A Garment

It's fun to see Chinese characters being incorporated in commodities because misunderstandings are, in themselves, fun.

Here is an example. The character printed on the pillow case, "縞", is a garment. The character consists of two smaller parts, "糸" & "高", "糸" indicates fabric and "高" is related to the pronunciation.

Some people ask me how can we memorize thousands of Chinese characters, and this is the secret: There are these "parts" that appear in characters repeatedly, so thousands of characters are just a combination of these parts; just like with 26 English letters you'll get thousands of English words. And most Chinese characters are made by one part indicating what it means and another part indicating how it reads, so you can make an educated guess if you get this logic. Every word with "糸" has something to do with fabric, so is "縞".

There is only one minor problem: "縞" represents the white clothes that people wear in a funeral to show their grief.

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The Beans

煮豆燃豆萁
豆在釜中泣
本是同根生
相煎何太急

Cook/bean/burn/bean/stalk (Cook the beans by burning the stalks)
Bean/in/pot/inside/cry (The beans cry in the pot)
originally/is/same/root/grow (We grow from the same root)
each other/fry/why/too/rush (Why fry me in such eagerness?)

This poet, 曹植, was known to be talented from an early age. His older brother, an Emperor, was jealous of the poet and feared that someday the poet would take over his political power. The Emperor ordered the poet to compose a poem within making seven pace, otherwise the poet would have to die. Here it comes "the poem of seven pace".

The poem is a famous quote in Chinese although the original one is slightly different. I saw it in the movie Beijing Rocks （北京樂與路, 2001）. The movie SUCKS. Yike!

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Copycat

I watched Yojimbo by Japanese director Akira Kurosawa to know that A Fistful of Dollars was nothing but a copycat, including the storyline, the characters and structure. It's a poor imitation: the strength was lost, the tension was watered down, and the deep understanding of Zen is abolished. Only the beauty of Clint Eastwood is, though, original.

When writing this, again, I can't get rid of the image of a cat in "copycat". In Chinese expression, a copycat is a dog-- "畫虎不成反類犬"-- intending to copy a tiger but it turns out to resemble a dog.

I do remember a dog in Yojimbo. After the concise but powerful opening, the samurai reached the outskirt of the town. The villagers offered him water but slashed their anger about the chaotic situation on the samurai: "Dogs come along for they smell blood!" When the samurai entered the town, an innocent-looking white dog passed by with a human hand in his mouth. Humor like this is what the copycat A Fistful of Dollars fails to copy.

Technorati Tags:yojimbo, akira kurosawa

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Audrey Hepburn and Social Capital

At first I know her as an icon of people growing up in the 60s, but I am too young for that. Until recently I got to watch her movies and know a little more about her than big eyes and bony face.

Love in the Afternoon, Roman Holiday, My Fair Lady, How to Steal a Million, and Breakfast at Tiffany's; watched in that order. When I thought she could only do the elegant naive princess, there is the vulgar poor girl in My Fair Lady impressing everyone with her almost primitive, untamed strength. Yet no less adorable, desirable, lovable.

Contrary to the strength of Katherine Hepburn which comes from intellect and reasoning, Audrey Hepburn demonstrates the qualities that summon the good old days: innocence, trust, simplicity, faith in humanity. She opens up for strangers and the chance meetings all turn out to be a memorable encounter if not more. In almost each of the movies we see her wash her hair, brush her teeth, in pajama, ear plugs and blindfold. We as the audiences are not the only one who sees it; she does that in someone's presence in the scenes. She is unarmed... with make-up though.

I am doing readings about "social capital" for my thesis. Put in plain English, social capital is the trust among people that can be used to reduce cost by avoiding unnecessary conflict, or enhance productivity by cooperation and sharing. That's what Audrey Hepburn stands for: to overcome the social disguise, appeal to common decency, and come to a true connection.

A dream of everyone: harmony and reconciliation with the universe. In Chinese it can be expressed as "天人合一": sky/people/unite/one, meaning: the universe and the people are united as one. That's the ideal and here is the reality: Do the Katherine Hepburn thing every now and then but spare a place for Audrey Hepburn, in case the Eden is found.

who were so dark at heart they might not speak
a little innocence will make them sing

--e.e. cummings

Technorati Tags:audre hepburn, katherine hepburn, my fair lady, social capital, e.e. cummings

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Cats and Dogs

English is not my first language, so I experience funny feelings which result in wacky questions such as, "when you say 'pussycat' do you think of 'pussy'?"

Nobody does. But that's how I get to know this anecdote. An actress was on a talk show and she had her cat sitting on her lap. For a friendly conversation she said to the host, "do you want to pet my pussy?" The host replied with a straight face: "Sure! Move the cat."

Still, I can't get rid of the image of a dog in the word "underdog". Same thing happens when someone mentions "peacock".

I think of pea, of course.

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Fire in Germany

It was half past midnight and I picked up a smell of smoke. Walking around the apartment checking, I was sure that something was burning. I opened the door and there it was, misty white smoke in the stairway.

I went down to the third floor and rang the bell. "Fire," I said, and the black couple replied in German. I asked them to call the police. Only in recollection it occurred to me that the lady was half naked.

On the second floor, smoke squeezed out of a door but no one responded to the bell. I walked further down to wake up the first-floor neighbors and two ladies answered the door. "Fire," I said. They replied in German but I was not sure if they understood me. The smoke floated upward so there was nothing unusual at their door. "Smoke, smoke," I said. I left when they started to put on their coats.

All windows in the stairway were opened and a few neighbors kicked the unanswered door open. Smoke, more smoke happily welcomed us, and a flashlight didn't help too much. The police and the firemen came and took over. We waited on the pavement.

A stretcher was brought out, a smell of barbecue scented. Things were thrown out of the bedroom window: a comforter, a pillow, unidentifiable pieces and residues. I stared at the window of the second floor thinking, "No bus and no metro... If I am not allowed to go back in, I'll walk for ten minutes to wake Nandu up."

It turned out that Nandu was lucky. We got back to the building after forty minutes.

A friend later told me that "fire" sounds like "Feier" in German, meaning "party". I didn't know that I accidentally invited my neighbors to a midnight "Feier" with "smoke".

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