picture with them.

This happens to us a lot.

Again, we aren’t that good looking, we are just average, but we are different here and so people want to take pictures with us.

I could never imagine going up to someone, who I don’t know in the USA, and just saying, “Oh, can I take a picture with you because you don’t look like me?” but people do here.  And it isn’t done in a rude or offensive way.  They just love selfies and love taking pictures with people.

So, Jill being Jill, she jumped right in and they took a few pictures.

After this, we continued on our way and just enjoyed the art and gorgeous day with very low pollution and blue skies.

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Day 335 in Beijing: Pizza A8 Pub And Chinglish.

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I really love Chinglish.

Even if I hated Google, which I don’t, I’d love them for their translation software because I’m pretty sure 90% of Chinglish is formed by using Google Translate.

Pizza A8 Pub is a restaurant that Jill and I frequent about once a week and I’ve blogged about before.

They have incredibly yummy greek pizza and other vegetarian food and it isn’t as crazy as the other pizza/pub bars around I.E.B.U., which is the university across the street.

Being that the university is across the street, lots of drunk teens, and young adults often show up to the places around here.

That is fine but it does make for a loud dinner which is not what we usually want.

Yes, you can hear me saying, “These darn kids! They have no respect!  When I was a teen, we had to walk to school, 17 miles, uphill both ways!  And for shoes we only have wooden planks with nails pointing upwards touching our feet!  These kids have no respect!”

That isn’t what I mean as we’ve partied with the college students and a lot of our friends are college students.

We just like a little peace and quiet, sometimes, and Pizza A8 Pub affords us this.

Anyway, I’ll just let you read the different specials and let you comment on the Chinglish.

 

pub

Day 326 in Beijing: Gient or Giatne. Either Way, It Is Not A Giant.

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Gient. I'm guessing this isn't a "Giant" bicycle subsidiary.

Gient. I’m guessing this isn’t a “Giant” bicycle subsidiary.

There are a lot of bicycles in Beijing.

Supposedly not nearly as many as there were 10 years ago since many people now own scooters, motorcycles and cars, but there are still a lot.

There are a large number of bicycles from different makers but Giant definitely seems to be the overwhelming choice of premium bikes.

However, there also seems to be some pretty serious knock offs of the Giant name.

Giatne. Also probably not a Giant subsidiary.

Giatne. Also probably not a Giant subsidiary.

I found these two different versions and they both made me laugh.

This isn’t quite “Chinglish” but it is close enough for me.

By the way, Giant is a Taiwanese company and I’ve owned a couple of them.

They are fantastic bikes and my friend, Christopher Rubin, used to work for them and got me turned onto them.

Day 313 in Beijing: The Speciality Ices the sand Nursing one’ health Machine.

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Martin and the Fakeamix Blender.

Martin and the Fakeamix Blender.

Those of you that follow my blog know that Jill and I love The Local.

It is a great bar/restaurant here in Beijing, and the owners, Martin, Kenn and Jessie, are awesome people.

They are funny, kind and work 14-16 hours a day and yet never complain or get annoyed.

I doubt I could do the work they do and stay as positive and cheerful.

We love hanging out with them and we often play “Beeriocart” with them when they are taking a well deserved break.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen Jessie play so far and we need to get her in on the fun!

Beeriocart, by the way, is the video game, “Mariocart” but when we play we drink at the same time.  Mariocart is a car racing game that is a blast.  Martin and Kenn are amazing at it.  Jill and I?  Not so much.

The rules are simple: there are four players who race the cars around different tracks. The person that gets last place, usually Jill or me, has to do a shot of alcohol.  The person that gets first place also has to do a shot.  Now, this is a very fair way of dealing with winning and losing because if you suck, like Jill and I do, you get a little drunk and have fun.  However, if you are great, like Martin and Kenn, you get drunk and start driving worse and it brings you down to our level.  Well, not down to our level but it does give us a little edge once in a while.

Anyway, Jill and I have been looking for a Vitamix since we moved here and noticed that The Local had a Vitamix!

I bought a Vitamix about 3 years ago, with the help of my mom and dad as a present for becoming a Licensed Marriage and Family therapist, and have done a 10 day green smoothie/juice fast which I loved.

Jill and I want to do one here but we haven’t been able to find a blender that is powerful enough.

I was hoping our problem was solved.

However, we soon found out that this was no Vitamix but instead, as I’m going to call it, a “Fakeamix.”

We asked them about it and they said it has been amazing.  They want to buy a new one since their’s is dying but they can’t find them anywhere.

Martin let us take a picture of it because the Chinglish on it is utterly hilarious.

I honestly love the look on Martin’s face.  It think it says it all.

Because who doesn’t want a blender that is, “A Machine Multiuse” and has the ability to be “The Speciality Ices the sand Nursing one’ health Machine.”

By the way, it is, as they openly declare, a “High Perform ance commercial Blender.”

Agreementness, would Eye have.  Question with out not, Perform ance.

 

Day 296 in Beijing: Nothing Tastes As Good As Sour Love.

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It looks so romantic from afar.

 

Jill and I get a weekly massage at Butterfly Nail Salon and massage in the massive Yashow Market in Sanlitun.

This market sells clothes, electronics, jewelry, and all kinds of other stuff.

And, everything is knock offs and usually pretty cheaply made.

In fact you can get a Burberry/Hermes/Louis Vitton scarf for about 10 bucks.

5 bucks if you bargain hard.

The quality isn’t the best but when you are in China, no one knows the difference so you can impress people that are easily impressed with supposedly expensive stuff.

I personally don’t care about brand names so I don’t bother with this stuff but it is a great way to buy a bunch of gifts, at a very low price, to bring back home and people seem to do that a lot.

The basic idea is to see what they offer, and then start at about 1/4 of the price and never go over 1/3 of the price at the end.

In reality it is a pretty stupid thing because people that know what they are doing will just waste time (like us) as we try to get down to the price we know they will sell it to us and we aren’t tourists that will overpay.

Nothing says romance like sour love.

Nothing says romance like sour love.

However, they make loads of money off the tourists that do overpay so we are stuck bargaining when we know what is a fair price and just want to get it over with.

Trust me, either way, they are making loads of money because this stuff costs them nothing to produce.

Anyway, there is some classic Chinglish at the Butterfly Nail Saloon in Yashow.

We’ve gone a number of times, but I didn’t realize it until just recently.

So, if you are in love, I hope these words don’t come true:

“May your love SOUR on the wings of doves in flight.”

Now, I know they meant to write, “May your love SOAR on the wings of doves in flight” but I have to admit it sort of sounds like a death knell of a relationship.

Maybe I’m just not romantic enough to get the meaning.

To each their own.

Day 267 in Beijing: Gargo Lift.

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At least now I know where I can lift my gargo.

At least now I know where I can lift my gargo.

People are moving around Beijing constantly.

This requires some pretty decent sized cargo lifts to move their furniture.

Actually, it doesn’t require cargo lifts as much as it requires, as they obviously wrote in Chinglish, a “Gargo Lift.”

I don’t know what the actual Hanzi script below the words “Gargo Lift” mean but I’m guessing the are correct since it is China’s own language and one would assume that they know what they are writing.

Then again, after living here for about 9 months, nothing really surprises me and the sign could say, “McDonald’s hamburgers” for all I know.

Either way, these little signs and surprises constantly keep Jill and me laughing at the absurdity of it all and the crazy circumstances that brought us to China in 2013 and allowed us each to celebrate birthdays here in Beijing.

We are definitely enjoying the ride in the gargo lift.

Day 261 in Beijing: FUYOU.

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FuYou. Pretty rude attitude for a container to have!

FuYou. Pretty rude attitude for a container to have!

Jill and I bought this container down at a local market.

We bargained for it.

And we bargained hard.

It is amazing how my personality changes when I’m “forced” to bargain.

I honestly don’t like bargaining but, if I don’t, I’ll pay about 3x what the real price is for the item.

I’d rather they just tell me what it should cost and we go on our merry way.

However, it is also a nice way to interact with people if you don’t try to underbid them or they don’t try to overbid you.

As neither Jill nor I speak Mandarin, you might be wondering how we bargain.

Everyone that works at the market has a calculator and pretty much has this English saying down perfectly, “Special just for you!”

The other is “Okay, best price!”

Other than that, you don’t really have to say much as you input a price on the calculator and they shake their head, “No!” and then put down their price.

I love a little gentleness in my plastics.

I love a little gentleness in my plastics.

As you get closer and closer to agreement, it becomes sort of silly and goofy because I have found myself arguing over a few cents.

It is almost as if the “real” amount of the money doesn’t matter because my ego, and endorphins, get going and it becomes a game.

Well, we bought this container.

I think it cost 20RMB (about 3 bucks) which is a fair price for quality containers here.

What cracked us up about it, though, was the name on the cover.

By the way, I have no idea how plastic can have “gentleness.”

If you do, please feel free to let me know in the comments.

 

 

Day 227 in Beijing: Letters From The Edinburgh Mansion Park.

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The Dog Dog really needs some help.

The Dog Dog really needs some help (Click on the picture for an enlargement).

I am a big fan of Chinglish.

If you don’t know what Chinglish is, I’ll define it.

Here is the basics of it: Chinglish is the translation of words from Chinese to English.

Sounds simple, right?

Wrong.

Both Chinese and English are very difficult languages and Google Translate has helped in a lot of ways for people speaking one or the other language to understand each other.

Google translate has also hurt people trying to understand each other because some of the translations are rather, how shall we say, colorful?

I have two friends that live in a apartment complex and they’ve been paying attention to the Chinglish letters that have been posted by management to help people have a more peaceness and healthyful happinesstime for your day to be great kind of day.

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