I usually assume that anything I care to say in Chinese I can say in Mandarin as well, so when we were supposed to tell a story in Chinese class I told a joke, except really badly and no one understood me. I told it to Joyce in Cantonese, and it made her laugh, and she told the class in Mandarin, and it made them laugh, and I told Willis in English, and it made him laugh too because he wasn't paying attention the first two times. It's sort of discouraging that my Mandarin is so bad. I like talking to Joyce in Cantonese, though this is more of a necessity because her English is bu tai hao. I think in taking foreign languages being bilingual is a major disadvantage. I'm so used to understanding what people say all the time that I get discouraged easily when I don't understand what people say or when I have to struggle to get a point across verbally, and it's like banging my head against a brick wall. I keep thinking that I've improved and then someone says blahblahblahblah in Mandarin and I feel like an utter retard. It's frustrating talking even to Joyce sometimes because while she's not as fluent in Cantonese as I am, so when I'm explaining some stuff in English, she doesn't get what I'm saying, and I can't explain using English terms to her because that's what she's having trouble with in the first place. Let the brick wall headbanging begin.

Because Statistics is such a Poof class, at the end of the period I was Student of the Week and introduced myself to the class. For some reason the class thought I was hysterical and one girl asked if I thought about being a comedian. It's glue. It's not that funny, and I can't be funny on command in any case. I'm boring most of the time, and I can't think of anything to say to the Bivalves or at Alex's Parties. Elsewise I'd have more friends.

I'm quite excited about my field trip next Friday to the National Gallery of Art, and then to a Chinese restaurant, though Mrs. Barret had issues with the last part when she was signing my permission slip. Yay! Milla's going too! I love my Chinese class field trips, except that normally I don't have anyone to talk to on the bus.

....

Well, okay, going with Milla means I still won't have anyone to talk to on the bus.

But I'd enjoy her company in any case.

Quote of the Day:

"I'll beat you to death!" -Silvia's mom, in Mandarin, to Silvia's little sister at dinner.

Eh, it was a cultural thing, and much was lost in translation.

I did my Chinese oral project on one of the famed beauties of China, Xi Shi, whose name is comically infamous for being impossible for Cantonese people like me to pronounce. I did not realize this until I did my presentation.

I must wonder.

Why the hell are Chinese emperors so damn easy to seduce? It seems to be an oft repeated and valid military tactic in ancient China to send a foreign king a beautiful woman as a "gift" to "distract him from affairs of state." I can see this would go over well nowadays. ("Your mission.. seduce George Bush!") You'd think after a few thousand years these kings would learn to be less easily distracted. Or perhaps the enemies of the state psychologically analyzed the target for easily distractable tendencies, like eating people's poo. Oh, wait. That's the guy who's sending Xi Shi. Okay, then the guy who's getting his state destroyed must be a TOTAL maniac.

Supposedly, when Xi Shi walked past, fish would sink to the bottom of the pool because they weren't good enough for her reflection, and flying geese would fall out of the sky stunned by her beauty, and half-bloomed flowers would close up again and the moon would cover itself in clouds because they were ashamed that her beauty was so much greater than theirs. She wouldn't make a very good werewolf. Which makes me think, that those descriptions would be more apt for a real UGLY woman... Though that must be a very good deal for a poor washer woman because you could eat roast goose every day. You know.. she takes a nice walk by the woods.. ladeedadeeda.. and... FREE POULTRY! Excellent! Instead of moving up in the world by the very dubious method of being the king's concubine, she can just open up a fried goose chain store, like KFC except it'd be YFG- YueFriedGoose. Though I think that her being a Beauty and everything wouldn't alow her to eat anything except like, a piece of lettuce every day. I must wonder though, when she's washing clothes in Washer's Stream, does the dirt flee the laundry just at the touch of her hand? That'd be extremely convenient. They never talk about things like that in books- they have a Xi Shi cosmetics line already so I think it'd be very informative to learn, so that we can come up with a Xi Shi laundry detergent.

Maybe that's why she's famous for having stomachaches all the time... too much damn goose. Eat some vegetables, woman!

Man. and you thought a thousand ships was somethin'!

I bought me some new shoes. They're beautiful. Worship them, mortals. I am easily made happy by material goods. Ahhhh. Luxury.

Today has been the day of belated revelations. Apparently, Chinese and Japanese are really close. 'Cute' in Mandarin is 'ke ai'. In Japanese, it's 'kawaii'. The sad thing is that I've known these two seperate pieces of knowledge for a long time, I just never bothered connecting them until now. Translating from Chinese is a bitch. Here's a poem translated literally by me, for your viewing pleasure.

Grape fine wine night light cup
Before drink piypa horse up blow
Drunk (something) sand field please refrain laugh
Ancient come war how many return?

Now. What the hell is that? Please?? GothJesus, I hope Chinese to English translators get paid more than I do. I'm proud of my translating work on this poem, actually. I can make it rhyme. Here goes. Meter is too much to be hoped for.

Fine grape wine, night's glow in a glass.
Before I drink the sound of a lute on horseback wafts.
Drunk on the sandy battlefield, please don't laugh
Of the ancient pitched battles, how many men come back?

Better, I should hope. Blegh. Cantonese pisses me off. I'm like the only one at school who speaks that dialect and isn't an immigrant from Singapore, except for Chris Lee. I need to change my blog template- it makes my posts look way too long. I'd do it, if I knew how to move my comments too.

Second revelation of the day. Nick S is a Discordian. Hence, Discordo.blogspot.com. And multiple references to Eris. god, I'm so stupid.