Where there are men, there must be chickens.
Peasant saying from Ningxia, China, 1936.
30 January, 2013
Quote of the day: on men and chickens
Posted by stalinsmoustache under hairy creatures of God | Tags: chickens, men |[4] Comments
[4] Comments
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31 January, 2013 at 4:07 am
Isn’t that supposed to be a pun? The word for chicken sounds a lot like the word for prostitute.
I know this because a friend of mine is Chinese, but was born in the UK. Her first language is English, but she also speaks Cantonese but not Mandarin (at least not very well!). Her mum doesn’t speak English at all and instead only talks Mandarin and Cantonese. Anyway, she once told me that they were in Hong Kong and she called her mum a chicken for not jumping over a large puddle. She got the pronunciation wrong, and her mum wasn’t pleased!
31 January, 2013 at 8:52 am
That would be intriguing. I will ask some Chinese friends, but there is a significant difference between Cantonese and the the local dialects of Ningxia.
31 January, 2013 at 8:58 am
Yea, I’m sure she said it’s similar in Mandarin though, so seeing that quote I thought it might be a pun based on a common idiom or something. Would be nice to know what someone who really knows that dialect has to say!
31 January, 2013 at 9:03 am
I’ll ask.