Pictures

Foreigner’s Chinese Composition Amuses Chinese Netizens

by on Friday, February 24, 2012 95 comments

A photograph of a foreigner’s beginner’s Mandarin composition has (probably unbeknownst to him) been uploaded to popular Chinese microblogging service Sina Weibo and is currently being gleefully forwarded by Chinese netizens, having already been shared 3,000 times and with over 600 comments. The original uploader comments:

Is this how laowai feel when they see our English compositions…? [衰]

Netizens are finding the lack of grammatical errors impressive, despite the simplicity of the content, and especially appreciate the pithy conclusion.

Translation of the composition:

Last weekend, Xiao Li gave Xiao Bai a phone call to invite her out to eat dinner. Because Xiao Bai loves Xiao Li, she was very happy. They went to Xiao Bai’s favorite restaurant. When they arrived, they got a table and ordered some food. Although Xiao Bai really likes cabbage, she isn’t a vegetarian. Xiao Bai ordered a plate of Homestyle Tofu, as well as two plates of beef. Xiao Li ordered two bowls of rice and one bowl of spicy-sour soup. The server brought the food very quickly.

After they finished eating, Xiao Li wanted to pay the bill, but had a large problem. He forgot to bring money! Right now he does not even have one yuan. Xiao Li is very embarrassed. He let Xiao Bai pay. Right now Xiao Bai does not love Xiao Li.

In the lower right corner, the teacher remarks: “Excellent!“

Comments from Sina Weibo:

麦韬旅游：

The level of many foreigners’ writing is just like this. Let them use English to write, and it’s still like this!

Niko_Gia：

oh, my god! My English writing level is just like this!

leafbabe：

No grammar mistakes!

兎孒尐姊A_B：

I’m reminded of my crappy English compositions, I’m a disgrace to/I totally failed my English teacher….

Albert_中毒了_：

I suddenly realized that my IELTS composition probably looks just like this in the eyes of a foreigner.

黄劭要睡到自然醒：

Why did Xiao Bai suddenly not love Xiao Li… Why?!

用D3100的准业余摄影师：

He really understands Chinese women. [嘻嘻]

醉荷闲趣：

Haha, when taking a girl out to eat, you must remember to bring money! Otherwise Xiao Bai doesn’t love Xiao Li anymore.

粘豆包:

[Responding to post title] Foreigners looking at our English compositions probably have the same feeling.

刘兵Jackliu：

I want to know, who did Xiao Bai end up loving in the end?

寒寒猫：

The last sentence is the highlight, the foreigner is so frank, their romance is very realistic, excellent indeed!

俞洋UNITED：

Apart from writing his characters better [handwriting], the rest is very good. Basically there are no grammatical errors, and is even better than a lot of Chinese people. [good]

肖弟V陈亦然：

Chinese translated into English is not very elegant/graceful [doesn't translate well]. But if English is translated into Chinese, it suddenly becomes very colorful.

堂本小兄弟：

Looking at his picture, the laowai is a handsome guy. If it were me, I’d give him full marks. Wahaha.

胡颖欣Chris_Hu：

I’m suddenly reminded of many classic British and American folk/country songs have this kind of lyrics, very plain and simple without flowery embellishments, just telling a story, or retelling a dialog between the singer and someone else, without commentary, seemingly without emotion or character, but after you hear it it’s something you remember for a long time.

尛尛Q：

Xiao Bai you’re too materialistic….[黑线]

legojiang：

Very logical! A powerful analysis of the relationship between cause and effect [哈哈][哈哈]

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95 Comments

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  1. chloe
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 12:06 am

    wow. might this be the time I get sofa?

    Reply
  2. Gay Azn Boi
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 12:07 am

    Judging by the lack of grammatical errors, I’d say it’s pretty impressive. I wouldn’t be able to write that, and I’m Chinese -__-

    On a side note, I wanna have a sexy time with this hot laowai…I hope he’s into slim Asian twinks :p

    Reply
  3. 山炮 ShanPao
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 12:46 am

    All I see is Chinese people who have never left China and grown up in the shell of nationalism. Can you name any developed country where such a story would become popular?

    Reply
    • kevinnolongerinpudong
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 1:02 am

      My sentiments exactly. Whenever people gather together to oogle at giggle about “foreigners,” I tend to think it’s just stupid and narrow-minded.
      And to the question- is this what our english compositions look like?- hmm, probably not.
      I think some of the amusement at this essay grows out of the fact that many Chinese students have the impression that they have to either be pseudo-enlightening or melodramatic or super-patriotic in anything that they write.

      Reply
      • althepict
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 5:23 am

        ” … many Chinese students have the impression that they have to either be pseudo-enlightening or melodramatic or super-patriotic in anything that they write.”

        So true!

        Reply
      • lonetrey
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 7:20 am

        And to the question, “Is this what our english compositions look like?”

        Personally, the answer is “yes” in my opinion. However, I’m not trying to humiliate my fellow Asians. I just find it funny because due to my parents being first-gen Chinese in America, so it’s actually a realistic interpretation of a “foreigner’s opinion”. I laugh at my parent’s English all the time!

        But the humor’s not really made with malice, so it’s all good in the end. Just some light-hearted humor to me.

        Reply
        • mr. weiner
          Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:56 pm

          I kept some of my favorite student’s essays from back when i was an English teacher. Many of them showed a disturbing familiarity with bar culture [for 12 year olds]and most were just over the top funny.
          Big difference between 12 year olds’ work and high school students/older students is they have had the life squeezed out of them by the education system in Taiwan.

          Reply
          • 侯火
            Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 2:06 am

            “Many of them showed a disturbing familiarity with bar culture [for 12 year olds]and most were just over the top funny.”

            Any stories you’d tell here?

      • AnaGia
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 7:11 pm

        They just have a different type of sense of humour. Quit judging.

        Reply
    • JSakamoto
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 1:51 am

      Yes you are 100% correct. Most chinese living in China are so naive when it comes to foreigners, especially white foreigners.

      Reply
      • jeffli
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 12:26 pm

        Dear Mr. JSakamoto,
        I must respectfully disagree … they are fkn experts!
        they think all foreigners have
        1. mansion style houses
        2 two bik car
        3 eat tu much chocolate bread and cheese
        4 What ? what is risotto? Italians eating rice? no no no they copy fom Chinese the same dish in china is called Hufukupdarice
        5 foreign men are gay

        6 Chinese man in foreign woman = chopstick in bucket.

        7 foreign schlong is scary schlong

        8 Aids is foreign poblum

        9 foreigners in China walk around with USD or EUro all day,

        10 foreigners like stupid grins when we cheat them.

        Reply
        • JSakamoto
          Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 12:37 pm

          Dear Mr. Jeffli,

          Oh, actually I think you misunderstood my post. I admit I probably didn’t use the right words. What I meant was most chinese think higher of white foreigners than their fellow chinese and other asians. They think white have higher morals in general when I think the opposite is true (therefore they are naive). As for me, well I think you know the stereotypes about people of my ethnicity. But I always prove them wrong.

          I agree with everything you said except #5, I never heard of that assumption ever. The rest are all common thoughts but many times not true.

          Reply
        • Joe
          Monday, February 27, 2012 at 11:24 am

          Haha I’ve heard the chopstick in bucket before.

          Reply
        • The Dude
          Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 1:31 am

          I do actually eat too much bread, chocolate and cheese.

          Not at the same time though.

          Reply
    • anon
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 6:52 pm

      How about Japan and Korea? Both developed countries where foreigners are routinely the object of amusement for the natives, on the internet, on television, etc. East Asia isn’t the only place, but East Asia is chock full of examples of people who find it incredibly novel for a foreigner of a different skin color to speak their language or adopt their customs.

      Come on, man, you’re not ignorant, so I’m forced to conclude that you simply don’t bother to stop for a moment to think before acting on prejudice.

      Reply
      • 侯火
        Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 2:43 am

        To be fair, he did say “nationalistic” nations. Japan and SK are super nationalistic (Japan in the form of xenophobia, and SK in the form of military and some xenophobia).

        Reply
        • anon
          Monday, February 27, 2012 at 2:56 am

          Actually, he didn’t. The “shell of nationalism” was referring to the Chinese. His attempted rhetorical question just asked for “developed”.

          I’m also confused by what you were trying to say. It sounds like you’re saying I didn’t fulfill his criteria of “nationalistic” but then go on to argue that my suggestion of Japan and Korea are super nationalistic…?

          Reply
    • typingfromwork
      Monday, February 27, 2012 at 7:02 pm

      These sorts of stories were popular over here- back in the days when imigration was still a new phenomenon.

      As Chinese people get more comfortable and familiar with the presence of foreigners there will be less of these kinds of wonderment at mundane things. Xenophobia will still be there though- but people are like that all over the world.

      Reply
  4. donscarletti
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 1:22 am

    In any language, that guy looks dodgy, really dodgy. From the photo he looks like the sort of dude who would invite a girl out and “forget” his wallet, slip her a roofie, or both even.

    I’ve got a coworker who we call 小白 because he’s thick. I think we might order some abalone and stiff him with the bill some time for an experiment.

    Reply
  5. JSakamoto
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 1:54 am

    When i try to say a few words in chinese i just hear giggles. Oh well it doesn’t bother me, it’s kind of fun to provide that kind of amusement and be the center of attention for a while.

    Reply
    • donscarletti
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:49 am

      Practice makes perfect. They’ll stop giggling after a while, but once you get too fluent they’ll just start ignoring you because you’re not cute any more.

      Reply
      • JSakamoto
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 4:28 am

        Lol, you’re so right, I already feel like such an anomaly whenever i got to China. Most people can’t tell I’m not chinese by first glance so when they hear me speak english they look at me like I got 3 heads, especially in the smaller cities with less tourists. It’s kind of fun for me and I enjoy it but it does get tiring at times.

        Reply
    • ddo
      Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 3:19 pm

      From what i experienced, i and my friends are just encouragingly kind to make foreigners comfortable if they would like saying some chinese, and we are surprised to see so many foreigners in shanghai can speak very good chinese.

      Reply
      • The Dude
        Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 1:41 am

        That’s the problem…

        You’re surprised.

        I can’t remember the last time I was surprised when I saw someone Chinese speaking English in my country… or elsewhere for that matter.

        Seriously… Chinese people have to get over this almost proud ‘my language is so difficult’ thing.

        The language is simplistic at best. The tones make the real difficulty, but once you’ve got all four down, it’s no problem at all.

        Written Chinese, well that is a different matter… but since the mainland dumbed that down with ‘simplified Chinese characters’, that’s not so hard either once you get the hang of the strokes.

        Truly wish Chinese would get over the ‘foreign monkey entertaining them with Chinese’ thing.

        I will agree with one thing though… Chinese are very kind about when we speak your language for the most part. That’s true. I only have to say ‘Ni hao’ and I’m told my Chinese is superb.

        Reply
  6. Scytheria
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 1:59 am

    Not surprising this one has captured Chinese hearts. You even have celebrity ‘laowai’ whose only entertainment skills seems to be derived from the fact that they are (A) laowai and (B) speak Chinese – Da Shan, for example. I always feel sorry for these celebs. Don’t they realise they are there for the same reason a chimp who wears clothes might be?

    “Wa! It’s a laowai! Look how weird he looks. What’s that he’s doing now? Wa! He’s speaking Chinese, like a real person!”

    Reply
    • baijiansi
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:12 am

      Da Shan is kind of a douche, but he does know about 4000 idioms, which is impressive even for educated Chinese.

      Reply
      • donscarletti
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:44 am

        In defence of educated Chinese, most of them don’t make a living of knowing idioms and not all of them have been speaking Chinese for as long as he has (28 years according to Wikipedia).

        The consensus is that Da Shan is something of a douche, probably true. But his douchness would not be so frequently brought up if it wasn’t for how jealous of him everyone is. He’s got a damn nice little gig, better than Feng Jie at least.

        Reply
        • Chris N.
          Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 10:22 am

          Funny that you guys mention that you think Da Shan is a douche, because on quora.com Da Shan himself answers at length the question “Why do Chinese learners hate Da Shan”. Its an extremely interesting read cause it just goes to show that he knows exactly how foreigners feel about him and that he understands why people think hes a douche.

          http://www.quora.com/Why-do-so-many-Chinese-learners-seem-to-hate-Dashan-Mark-Rowswell

          Reply
          • donscarletti
            Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:18 pm

            This answer is quite intelligent and self aware and proves that Mark Rowswell is not as douchy as Da Shan. The only thing I take exception to is his “Canadians are a bunch of weak arse milk sops” rationalisation for his own double mild weak sauce persona. Canada is a diverse country with many people with bland personalities, but then again, look at the Trailer Park Boys for something more edgy. Nobody is expecting him to unleash nationalistic anti-Chinese tyrades on their own television, but he made the occasional comment that went a tiny bit far and pissed off the man, for example the white version of Guo Degang, he might be more admired.

          • anon
            Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 6:56 pm

            Glad you posted that link or I would’ve. The anti-Dashan hate I think really speaks more about the hater than Dashan himself.

  7. mankouzanghua
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 3:36 am

    I’m not sure why, but they chopped off the lower portion of this guy’s composition, where things really started to get interesting…

    一天之后小力一直待在窝里，后悔他做的傻事。晚上10点他手机响了，是他亲爱的小白发的短信：“帅哥你欠我的，你准备好还清吗？”小力一收到就知道这是什么意思，他知道这个不是钱的问题，这就是欲望的问题，小白又有那种憋不住的感觉，那种着急骚动必须发泄的感觉。小力赶快穿上裤子，用一只手回小白的短信，“你要我做什么我就做什么。”收到小白的下一条短信的时候，小力已经在路上，在想象他一会儿要经历的淫荡乌托邦。小白发的短信很直接：“想要你。。。” 到小白那儿的时候，发生好多好多不能说的事情，甚至一些不知是否合法的。到底只能说小白被她那个铁公鸡的男朋友操得挺舒服的。而且不用说他们下次一起去吃饭的时候小力再一次忘记带钱了！！

    Reply
    • PeterScriabin
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 10:59 am

      Foul-mouthed-one: thanks, that did pep it up a bit.

      But I am not clear who the “they” are who chopped off the lower portion of this guy’s anatomy, composition?

      Many of the Chinese commenters also do not seem to have read this denouement (which has the same rather whimsical take on the well-springs of Chinese love relationships as the first paragraph!)

      Reply
      • PeterScriabin
        Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 3:46 am

        Oh, duh, the penny finally dropped. Sorry!

        What I’d like to know, 满口脏话, is how you learned such brilliant Chinese. Did you study at uni, get a degree before meeting your partner? Or did you learn “on the job”? How many years did it take to attain such fluency?

        I heard Huntsman, who is so-called fluent, in an interview, and was not impressed, especially when my gf confirmed his accent is not too 标准.

        Reply
        • mankouzanghua
          Monday, February 27, 2012 at 11:27 am

          haha, you’re now setting off my sarcasm detector!

          Reply
          • PeterScriabin
            Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 3:45 pm

            And you my false-modesty detector.

            Yeah, I was a bit gushy, just rather embarrassed I’d assumed so readily that you’d gone to the original posting site and found additional material – which still seems more plausible than that you’d go to such creative and humorous trouble just to amuse the crowd that shows up here!

          • mankouzanghua
            Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 10:29 am

            It wasn’t too much trouble. This Qi Si Yuan reminded me of when I was a beginning Chinese student. I had some courses in university and would do similar things to make them interesting. One of the activities we did was write and perform dialogues, and my Chinese partner and I would usually make ours a little bizarre. One on hobbies and treating a friend to dinner, the guy was a bit of a stalker. The one on going to the doctor, it became more and more evident as his consultation went along that his ailments were psychological. Our professor I think was usually “horrified,” but we always got 满分.

            So I kind of felt a kinship with this guy who was also trying to spice up his homework.

            I have a bunch of problems with the typical classroom language learning. From what I’ve seen with myself and other people, it doesn’t usually work well. It inspires no confidence and no experimentation, two of the most important factors for fluency. It also doesn’t let you learn and express what you actually want to communicate.

            One class sticks out in my mind. My professor was teaching us how to describe our hair color. It was the same old routine where everyone in the class took turns repeating the same sentence, “wo de toufa shi ___se de.” Well, the only colors we knew that were relevant to hair were yellow and black. My hair is brown. So when my turn came I said, “Wo de toufa shi kafei se de.” Immediately the professor said, “No, no, no. We do not say like that.” Today, I’m sure that was a perfectly correct statement that anyone would understand. She rebuked me only for stepping outside the bounds of repeating a sentence pattern and inserting one of two words.

            When I first met people who were learning Chinese by speaking and IMing, I was blown away. I knew some rather random vocabulary, like different sports and words like “vegetarian” (which I see was also among Qi Si Yuan’s early input, for some strange reason), but I didn’t comprehend the first thing about expressing myself and how very simple it could be. I met this Korean guy and was trying to talk to him in Chinese about learning Chinese. And he goes, “shuo hua keyi, biede tai nan.” I knew immediately that this person’s understanding of Chinese was not just quantitatively better than mine but actually qualitatively different. He had been learning Chinese for probably 1/4 of the time I had, but he was actually fluidly using Chinese, especially the simplest and most useful but also the most unique aspects of Chinese grammar and word meanings.

            After that I didn’t have (or want) any more Chinese classes.

            The other problem I had with classes is that they led me to believe (or maybe it was just my own lazy attitude) that tones weren’t that important. I actually believed I could ignore them. In class it worked because the teacher always knew what I was supposed to be saying. In the real world, though, it did not promote confidence in using Chinese. You can often see the effects of this with non-native Chinese speakers sounding very unsure about what they’re saying even when they know all the characters. I got to the point where I would expect people to pause and consider my meaning after I said even something simple.

            One time, I asked someone rather out of left-field if they liked climbing trees when they were little, and I actually knew and emphasized the tones for 爬树. I was surprised when, without even pausing, the person was like, “xi huan!!!” That odd moment stands out in my memory as a turning point and big leap for me. You absolutely have to learn to use tones, and to do so you need more listening input and speaking practice than a class could ever provide. If you have a Chinese friend who is too embarrassed to speak English, he or she can provide more speaking practice in one day than a whole semester of Chinese class, and the content is useful (unlike “vegetarian,” which is a common word only for the 1% of learners who are vegetarians, right?!).

            So, don’t feel disadvantaged if other people are learning in university and you can’t. In terms of a degree, it’s good, but for amount of time spent and habits cultivated they tend to be inefficient. (my opinion)

          • qi si yuan
            Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 1:53 pm

            @ 满口脏话

            this is precisely my thought process in language learning. As you assumed, my classes in the States are all very dry call-and-response style, where you must use the exact vocab words and sentence patterns that the lesson covers. It’s possible to get the rules beaten into you that way, but no one can ever learn a language proficiently with this method. To learn a language you need to have fun with it, apply it to new situations no matter how outrageous. It leads to some pretty interesting/confusing/awkward situations, but those are the ones you’ll always remember. for instance we had an unusually boring lesson about international relations a few weeks ago, but it’s much more memorable when put in the context of martian invasions.

            the follow-up to the original essay is hilarious, I thought you were a native chinese person the first time I saw it. 加油！

    • elizabeth
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 11:10 am

      It’s a ‘conservative’ society out there. Some of his descriptions could be considered too outrageous.

      Reply
    • donscarletti
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:44 pm

      Heh, nice story. But I think that guy could not have written this paragraph. The most obvious giveaway is that his Chinese class would have not taught him the term 淫荡, or for that matter 卖淫，手淫，淫贱 or any other marvelous vocabulary that involves that wonderful character.

      Reply
      • kevinnolongerinpudong
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:57 pm

        Mankouzanghua, that is the officially the funniest comment I have ever read on this site.

        Reply
      • andrew (齐思源)
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 7:15 pm

        thanks for teaching me some great new vocab!

        Reply
        • little barbarian
          Friday, March 2, 2012 at 8:46 pm

          Lol seriously are you the guy who wrote the composition? I have to say its awesome. Amazingly almost no grammatical mistakes can be found. However, it’s too colloquial and some sentences are grammatically correct but look like English. It would be better and brief if some advanced and formal vocabulary or idioms are applied.
          I am kind of surprised about your language level. Any suggestions about Chinese learning? I need to teach my bf who knows nothing and is struggling with tones. I don’t know what to do to start.

          Reply
      • UkExPaT
        Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 9:02 pm

        He could have looked it up in the dictionary. Most people know how useful google translate is.

        Reply
    • funky
      Monday, February 27, 2012 at 11:33 am

      :) made my day ^^

      Reply
  8. Gay Orc
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 3:45 am

    da shan is a really humble and nice guy and i think everyone is just sick of hearing about him or being asked if they know him (especially if you are canadian, there is no escape).

    Reply
  9. notorious
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 3:49 am

    if I was bold, or perhaps a sado masochist I would link my youtube video of when I was first learning mandarin. would probably draw so much derision I would not be laughing lol

    Reply
  10. Uncle Sam
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 5:44 am

    Quiero seber que mi espanol es lo mismo!

    Reply
  11. xiaoxiao
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 6:46 am

    cute~

    Reply
  12. SteveLaudig
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 6:46 am

    The only salient fact question: “Is the communication effective?” Adhering to grammar rules strikes me as less important than getting the message across. Outside the classroom rammar is a vehicle not a destination.

    Reply
    • 侯火
      Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 3:01 am

      Chinese as a language in general falters under the question of “is the communication effective?” There are far too many ambiguities present in normal conversation in Chinese, it’s just baffling.

      I wonder if this new widespread access to the net will introduce new innovative solutions to the ambiguity of Chinese, now that China has an internet population greater than the US. Lord knows how many new terms and phrases have been spawned by US & UK internet dwellers…

      Reply
  13. lonetrey
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 7:15 am

    AHAHAHAHAHA As a Chinese-American, this composition is especially amusing to me since I get to understand both sides of the situation! It’s unfair to judge this guy based on his beginner’s chinese, but it’s still funny.

    I feel bad for laughing, but I still do it anyways. XD

    Reply
    • notorious
      Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 8:11 am

      Since we are both americans, can you explain the amusing part? You may be able to relate it to me better than any of the other people here. I don’t think I even smirked. Is it funny because it reads like it was written by a second grader doing his best to avoid a grammatical error? Too simple?

      Reply
      • lonetrey
        Monday, February 27, 2012 at 9:20 am

        It’s funny because it’s hilarious that a grow-ass man is writing like a kid, but it’s also understandable since that’s how education goes. Baby steps for the foreign language students.

        Also, I laughed because I mentally read the composition piece in my dad’s engrish voice.

        Reply
  14. pirx
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 8:38 am

    Well, I think it is great if people are making the effort of communicating in a second or third language. The point is not perfection, the point is that people understand you in another language.

    Perfection is a luxury one can add-on later.

    As to the content, Qi Si Yuan understands well, that in social values-depraved Chinese society love exclusively goes through wallet.

    Good job, man, you rock!

    Reply
  15. Rod
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 9:13 am

    I think it’s alright to poke fun, as long as the persons laughing too. Language is funny.

    Reply
  16. congee1
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 9:40 am

    Well, many CBCs/ABCs/BBCs raised in the West have piss poor English and a naive, simplistic, understanding of Western culture, so what’s the difference?

    Reply
  17. Dynasty
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 10:18 am

    Hard to make grammar mistakes in a language with no grammar to speak of.

    Reply
  18. staylost
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 10:33 am

    Big ups to the guy who wrote this. He represents all of us simple laowai.

    Reply
  19. elizabeth
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 10:41 am

    Excellent, Mr Qi Si Yuan! Especially your punchline at the end. Now I have to really brush up my Chinese. Maybe I’d do better by writing about my experiences. Lol!

    Reply
  20. Tando
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 11:31 am

    Jeez, Chinese “memes” are so fricking lame.

    Reply
  21. eattot
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 11:57 am

    Xiao Li is very embarrassed. He let Xiao Bai pay. Right now Xiao Bai does not love Xiao Li.

    哈哈哈哈！ so funny!
    hahahahaha, i can not stop laughing!
    true, who wants to meet a guy let women pay again?
    hahaha!

    Reply
  22. Princeps
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 2:12 pm

    I am currently in Beijing studying Chinese with this guy. He most certainly has a way with the language.

    He is also well aware of this situation thanks to our Chinese teachers.

    Reply
  23. andrew (齐思源)
    Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 7:39 pm

    wow… this is awesome! 我就是那个齐思源，没想到我的作文可能走红了！i have no idea who posted this photo, but i am impressed that it has become so popular.

    This ‘essay’ was an assignment in Beginning Chinese semester 2, and is about a year old. The content is very limited because I couldnt speak much chinese at that time… the compositions i write now aren’t nearly as interesting- they lack the stupidity of this first essay. I feel that such an insignificant thing, eg. having your date pay for dinner, is not a big deal. However i have no idea how to express that in chinese lol.

    I don’t know why people find this essay so interesting, but I sincerely appreciate everybody’s support and comments on Weibo and Renren! 谢谢！

    Reply
  24. Shanghairen
    Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 12:05 am

    When foreigners learning Chinese want to write something, they keep it simple and write at their level. When Chinese people try to write something in English, they try to keep the same complexity they have in their native language, and the result is often a disaster–very few sentences without some kind of error. Why is this so difficult for them?

    Reply
    • notorious
      Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 12:12 am

      This is true. Especially when I speak mandarin I would equate my speaking skills to a four year old child.

      Reply
    • anon
      Monday, February 27, 2012 at 12:22 am

      In my experience, its not really them trying to keep the same complexity but one of two things:

      1) They’re running their Chinese through Google Translate or something similar.

      2) They’re translating how they would say it in Chinese and the problem becomes the differences in grammar and syntax between Chinese and English.

      Reply
    • Bruce Tutty
      Friday, March 2, 2012 at 10:24 pm

      I saw a documentary on Mayan that went over this.

      i think Chinese is not more or less complex, but is older so it is based on a medium sized set of syllables, that makes it vocabulary by being expressed tonally.

      English is a newer language created from older languages, that is based on single character alphabet, and makes a large vocabulary, that are expressed directly.

      So the two don’t really translate at all, and have to be interpreted instead.

      No wonder they are difficult for non-native speakers.

      Reply
  25. mimomimo
    Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 5:22 pm

    So…obviously his teacher posted this. Professional!

    Reply
  26. D
    Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 7:01 pm

    no money no talk. that is as real as it’s gonna get.

    Reply
  27. Ryo
    Sunday, February 26, 2012 at 9:49 pm

    Not really related, but a LOT of Chinese guys pull this shit to get free meals from girls.

    I heard a story where a guy brought a girl to McDonald to eat. They both go and order and the guy would hurry and order first, then he say to the girl: “ok, I’m finish ordering, I’ll go find us a seat.” These guys are not shameful at all.

    Reply
  28. Joe
    Monday, February 27, 2012 at 11:11 am

    In his mind, he is not writing, but drawing pictures, so his handwriting looks like that of a child.

    Reply
  29. typingfromwork
    Monday, February 27, 2012 at 7:09 pm

    It’s nice to see this guy getting a lot of positive comments, even though the composition is barely primary school grade. Still, it passed the mark.

    English compositions by Chinese students are of a similar level. It just shows how hard it is to actually learn a completely foreign language.

    Reply
  30. Justin
    Tuesday, February 28, 2012 at 4:04 pm

    The difference between this and a Chinese writting English is that this foreigner has probably only been studying Chinese for 1 or 2 years. Unlike the Chinese who study English for 10+ years and still can’t have a basic conversation.

    Reply
  31. Servaas
    Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 10:58 am

    One typo: 现在 not 先在.
    Great story!

    Reply
  32. Paul
    Thursday, March 1, 2012 at 1:05 am

    Chinese grammar is much simpler than English grammar.

    Reply
  33. john
    Tuesday, May 1, 2012 at 4:17 pm

    I wonder how the Chinese students would feel if the English teachers posted all the shit we have to look at?

    Reply
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