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China-speak, Times Two
Your Chinese Isn’t Bad
When I shop here and there, storekeepers often comment to me, (in Chinese),
“Your Chinese is good.” I always reply, and truthfully, “It isn’t good. It’s bad!) A
college girl I met on a long train trip flattered me with the comment, “Your Chinese is perfect.”
(She was being sweet, of course -- my Chinese is sorry!) A former student, in an e-mail,
recently, informed me that she is “amazed” my Chinese is “not bad.” (Actually it is bad, but
sometimes, in class, and in conversation, I get lucky, and look good.)
I have raced through self-study course, after self-tuition course, during my nine-year
stay, here, in the Middle Kingdom. I’ve made hundreds of flash cards, in pinyin, and of the
characters. Yet, progress seems much too slow. I’m truly ashamed that I’ve been in the
P. R. China so long, and don’t know the language better.
But, I keep trying. Early next year, I’ll take an HSK Chinese proficiency test. When I receive the scores, a short time later, I’ll know if my Chinese is really “perfect,” “good,”
or “not bad.” And I’ll almost surely get a certificate to list on my C. V-- if I don’t make a fool out myself in the testing.
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We Love Chickens in the House
In one of my university Spoken English classes, the topic was, “My Dream House.” The students were to make notes for a short while, then each was to come
to the front and give a short speech describing his or her dream house.
During the second class of the day, one girl in describing the house she wants
most, declared, “Of course, I want a chicken in the house.” Naturally her class-
mates broke into quite loud laughter. She meant to say, “kitchen.”
I was thinking the incident hilarious myself. The next group of students
I faced that day owned the same “My Dream House” topic. Not too far into that
gathering’s talks, one of the co-eds confided, up front, to all, “And I want a big
chicken in my house!”
I then told these students that the same thing had happened earlier in the day.
College and university students love to laugh. So do professors. We all shared
some fun over this jolly mistake to which Chinese university English language nuts must be prone.
[The End]
Biography: (Mr.) Clair Lasater teaches Spoken English at Shandong Jiaotong University. He has taught as professor at Hainan University, Ling Ling University (now the Hunan University of Science and Engineering), and Shunde Polytechnic. He has been published in the Guardian, and China Daily.
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