Engrish

Oh my---BEST website  engrish.com  What passes for English in other countries--especially China and Japan is really, REALLY funny.  The website has a special link for Chinglish and these gems were posted today.

At a restaraunt you can order: Steamed mini dread
A park sign pointing to a garbage can:  No not disorder rubbish here
A sign on the grass: Please take care of the sleeping grass.

There are HUNDREDS of these things with pictures.  I'll have to make a point of reading these daily while I'm in China.

Dead Fish

I asked my friend Xin Zhang what she misses most about China.  "THE FOOD! THE FOOD! THE FOOD! You people here eat DEAD fish!"  "You mean you like raw fish like sushi?" "NO! The Chinese cook their fish--(small rant here about crazy Japanese cuisine).  But when I go to the store here the fish is frozen. It is dead.  I asked if Chinese food in America bears any relation to real Chinese food.  HUGE eyeball roll.  Xin says she can cook 100 times better than the Chinese restaraunts, but that she is not considered a good cook.  "In China I am a stupid cook. My father won't let me into the kitchen." 

According to Xin we should skip Shanghai--it's just like New York and not at all the real China.  She also described a fun place but couldn't tell me what it was in English.  Somewhere in China there is a huge flat rock--that is covered by about six inches of water. I'm still not sure if it's part of a river or a lake.  But the rock is so smooth and the water so shallow ("only this thick") that it feels as if you're walking ON the water.  People come from all over just to walk around and play on this rock.  Xin says that China is fun because there are so many people and all of them are thinking of fun things to do all the time.

The Forbidden City

This is the first place I want to go if I ever get to China.  How could anybody resist with a name like--The Forbidden City?  It was the central location of goverment for China for hundreds of years.  My Chinese friend said the palace complex has 9991/2 rooms.  This is because the first emperor that lived there was offspring of the Sun God. The Sun had 1,000 rooms in his palace so naturally his own son would not be permitted to equal or outdo his father. 

Palaces and beautiful places are common enough in the world.  What makes the Forbidden City special to me are the NAMES of everything.  These are just great.  For starters, here is a picture of "The Hall of Imperial Zenith."

  

In the outer court we'll find "The Hall of Supreme Harmony," "The Hall of Central Harmony" and "The Hall of Preserving Harmony."  Somewhere there is also the "Hall of Medium Harmony."  In the Inner Court there is "The Palace of Heavenly Purity," "The Hall of Union" and the "Palace of Earthly Tranquility."  

Apparently the emperors used to live in the "Palace of Earthly Tranquility" until the Qing Dynasty--after that he lived in the smaller "Hall of Mental Cultivation."  

Also in the complex is the "Pavillion of 10,000 Spring Seasons", the "Hall of Union and Peace," "The Hall of Protective Harmony", "The Gate of Divine Prowess" and finally "The Hill of Accumulated Elegance."

I don't know about you, but I could do with some "Supreme Harmony, Tranquility and Elegance."   

The Empty Pot

Warning!  Plot Spoiler!

This is one of my all time favorite books which happens to be set in China,  by Demi.  The pictures are wonderful and the story is sweet.  In short, the emperor needs to choose a sucessor and he makes a grand announcement that all the children are to come to the palace and get a seed--whoever grows the most beautiful flower will become emperor.  One little boy is a very good gardener and he is sure he can grow something beautiful.  He plants and tends his seed but it doesn't grow.  He tries everything, but when the great day comes and all the children are to show their flowers he still has nothing but an empty pot to show for his efforts.  He is very embarrassed but he goes anyway.  The emperor is frowning at all the flowers but stops at the boy's pot and asked what happened?  The boy confesses that he tried as hard as he could but the flower just wouldn't grow.  He brought the empty pot because "it was the best he could do."  The emperor honors this boy for his integrity and chooses him to be his heir.  All of the seeds he had given out had been cooked and could not possibly grow.
   Story is told much more beautifully of course.  It's a book I treasure.   

James Bond

Here we are in China!  For reasons best known to herself, the first thing Catherine looked up was how to write James Bond in Chinese characters. 

007