博客介紹： “中國文化” 是什麼？: What is "Chinese Culture" for?

(Source： http://www.indiewire.com/film/marina-abramovic-the-artist-is-present)

要了解這句話先就要先除去籠統且陳腔詞濫調的刻板印象。我們先看這模糊句子的完全相反：Marina Abramovic's: 有一位藝術家在場。

To understand this phrase you have to remove the mask of stereotypes and clichés that weigh it down. Let's look at something that’s the complete opposite of this ambiguous phrase: Marina Abramovic's: The Artist is Present.

看來有一位小姐穿着笨重的裙子坐在椅子上，盯著對面座位的其中一人。觀眾看完了就換位盯着Abrimovic. 沒什麼了不起。不過，Marina Abromovic 三個月來，都在博物館的營業時間裡坐在這張椅子上！ 她也不是只坐着發呆。如果對面觀眾對現在時態想得開，她盯着全神貫注。雙位手無寸鐵，觀眾感覺到一個無借口,無自傳，最純凈的感情。

It appears to be a woman sitting in a large clunky dress staring at a member of the public across a table. Once a viewer is done, the person leaves and another sits staring at Abramovic. Nothing special. But Marina Abromovic has sat on this chair during museum hours for 3 months! She's not spacing off either. If the viewer on the other chair is open to the present, she stares straight into you with full concentration. Both are defenseless, the viewer senses emotion in it's purest form without hiding behind ego or pretext.

和一般認知的中國文化是完全相反的。文化是舊的，傳統的，充滿象徵意義。可是有意義嗎？

The general perception Chinese culture is the complete opposite. Culture is old, traditional, full of symbolism. But is is meaningful?

我忘記那個統計，可是大家都談到中國超過整個世界的算數和科學技巧。這究竟是根據“中國文化” ？我不確定。論語第一句不是說，“學而時習之，不亦樂乎？” 這些孩子高興得泡選擇題答案? 中國人和外國人都有這種先入為主的概念，教育將等同於成功，而只有少數人質疑測試本身是有意義的. 在漢代科舉約幾乎百年之後，那個時代充斥著腐敗和賄賂。我懷疑孔子設想他的前任，爭取SAT完善。文化不只是為了經濟發展。

I forgot which survey, but there's always talk that China surpasses the entire world in math and science. Was this due to "Chinese culture" ? I doubt it. The first line of the Analects quotes, "If there is the practice of learning, is there not joy?" Were these kids happy when they were bubbling their multiple choice answers? Both Chinese and non-Chinese have this preconceived notion that education will equate to success, but rarely do people question if the test itself is meaningful. Barely after 100 years after the civil service exam during the Han Dynasty, it was riddled with corruption and bribery. I doubt Confucius envisioned his predecessors to strive for perfects on the SAT. Culture isn't solely for economic progress.

像觀眾看着Marina的眼睛，我們必須放棄自己的自負和偏見試圖尋找背後文化的意思. 中國的文化不是因它原有的特色產生意義，它的意義來自通過我們可以感受到其中的價值。希望我繼續寫博客，能讓讀者現學習的快樂。

Like a viewer looking into Marina's eyes, we have to let go of our own ego and prejudice when trying to find meaning behind culture. Chinese culture isn't meaningful because of it's traits, it's meaningful through the values we can sense and intuit. I hope that as I continue writing my blog, my viewers will find joy in learning.

A Shanghai Woman's First Impression of an Indian Woman in Eileen Chang's "Love in a Fallen City"

The scene is at a cocktail party at a Hong Kong hotel during the 1930's.

迎面遇見一群洋紳士，眾星捧月一般簇擁著一個女人。流蘇先就注意到那人的漆黑的長髮，結成雙股大辮，高高盤在頭上。那印度女人，這一次雖然是西式裝束，依舊帶著濃厚的東方色彩。玄色輕紗氅底下，她穿著金魚黃緊身長衣，蓋住了手，只露出晶亮的指甲。領口挖成極狹的Ｖ形，直開到腰際，那是巴黎最新的款式，有個名式，喚做"一線天"。她的臉色黃而油潤，像飛了金的觀音菩薩，然而她的影沉沉的大眼睛裡躲著妖魔。古典型的直鼻子，只是太尖，太薄一點。粉紅的厚重的小嘴唇，彷彿腫著似的。柳原站住了腳，向她微微鞠了一躬。流蘇在那裡看她，她也昂然望著流蘇，那一雙驕矜的眼睛，如同隔著幾千里地，遠遠的向人望過來。柳原便介紹道："這是白小姐。這是薩黑荑妮公主。"

Directly inside they encountered a group of gentleman, the group of stars gathered around the moon as the commoners gathered around the woman.  Liu Su first noticed the person's pitch black hair braided into a high disk on her head.  This Indian woman, although is currently dressed in Western attire, wears a deep rich Eastern color.  At the bottom of her black fine gauze overcoat, she wore a goldfish yellow cassock, covering her hands, only showing her shiny crystal fingers.  Her neckline closed a narrow V-shape, which ran down towards her waistline.  This is Paris' newest trend called "A Line of Heaven."  Her face was yellow and glossy, like the floating gold Bodhisattva Guanyin, and her deep within her dark eyes hides a demon.  Only her classical style straight nose was a little too sharp, a little too flat.  Her pink thick little lips look as if they were swollen.  Liu Yuan stopped his tracks, faced her with a subtle bow.  Liu Su was there looking at her, and she boldly a looked at Liu Su.  Those conceited eyes, as if separated by a few thousand miles of earth, distantly facing back.  Liu Yuan then made an introduction, "This is Miss Bai.  And this is Lady Sahaini."

My Take on Appreciating Chinese Calligraphy (Part II): Expression, Alcohol, and Transcendence

Let's start with the basics.  Ou Yangxun's (歐陽詢) (557–641) calligraphy is typical style elementary calligraphers.

Notice that the characters are very regular.  The strokes also have a uniform depth, and within each region and aspect of each character, there are vertical, horizontal, and circular symmetry.  The vertical and horizontal strokes bulge and narrow ever so slightly to give characters a sense of fullness.  This is an example of structured and standard calligraphy where effort and a sense of calm is required.

How writers control the brush expresses emotion in calligraphy.  Thick places tell where the calligrapher paused, while thin lines suggest faster movement.

Wang Xizhi's (王羲之) "Preface to the Orchid Pavilion" (353 AD) is the magnum opus of Kaishu script.The original piece was destroyed when a greedy king buried it in his tomb.  The oldest copy of closest to the text dates roughly 300 years after Wang wrote his orginal.  Not only are the words aesthetically pleasing, the meaning behind the text itself inspired me to major in Chinese.

(Source.  The text starts on the upper right corner with "永和")

The text is a description of a gathering of scholars enjoying a fancy drinking game (it involves floating shots down a little stream).  The text was written the moment the calligrapher was with with his scholar friends.  The beginning of the text describes the merriment and bliss the calligrapher experiences, but as the night progresses he questions the insignificance of his spatial and temporal existence. Wang feels the reality of his mortality.  One can imagine the spontaneity and anxiety of his words as the text progresses from right to left.  His words aren't valuable because they fit the standard norms of Kaishu, but its captures and displays what Chinese calligraphy is able to express.

Here is Emperor Huizong's (徽宗) calligraphy:

(Source.  This is the phrase for "parakeet.")

Emperor Huizong of the Northern Song Dynasty (1082-1135 AD) was known for his "slender gold script" (瘦金體).  Notice that his characters are very thin.  Some of his strokes leave residue as he continues to the next stroke.  One calligraphic scholar noted that to accomplish such rapid movement, he must have used only the tip of his brush without pausing very much.  One can read through his calligraphy that he was an impulsive emperor.  Textual evidence of an extravagant pet rock collection confirms this.

The next piece is by a scholar official named Huang Tingjian (黃庭堅), a generation older than Emperor Huizong of the Northern Song Dynasty.  This is beautiful example of grass script (草書).

The calligraphy is now incomprehensible compared to standard Kaishu.  This obviously wasn't used as a means of communication.  This calligraphic form was motivated by the need to express a transcendence of reality.  The words are very fluid, which translates from the calligrapher's very fluid hand movement.  Usually either the calligrapher was really drunk, in a high meditative state, or both.  Not only was alcohol associated with rambunctiousness and high energy merriment in Chinese culture, alcohol was also associated with sophisticated scholarly gatherings and literary composition as we have seen previously with Wang Xizhi's gathering.  Try to imagine a group of American writers from The New Yorker, drinking martinis together as they compose short stories.

One has to see the calligrapher's actual hand movements to really understand the essence of the art of calligraphy.  The act of writing calligraphy is also performance.  Here is the text (Su Shi's "On the Topic of the West Forest Wall" 蘇軾 題西林壁) being written in many different calligraphic styles. (I also love the background people's reactions, especially when the calligrapher stretches the last character.)

Kaishu script:

Cursive script(行書):

Grass script:

Of all the calligraphy I have seen, I will die happy if I ever have the chance to view the following piece in person.  Su Shi's "Cold Food Festival" (蘇軾  寒食帖) was written in 1082 AD during the Northern Song Dynasty.  The piece is currently in the Taipei Palace Museum of Arts.

(Source.  Full scroll here.)

Su Shi was sent to exile for being accused of libel in his published poetry.  The text is about how the passage of time and beauty of spring cannot penetrate the loneliness of exile.  The strokes he uses are thick relative to the size of his characters, and simultaneously the words are very orderly and compact.  Compared to regularity of characters in court documents he wrote, the variety in size and shape emphasizes the distress he feels.  As the text progresses towards from right to left, the words get bigger.  He starts to lose some control of his brush not from dramatic anguish, but from a deep melancholy.  The brush strokes are slower because the strokes get thicker.  It's as if I could see him 1000 years ago, sobbing quietly in pain as he realizes the anticlimax of his life as he fades towards insignificance.  Little does he know that he would be one of the most revered figures in Chinese culture.  At least he's at list a favorite on my list.

Unlike portraiture or a painting, Chinese calligraphy can convey what the calligrapher felt the very moment the characters are written.  Even thought Chinese calligraphic works are only humble pine soot and paper, it reminds us that the length of individual human legacy is not defined by what one owned or the popularity during one's contemporary time.  Rather we remember how others made us feel.  Chinese calligraphy in it's most basic form is an art form that expresses the human condition.

Understanding the Opposite Sex

在戀愛過程中，女人往往聽不懂男人的話。

Through the course of a relationship, women typically don't understand what men say.

傾城之戀   作者：張愛玲

Love in a Fallen City   by, Eileen Chang

A Chinese Woman's Face at Night

她安慰著他，然而她不由得想到了她自己的月光中的臉，那嬌脆的輪廓，眉與眼，美得不近情理，美得渺茫，她緩緩垂下頭去。

She comforted him, then unwillingly thought about the glow of the moon on her face, that delicate feminine outline, the eyebrows and eyes, an uncommon beauty, an obscure beauty, she gently lowered her head.


傾城之戀，作者 張愛玲

Love in a Fallen City by Eileen Chang

The Most Basic Rules of Chinese Sentences

Modern Mandarin unfortunately does not have a standard primer or document that every Mandarin speaker agrees upon.  English had at least three centuries of debate and scholarship to form the basic rules of English grammar, but Mandarin had less than a century due to political reasons.  

Fear not!  Here are a few basic rules that govern Mandarin:

1)  Basic sentences follow the subject-verb-object structure (SVO):

The most famous example of this sentence in English is "I kick the ball" (There's a paper written by an academic, but unfortunately I can't find the source).  You can easily identify the sentence components.

The sentence in Mandarin is: "我踢球."  It literally translates to "I/kick/ball."  Notice that "the" is missing, which leads to the next rule.

2)  Chinese is a pronoun drop language, or pro-drop.

After the pronoun is mentioned once, it usually doesn't appear afterwards.  A Mandarin speaker who is starting to learn English tends to drop pronouns.  It may sound blunt and a bit rude, but the overuse of pronouns sounds awkward not just in conversation, but in prose as well.  

For instance, in the English sentence "The book is front of the pencil" translates to "書在鉛筆前面,” which literally translates to "Book/at/pencil/front."

3) Chinese is a left-branching language.

This means that the modifier of basic elements of a sentence placed to the left.  English is a hybrid of left and right branching, but Chinese tends to be more strictly left branching.  So going back to the first example, if I want to add that the ball is yellow, I say "我踢藍球."

Most other rules you have to memorize, play by ear, or apply to specific cases.  Hopefully, this is a good starting point!

The Art of Mandarin

A friend of mine who's a profession writer told me that a blog must accomplish one of two things: express relatability or express expertise.

Even after publishing around 100 posts, my blog had content, but it didn't have a sense of purpose.  I left my blog on hiatus over the summer partly because I was afraid my blogs would be ignored.  I assumed that most people would rather consume infotainment, nothing that would hurt their heads. But I realized that I didn't need to cater to people who wanted distraction and entertainment.  I needed to write for the sake of writing, or art for the sake of art.

The other reason for my hiatus was because I started writing my novel.  Yes, I'm one of those people at social gatherings who start my conversation with "I'm working on this book about...," only to drone on about a half coherent plot.  My novel will tie closely to the themes of my blog.

Why titled, "The Art of Mandarin?"  "Tranquil Polmelo" doesn't roll off the tongue. My blog also isn't a guide to teach people Chinese.  There are plenty of websites that can help you the basics, or Google linguistics papers on the grammatical uses of particular Chinese words.

My blog is going to be about how Chinese sentences convey meaning and how meaning coveys the art of writing Mandarin.

10 Words or Phrases in Chinese That I Find Annoying

1)  壽 shou4:  Longevity

It's going to take you a few years off your life trying to get this right.

2)  持/待/侍/寺  chi2/dai4/shi4/si4

to maintain/to deal with, to wait for /to attend on/temple

I especially hate dai4 and shi4

3)  乾/幹 qian2/gan4

Part of the name of a Qing Dynasty Emperor/ to fornicate

"I will smack any of you if you get this wrong" --- Former Chinese professor

4)  ANY 4-word idiom, aka 成語

e.g.  囫圇吞棗：Out of confusion, swallow jujubes
This means when you encounter something confusing, you can't digest it, figuratively and literally.  Just say I don't get it!  Goodness!

5)   橙子，橘子，桔子 deng4zi1, ju2zi1, jie2zi1

These all mean oranges, but different sizes.  My parents always scold me for not knowing the difference.  It's all citrus!!!!

6) 纖 xian1: fiber

Ugly, just..., I can't....

7)  牽/宰/牢     qian1/zai3/lao2  :  to pull/to butcher/to jail

I could never get these right.

8) 龜  gui1:  turtle

I can draw a turtle faster than I can write this character.

9)  由/以/已/為/於/卻/而 you2/yi3/yi3/wei234/yu2/que2/er2

Imagine all the pronouns could use in English, and switch them interchangeably whenever you feel like for 3000 years.  You end up with this monstrosity.

10)  瑞典/瑞士 rui4dian3/rui4shi4:  Sweden/Switzerland

RAY-DIAN and RAY-SHI does not sound like "Sweden" or "Switzerland."  I'm not to worried, the Chinese embassy can barely get this straight either.
  

Words of the Day

卑鄙bei1bi3
base; mean; contemptible; despicable; grubby; sordid

公佈gong1bu4
issue, announce

信函xin4han2
letter envelope

洩/泄xie4
wreak

**Note:  Okay, how do these characters mean the same exact thing and sound exactly the same when they look completely different!!!??

垮kua1
fall, collapse


惠卿卑鄙公佈王安石的私人信函，離間他和皇帝的情感，王安石就垮臺，他晚年常一天寫【福建子】好幾次，以發洩心中的怒氣，呂惠卿就是福建人。

Huiqing contemptibly announced Wang Anshi's private letter, giving distance between Wang Anshi and the emperor's close relations.  Wang Anshi then fell from his position.  In Wang Anshi's later years, he frequently wrote "That Fujianer" during a given day on many occasions to express the rage of his broken hear.  Lv Huiqing was a Fujian person.

Mother's Day and the Mother Tounge

My graduation ceremony for my Chinese major was on Mother's Day.  The best graduation speech I ever heard was my classmate talking about why so many languages use the phrase "mother" when describing a native language.   In Chinese,母語 mu2 yu3 literally translates to mother language.  I wish I had a copy of that speech, but my paraphrasing is only a shadow compared to the original.

He talked about how our relationship to language is as intimate as our relationships to our mother.  If we think about it, the way we communicate and are able to exist in the world is through our mothers, and that our mother tongues frame the way we see the world.  And of course he gave a shout out to his own mother as well.

Although I first learned TeoChew (a Chinese dialect) and English at the same time, TeoChew has a much more visceral and intuitive oomph.   For me, I never empathized with English poetry until I hit college, but Chinese poetry was thoroughly enjoyable was I around 10.  It was because I wanted to learn more about my mother tongue that propelled me to major in Chinese.

If you are bilingual, or event if you only know one language, think about how your native language feels compared to a secondary language.  I like to describe this feeling as eating your grandma/mom's best dish versus eating a well prepared dish from a culture you are unfamiliar with.   A good dish from a high end restaurant taste's good, but mom's good cooking hits you at a deeper level.  Your cultural history, your biological mechanisms that evolved to process that particular food, and your mother's understanding of your personal preferences nourish your soul with that one dish.  That's the feeling you get from speaking in your mother tongue.

So as you are talking to your mom, eating with your mom, or even thinking about your mom, remember that you think and speak with your mother tongue.

Happy Mother's Day!






**Personal note: I'm enjoying cheesecake with mom.**

Words of the Day

奸佞jian1ning4
crafty and fawning

為了便於認識三位奸佞小人，我把李定，舒亶和鄧綰的名字譯成容易拼的英文。

For the sake of convenience recognizing the names of three tricky lesser people, I took Li Ding, Shu Dan, and Deng Wan's name and translated them to easier English.

隱瞞yin3man2
conceal, hide

李定隱瞞母親的死訊，不願辭官，在儒家社會是大膽的冒犯。

卿qing1
A common surname

Words of the Day

甘gan1

willingly

庸yong1

lowly

強國的美夢破碎了，他自甘治庸才政府。

The dream of a powerful country was shattered.  He [Emperor Shenzong] willingly governed a lowly government.

陷入xian4ru4

fall into a trap

牢籠lao4long2

cage, shackles, bonds

犧牲xi1sheng1

sacrifice, scapegoat

般ban1

just like

他陷入自己野心的牢籠，成為美夢的犧牲品，夢境增長廣大，然後就像泡影般破滅了。

He [Wang Anshi] fell into the trap of his wild heart, becoming a sacrifice to his dream.  His dream kept increasing in size.  Afterwards it would pop like a bubble.

Words of the Day

軌gui3
track marks, gauge

勃勃bo2bo2
thriving, vigorous

一邊是元老重臣，人數多得足以代表全體，一邊是神宗所支持的王安石，和一群新進小人，野心勃勃卻心懷不軌。

On one side you have old, experienced ministers, who's number mostly represents everyone.  On the other is Emperor Shenzong chiding Wang Anshi, along with a group of new people of lower rank with wild, vigorous hears that are bad-hearted with no gauge.

牽涉qian1she4
To involve

列lie4
rank

為了便於參考，也為了不牽涉太多人名，我排出下列黨爭重要人名表，讓大家看看力量的排列：

For the convenience of examination, and not to involve too many people, I arranged a list of the rank of important members of the partisan battle.  This will allow everyone to see the arrangement of power:

**The text then lists major members of reformists and anti-reformists.  Su Shi belongs to the list of anti-reformists.

100th Post! Consciousness and Art

Last time I mentioned how during the Northern Song Dynasty, a piece of art called "Tearful Citizens" convinced the emperor to stop Wang Anshi's extremist economic policy. I like to believe that when Emperor Shenzong first saw the painting "Tearful Citizen," he realized he was a fallible human being.  Instead of logic, an innate feeling for compassion for our fellow man shifted political dialogue to better society.

Can art still do that?  Can art make us more conscious of the human state?

Recently I spent 6 hours at the Norton Simon Museum of Art in Pasadena.  I forced myself to slow down and spend at least 5 minutes on a piece of art that attracted me.  Specifically I'd like to talk about the biggest painting at the end of the 19th century hallway:  The Ragpicker by Edouard Manet.

(Source:  Norton Simon Museum)

As I sat on the bench, staring intently at this painting for half an hour, I noticed many people would barely glance at the piece.  Only one person bothered to appreciate standing for a minute before moving on. 

The caption next to the painting explained how Manet was trying to romanticize the freedom of the paper collector, unbounded from the birth of urbanization and modernity in Paris.  

At a glance our instinct is to dismiss the ragpicker as not worth noticing, but if we put ourselves in Manet's time, most paintings depicted opulence, joy and luxury.  Why spend so much time and effort on something so low-brow, so common to reality?

I first noticed the tall sturdy stick the old man carries in is left hand.  Though the hand is course and rough, the glow and roundness shows power in his hand.  While the left hand provides balance, the right grips his earnings, and opportunity to live for another day.   The ragpicker's hat tilts upward, and provides movement in his eyes.  He's looking upward for another chance towards opportunity.

It's easy to live with money.  Not only does the ragpicker have to live with the burden of carrying his garbage, what's heavier is the burden of poverty.  His shoulders are slack, and his legs bow outward not because of the weight of the refuse he carries.  Instead the brown sack he carries is empty.  His body is distorted because he carries the burden of poverty.

In many ways, aren't we just like the ragpicker?  Aren't we trying to sift through the junk and dirt of the human world to find value?  Manet piece show's that even with nothing, we still are the same human being. 

Words of the Day

頒ban1

to issue, to distribute

贈zeng4

to give as a present

虛xu1

empty, to empty, sky

銜xian2

rank

御史yu4shi3

A type of ancient government official

除了三省的御史，還有獨立的御史台，另外有各種機構供朝廷頒贈虛銜。

Aside from the ministers? of the three provinces, there are also independent minister? roles. Also there are many systems the royal palace uses to distribute rewards and strip ministers of rank. 

Words of the Day

This is how Su Dongpo labelled Wang Anshi:

【天命不足畏，眾言不足從，祖宗之法不足用】
"Heaven's mandate is not worth fearing, everyone's words are not worth following, the ancestor's ways are not worth using."


拗ao4
To disobey, to go against

Chapter Title:  拗相公
The Disobedient Minister

籠罩long3zhao4
to envelop, to shroud

我們必須了解此一政治鬥爭的本質，因為蘇東坡的一生都被黨爭所籠罩。

We must interpret the source of governance conflict because Su Dongpo's entire life was shrouded by partisan bickering.

堅毅jian1yi4
Persistence

我們都知道堅毅是優良的美德，但是要看一個人決定做什麼事而定。
We all know that perseverance is a good moral quality, but we must look at what the person is doing in order to persist.

標籤biao1jian3
label

Words of the Day: The Tearful Citizens Painting

End of the Chapter:

It was only when a brave small official name Zheng Xia painted the atrocities outside the court walls did the Northern Song emperor finally retract his economic reform.  

**Unfortunately, the original painting lost with time, but here is a a Ming interpretation of the painting of the 【流民圖】or "Tearful Citizens".  (Source)

拖垮tuo1kua1

to be tired out or collapse from burden

暴政bao4zheng4

tyranny

就算沒有異族侵略，暴政也能把國家拖垮。

This counts as not having foreign invasion.  Tyranny can collapse a country.

Words of the Day

詼諧hui1xie2
Humorous, funny

有一天蘇東坡遇到他，就詼諧地說：“那麼 ‘滑’ 字一定是 ‘水之骨’ 囖。”

One day Su Dongpo encountered him [Wang Anshi], and humorously said, "'Slippery' must be 'the bone of water'."

**You have to know the Chinese to get this pun.

遵循zun1xun2
comply with, follow

符合fu3he2
conform to, to suit

後來有些中國學家者遵循西方集產主義的觀念，想洗刷王安石在歷史上的罪名，說他的思想 “符合現代社會主義”。

Later on some Chinese scholars followed western collectivism, and thought about erasing Wang Anshi's tarnished name, saying that his thoughts were "in accordance to modern socialism."

Words of the Day: Su Shi is a Dorky Word Nerd.

Before I start, the character “鳩,” which is some type of sea bird, has the character for "9" to the left.

The quirky anecdote:

One day Wang Anshi and Su Shi were having a chat, and Wang An Shi asks, "Odd, why does "鳩" (seabird) have the characters "九" (nine) and "鳥" (bird)?"

Su Shi replies, " The Book of Odes quotes: '鳲鳩 (Shijiu) birds on the mulberry, there are 7 children.'  If we count seven children with momma and papa bird, we get nine right?"

憑ping2

lean on, rely on

研究國字的構造和起源，不用比較法，卻憑幻想的活用。

Analyzing the country's word construction and origin did not use comparison, but relied on active imagination.

歸謬法gui1miu4fa3

**Side note: This is the first time I've seen anything pronounced MEE-YOH in Chinese

Reductio ad absurdum (Latin: "reduction to absurdity"; pl.: reductiones ad absurdum), also known as argumentum ad absurdum (Latin: argument to absurdity), is a common form of argument which seeks to demonstrate that a statement is true by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its denial,^[1] or in turn to demonstrate that a statement is false by showing that a false, untenable, or absurd result follows from its acceptance. 

蘇軾喜歡用歸謬法。

Su Shi loved using reductio ad aburdum.

Words of the Day

When irrational people like Wang Anshi have political power, they tend to sap power from intelligent people.

拋pao1
cast aside, throw away

【三經新義】其差無比，他死後就被人拋到腦後，沒有一篇留下來。

There was nothing else comparable to "The New Righteousness of the Three Classics."  People cast it aside to the back of their minds, without a single copy remaining.

侮辱wu2ru3
to humiliate, to dishonor

他只花兩年完成【三經新義】， 尤其是對學術的一大侮辱。
He [Wang Anshi] spent only two years to write "The New Righteousness of the Three Classics," but it especially denigrated learning.

滑稽hua2ji1
funny, farcical

半吊子ban4diao4zi(light)
flakey, air head
It literally translates to "half a string of cash"


不過我要提一下，王安石的【字說】非常滑稽，和所有的半吊子的語學差不多。
But I would like to point out, Wang Anshi's "Words and Speech" is quite farcical, it has the language intelligence of any air-head.

Words of the Day

遭zao1
To encounter (used typically in negative contexts)

雷霆lei2ting2
Thunderclap, thunderbolt

妄wang4
chaotic, random

他像希特勒，遭到反對就大發雷霆；現代精神病學家可以把他例為妄想狂。

He [Wang Anshi] was like Xi Tele, when there is opposition he would strike like thunder.  Modern psychologists would classify him has a lunatic.

評註ping2zhu4
Commentator

他把自己當作經書唯一的評註家。

He [Wang Anshi] would place himself as the only official commentator or classic text.

濫lan4
gushing liquid; excessive

這樣不僅是濫用權威，也是污衊學術。

This not only was an over excessive use of power, it also contaminated the art of learning.

Thoughts:  Wang Anshi gives us an interesting insight on how extremist views can affect thought and politics.

My Chinese Teacher's Last Piece of Advice and My New Quest

I remember my worst week in college.  Within the span of a week, I had to deflate a cyst on my back, meet a long time friend who came to town, decide whether to go to Germany to do research, had roommate issues, head out of town to visit my mom, and write a five page paper on the Chinese scientific community... in Chinese.

After finishing my essay and burning out my last brain cell, I then had to prepare a presentation to the class about my essay.  I can write Chinese fairly comfortably, I can pronounce the words like a literate person, but if I had to answer questions at the caliber of what was expected of my class, I get scared shitless.

I have no idea how I pulled through my Chinese language class.  The teacher asked  questions like: 

 

"Do you agree with Mencius that human goodness is innate?"

"To what extent do you feel cultural stereotypes are valid?"

"What's your view on the death penalty?"

I would sit in my class sweating, clenching my bowels, hoping my name doesn't get called. I was sitting there like a mute person.  I could hear and understand what everyone was saying, but I was so intimidated by my classmates that I would simply freeze.

I managed to survive, and on the final day of class after everyone gave their presentations, my teacher gave us one last piece before our language class forever:

"Right now you are at the peak of your Chinese language skills, after this day and henceforth, most of you will gradually lose this ability unless you move to Asia.  I have only one piece of advice:  Read.  Read as much as you can as frequently as you can."

I've been reading on and off on my own, but it's hard to to stay focused when I'm reading alone.  I also know that some of you out there are trying to learn Chinese, so I hope I won't be lazy and share my experience with you guys.  Right now I would say I read at a middle school level in a Chinese school system, so around 2000-2500 characters are under my belt.  I would need a couple thousand more to read at an academic level.  

I'm going to start a little project.  This may fizzle out in a day, or could hold the key to my success. I'm going to learn 5 characters a day, everyday for the next two years.  If I can maintain this pace, I could learn another 3500 characters.

The first five characters will be up tomorrow.  I hope this works.

Qingming and The Point of My Blog

The West views death as an act of completion, like a book that's been read and stored into the dusty archives of time.

I personally hate Halloween because is caricatures death as subhuman ghouls and spirits that are ravenous for human flesh or high fructose corn syrup.  It assumes that death is in need of something, what we call "undead."  The act of death becomes incomplete, an act of avoidance of what death is.  Dead.  Immobile. Non action.

The rituals behind Qingming tells us something different.  Families would gather food, offerings, and tomb cleaning equipment to a beloved's grave site.  After the gravestone is clean and the offerings in order, every living family member burns incense and kneels in front of the grave to recite a prayer.  Once the incense is placed in the incense pot, the surroundings and your living relatives remind the individual of one's place at the present moment.

(source ;  Northern Song Dynasty)

I remember one of the more recent times I lit incense was when I visited my great grandfather's grave.  When visiting my father's old village in Cambodia, my family bought a few apples from market and slowly drove through a dirt road.  Except for the occasional satellite dish and cell phone tower, only small houses on stilts and lush rice paddies surrounded us.

The grave site sat on another farmer's field.  We slowly meandered from his house and strolled down a narrow, winding footpath around various small pools.  We entered a small eucalyptus grove.  At the center was a tall Cambodia stupa, with winged apsaras lifting the spirit into the sky.  A midst the tropical oasis, the small sanctuary was a cool refuge from the world.  With death staring straight at me, I felt mindful of the past, present, and future.  My worries felt insignificant to the infinity of time.

In many ways my blog site has been about death.  My blog is about art, the antithesis of death.  I don't see living as the opposite to death because people can function physiologically without being conscious of the world they live in.  Art preserves the expression of another human being, so communication of another person lives so long as the artwork remains intact.  Or as Stephen Fry puts it, "history whinnies and quivers and vibrates in all of us."  My blog is about how Chinese literature expresses art and how it still reverberates through the modern consciousness.

Xihu Omelette Recipe in English! 西湖煎蛋

(Near modern day Hangzhou)


0:14 Welcome to Everyday Eats (The title of the cooking series is called “tian tian yin shi”)

0:17 Master Chef Li Tiegang will teach you to make beautiful food

0:19 But before we started today, Master Chef Tiegang was laughing, saying that our audience should go to Zhejiang.

Yup. Xihu (The Western Lake)

Really to Xihu?

Yup.

0:29  Why?  Because today’s dish is called, “Xi Hu Omlette”

0:45 Narrator: Will the dish today be really hard to make?  No, it’s really easy!

0:59 Ingredients:

Main ingredient:  Chicken eggs

Supporting ingredients:  Chinese Chives, ground pork, and tiny shrimp

Seasonings:  Rice vinegar, soy sause, white sugar, etc.

1:11 The first step is to deal with the ground pork and the tiny shrimp.

1:18  I don’t get it.  What does the Xihu Omlette and pork have to do with each other?

1:26  This is to add some texture.  There’s also egg white and calcium.

1:30  All right, I’ll add some oil.

1:33  Don’t add oil, add water.

1:34  Huh?  Add water?

1:36  Yup

1:38  First we deal with the ground pork.  When using water to stir fry pork…

1:43  You add warm water?

1:44 Yes.

1:45  Why add water?

1:50  This way the outside is crispy, and the inside tender.  And there’s less oil.

1:58  Starting out meat has lots of fat.  Adding more oil is too much.

2:03  When there’s still some water, add the tiny shrimp.

2:08  Wait, wait!!!  I don’t understand!  You didn’t add oil and you’re adding it to the liquid?

2:17  Okay so there’s lots of calcium inside the shrimp skin, and there isn’t much flesh.  Typically you eat it and it doesn’t feel like there’s meat.  When we add it to the water, the flesh expands, so it tastes like there’s flesh.

2:29  Lots of friends don’t like to eat tiny shrimp, because it smells fishy.

2:35  Hey notice when I added the shrimp, the fishy stench escaped.

2:47  Notice the shrimp aroma is slowly coming out.

2:54  So the first shortcut to making this is to use water, not oil to cook the meat and shrimp.

3:03  Now the ground pork is crisp.

3:14-3:34  (Narrator sums up the conversation thus far.)

3:33  After cooking the pork and shrimp, we now beat the four eggs.

3:45  Add a pinch of salt to the eggs to add some flavor.  And then add some red rice vinegar.  This will help the absorption into the shrimp.

4:05 The vinegar also has a salty taste, so don’t add too much.

4:10  Now we cut the Chinese chives into two.

4:15 What, you’re cutting only once, leaving it this long?

4:18  Yup

4:28  Turn on the fire.  Add some oil, and then add some water.  Now we use this to cook the chives.

4:53  This is to keep it from leaking water, and it keeps the chive’s aroma.

5:08  If you just scald this in oil, the chives will break apart.

5:14  Oh, I smell the chives!

5:16  Now we add the shrimp and pork into the eggs.

5:24  Now the chives are cooked

5:24-6:00 (Narrator repeats)

6:05  We add less oil than we normally do when we fry an egg.  How hot should the oil be?

6:11 60% of the way there.  (Keep 1/3 of the egg aside)

6:18  (Repeating what’s inside the egg mixture)

6:36  Now we add the chives

6:50  Now we cover the chives with the rest of the egg batter to seal the aroma of the chives into the egg.  TURN DOWN THE HEAT TO LOW.  This is so that heat can cook into everything evenly.  Once you see the top solidify, bring the heat back up.

7:15  While we wait for the next two minutes for the whole thing to cook, let’s tell the audience how to fry the perfect egg.

7:26  - 9:08  (The next montage compares cooking eggs by itself, with rice wine, and adding)

9:09  When the egg is not translucent anymore, add vinegar

9:11 You can also add milk.  To tell you the truth I like to tell everyone may dad’s specialty.  When he steams eggs he adds a little milk.  It tastes delicate with the aroma of milk.  Try it at home

9:24  First stir the egg like this in the wok

9:25 Why?

9:28  So that you can tell the omelette is cooked.  And when you flip it, the color should look like this.

9:45  When you flip it over, add water.

9:56  Add it to the side

10:10 This is to keep the puffy texture.

10:31  Now we will make the Xihu vinegar sauce

10:41  Once the water is dry, look it poofs up!

10:58 Let’s set it aside

11:06  Now let’s cut and present this

11:20  (first boil water.  They didn’t mention this part)  Add some salt, less than two grams.  Add around 5 grams of sugar.  Add some soy sauce for color.

11:53  Next, bloom tapioca starch in water.  This must come before the vinegar.  Do this by eye

12:20  Next add the vingar (this is Chinese red vingar, NOT WHITE).  Around 20 grams

12:27  Now the sauce glistens  TURN OFF THE FIRE.

12:54  We’re done!

13:10  (Review)

Palate Shock

(photo by Terrapin Trails)

In-and-Out tasted bland after coming back from Cambodia.

Yes, most countries are developing faster than Cambodia.  No infrastructure.  Garbage everywhere.

Yes, there was political instability with the biggest protest in 30 years.

Yes,  I feared social anarchy, plotting my escape to the US embassy or Vietnam.

But after biting into that burger, I couldn't help but feel sorry for the United States.

The United States has one of the most sophisticated infrastructure for growing, transporting, and even scientifically analyzing what we eat.  Yet most American food lacks the capacity to provide nourishment and satisfaction after eating.

Rich and poor Americans alike are constantly hungry, thinking that nourishment comes from quantity, not quality.

Exactly a day after coming back to the US, I walked into Target with my friends.  I was shocked at how sterile the food was.  A whole aisle dedicated to food in bar-form, some only 100 calories!  Boxes are covered with photo-shopped pictures with numbers and chemicals only an organic chemist would understand.  All provide the illusion of fulfillment.

Food in Cambodia is about survival and instinct.  Although some food borrows techniques from modern agricultural science, most of it is still unchanged and organic.

When you drive half an hour away from the city, tanned faces of farmers are sweating, bending, and plucking.  All hope their crop produces something.  The green rice paddy is checkered with patches of dry dirt and weeds.  These are the failures unable to feed, a little closer to death.

The harvest then gets packed briskly and tightly onto anything that runs on gasoline, only to be hoisted across pock-marked roads.

Delivery, seller, buyer all  converge to market, a canopy-covered sweaty arena of organized chaos.  Everyone's movement figuratively and literally tries to survive the mass chaos.

A pedestrian is almost run over by a motorcycle weighed down by onions.

The seller haggles high.  The buyer low.

Mothers and daughters looking, rubbing, smelling, using their feminine instinct to satisfy their family's guts.

Everyone follows the instinct fighting for the last penny.

When the prizes are bought, the food was harvested or killed within the same 24 hours.

The buyer is usually the cook as well.  A good cook will be like a mother tending her baby as she cleans and nurtures the food with all the love and affection she can give.  Sometimes sweating for another 3 hours in the kitchen heat.  When all is said and done, the food is ready to provide nourishment.  When you eat, you feel the power of food down to your very bones.

Food in Cambodia completely satisfies the instinct for hunger.