提笔忘字
The most astounding example I encountered back in my early days studying Chinese was during a lunch with three graduate students in the Peking University Chinese department. I had a bad cold that day, and wanted to write a note to a friend to cancel a meeting. I found that I couldn’t write the character ti 嚔 in the word for “sneeze”, da penti 打喷嚔, and so I asked my three friends for help. To my amazement, none of the three could successfully retrieve the character ti 嚔. Three ..."Forget the word Pen"
Mandarin Curses from the Show "Firefly"
Cow Sucking吸牛 ・ Shee-niou - xī niú
A Baboon's Asshole狒狒的屁眼 ・ FAY-FAY duh PEE-yen - fèi fèi de;dì;dí pì yǎn
Extraordinarily Impatient Buddha (True Patience of Buddha)真沒耐性的佛祖 ・ Jen mei NAI-shing duh FWO-tzoo - zhēn méi;mò nài xìng de;dì;dí fú;fó zǔ
Dog Fucking狗操的 ・ Go tsao de - gǒu cāo de;dì;dí
Panda Piss熊貓尿 ・ Shiong mao niao - xióng māo suī
Frog-Humping Son of a Bitch青蛙操的流氓 ・ Ching...Not prurient, but funny and fun to practice.
回饋
The Chinese characters here are 回饋 (made out of black and white sesame seeds). You should recognize 回 if you have been following me on Facebook.回 means return. 饋 means ‘offering food to someone’ or ‘gift’. It is made out of 食 and 貴. 食 means ‘to eat’ or ‘food’. 貴 means something precious or expensive. 回 (return) 饋 (gift)= 回饋 (to give back)回饋 is normally used to express someone returning something good to the society. In this case, I am trying to ...Returning good to society.
加油 as a Term of Encouragement
The Chinese characters say 加油 (Jia1 you2).加 is composed of 力 (power) and 口 (mouth). It means 'to add'油 is made out of 水 (氵, water) and 由(from/ due). It means oil.加（to add） 油（oil）= add oil or make an extra effort
加油 is a terribly common phrase in day to day life. If you want to encourage someone to carry on great work, or in a sports competition, you say 加油! A bit like 'go on!' in English.
Of course another literal meaning of 加油 is to refuel.ShaoLan explains how the symbols break down.
Is a combinations of the characters for "child" and "palace."
"Word" plus "to get lost"; thus, a riddle is words that you become lost within. The word "to get lost" is also interesting, a combination of "path" and "rice", which reminds us of leaving breadcrumbs to find our way back.
Mandarin for "War"
占 戈 = 战
notesIs to divine by the dagger-axe (an ancient weapon).
Chinese term for when two people are playing a video game and one kills the other before they even have the chance to act. Also can refer to people snapping up a good deal at the store, leaving others with not-so-good deals.
Hackers Loved Chinese Food
Chinese food was a system, too, and the hacker curiosity was applied to that system as assiduously as to a new LISP compiler. Samson had been an aficionado from his first experience on a TMRC outing to Joy Fong’s on Central Square, and by the early sixties he had actually learned enough Chinese characters to read menus and order obscure dishes. Gosper took to the cuisine with even greater vigor; he would prowl Chinatown looking for restaurants open after midnight, and one night he found a t...
notesBecause they discovered, through Chinese dictionaries, that there was another menu for Chinese patrons with better food that had fantastic names.
Mandarin for "USA" is "Beautiful" plus "Kingdom"
美(beautiful) plus 国(kingdom) = 美国 notesPerhaps they were referring to our expansive open spaces and national parks.
