If you, like the rest of Taipei, were in Daan Park enjoying the beautiful weather over the weekend, you might have caught sight of protesters with signs calling for the recall of KMT legislator Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) under the slogan “Reboot Daan” (which is a pretty clever English pun to use).
This close-up below shows more details:
大安強強滾 罷免羅智強！ 羅智強 烙跑路上？ 強強滾 連署路上！
Daan’s strongman has to go Recall Lo Chih-chiang! Lo Chih-chiang running wild in the streets? The strongman should go, recall petition on the streets!
I found this Ministry of National Defense poster in the run up to the 7th National Senior High School Honor Guard Competition at Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall (Liberty Square) kind of interesting, in that it incorporates some Japanese in the form of a pun.
The main slogan on the sign reads:
愛國儀級棒
Patriotism is the best!
This is a bit of word play on the Japanese term いちばん（一番） meaning “the best” or “number one”. This is normally transliterated into Mandarin as 「一級棒」, but in the sign, the 「一」 (yī/one) has been substituted for the 「儀」（yí/ceremonial) of “Honor Guard” （儀隊）.
I know I have a penchant for over-interpreting, and this is likely an attempt (alongside the manga-esque figures on the poster) at appealing to manga-loving Taiwanese teens, BUT… this does seem pretty layered.
The ROC Armed Forces have a traditional association with the 外省/waisheng (post-1949 Chinese immigrant population), who often exhibit anti-Japanese sentiment (see previous blog post here). This is because the army had fought the Japanese in China prior to fleeing to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-Shek (a memorial to whom is actually facing this sign). Perhaps then the younger generations within the Ministry of National Defense and the ROC Army are less hung up on these issues and are appealing to a broader church? (This is the over-interpreting part).
Incidentally, the memorial has been subject to inter-party squabbles for quite some time. The square was originally called Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall, but in 2007, amid objections from KMT Mayor Hau Lung-pin (郝龍斌) and ex-mayor and then presidential candidate Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), the inscription on the iconic arches was changed from 「大中至正」(a classical Chinese reference which contains 「中正」, one of the many names taken by Chiang Kai-shek) to 「自由廣場」. However, as the KMT were still in control of the Taipei City Government at the time, the MRT and the general public continue to refer to it as Chiang Kai-shek Memorial Hall. The name of the hall itself was also changed briefly from 2007-2009 to “National Taiwan Democracy Memorial Hall” before changing back. The current Mayor of Taipei, Wayne Chiang （蔣萬安） is believed to be the great-grandson of Chiang Kai-shek, so this thorny tale is sure to continue into the future.
Found this beautifully-crafted note in one of the toilets at the Red House (紅樓), part of its power is that it’s actually stuck on the door in a way that seals the door shut:
This cubicle has been blocked again, again, again, again and again, due to inappropriate things being thrown into the toilet bowl. Can those special people that are drawn to use this toilet be more careful and not accidentally dispose of any personal item that’s not piss or shit into the toilet bowl, including toilet paper, wet wipes, condoms, underwear, stockings, trash bags, dental floss, cotton buds, lip stick and pens!
Thanks for understanding how hard our cleaning ladies are working.
This cubicle is under renovation until June 22
The font size seems to underline the sarcastic tone of the note and the combination of a polite register along with vulgar language. To be fair, that toilet seems to attract a lot of strange people.
Just as in English advertising you’ll see some letters substituted with images, the same happens in Chinese, and you’ll often see parts of characters replaced. I’ve captured a few examples below, but let me know if you spot any yourself!
In what we’ll call questionable taste. A kid with an open mouth takes the place of the 「口」 component of 「吃」 in this sign (and yes, 吃 has most if not all of the connotations of the word “eat” in English). It reads 「吃我 早午餐」 (Eat Me – Brunch).
This congee shop has creatively substituted the central 「米」 component of 「粥」 for a stack of steaming bowls of congee.
Although I dabbled in my youth, I’m pretty much a post-Queen’s Gambit chess player. I’ve really gotten into it over the past few years, although I’m still at around 1000 ELO (Daily), so just thought I’d provide a bit of info on the scene in Taiwan and some useful vocab in Mandarin.
Most of my interactions have been online, but there are some meet-ups in Taipei, also happy to play over-the-board with anyone in and around Chiang Kai Shek Memorial Hall over lunch times.
If you want to play for Taiwan, you can join Team Taiwan on Chess.com (you can only play for one country at a time, but they’re flexible about the flag displayed in your profile). Also, feel free to add me and play me.
Although Xiangqi (象棋) is more popular here, there is a growing community of chess players too, including stand-up comic, presenter and podcaster Brian Tseng. He’s yet to disclose his Chess.com username, but he’s mentioned chess a good few times in his podcast, particularly in the King’s Gambit (王翼棄兵) episode, where he talks about applying the lessons of chess to everyday life.
You can find some cool stickers on Instagram, by searching for “rvdtor.”
In a previous post, I mentioned the phrase 「是在哈囉」 to mean *sassy voice*”Hello~~!” or “What the f*ck is going on?” Well, recently, I spotted a variant of this phrase on a friend’s Facebook post, playing on the similarity in sound: 「是在哈佛」, which is used to mean the same thing, but with a twist:
“I can’t get through to any of the numbers for confirmed positive cases. I can’t get through to the remote-treatment number I can’t get through to my district office It’s the fifth day and I still haven’t received the welfare package and I’m yet to receive my quarantine notice.”
“None of the options on the “Health Companion” app work, why did they even launch it? Of the mass of various apps launched by hospitals, I wasn’t able to use even one (I need a remote consultation). I called the number for the health department of the District Office (Wanhua District) 23x33x92 It told me to call 23x33x92 instead. What the f*ck is with giving out the same number??“
“When I dialed it again it said the line was busy, and if I wanted to continue waiting I could press *. After I pressed *, it said this option was invalid and the line cut off. I wasn’t able to get through to any of the numbers, so it seems Betelnut Ko Wen-je (Taipei Mayor) just wants people to die at home.”
The “hello” in the original phrase is switched up for the Chinese word for Harvard. This phrase originates from the suggestion that Christine Fan (范瑋琪) stated that she was a Harvard alumnus on her CV, when, in fact, she transferred to the Harvard Division of Continuing Education in the second year of a degree and never graduated. The implication in highly-competitive Taiwan is that the Harvard Division of Continuing Education does not count as Harvard proper and that she was trying to plump up her CV, although the portrayal of her as a Harvard grad seems largely to have been led by the media.
The phrase still retains the meaning of the original, basically “What the f*ck is that all about?” but with an extra pop culture reference added.
The reference to Betelnut Ko Wen-je to refer to the Taipei Mayor originates in a series of pranks played by high-schoolers on politicians, where they ask to take a photo together and then ask them awkward questions or find other creative forms of embarrassing them. In this instance, the high-schooler dressed up (rather subtly) as a betelnut to take a photo with Ko:
Tones play an even more important role in Chinese than accurate pronunciation a lot of the time, but you know you’re swimming in the deep end when even native speakers have to clarify the difference.
One of my friends was talking about a colleague of theirs and said:
「XX很雷，跟他共事很累。」 “XX is a real liability, working with him is exhausting.”
When the person he was talking to appeared confused, another friend clarified 「地雷的雷」.
Literally “thunder,” or “landmine” in the context of 「地雷」, 「雷」lei2 is an adjective used to describe someone as clumsy or always mucking things up. My friend made a real effort to emphasize that it was second tone, to distinguish it from 「累」 lei4 (tiring/tired).
The humble brag needs little explanation, but it was interesting to hear the host of the GooAye podcast use a Chinese term that means something similar the other day when talking about him and a bunch of other renowned Taiwanese podcasters becoming fathers recently. Basically, he said that people have been recommending him thought pieces on how to be a parent, and some of them are a little fucked up.
Among the pieces people have recommended, I looked at a lot of them and they were pretty messed up. Like maybe the parent hadn’t studied properly when they were young, or, in some cases, the parent had done well in their studies, but never really pursued them to any conclusion. So it’s like they want to project themselves onto their children so that their children can help them accomplish what they never could. It’s fucked up like that. Then some of them are even “humblebrag” pieces. This word for “humblebrag” is used mainly in China, so don’t come after me word police. I just think it’s a pretty accurate expression. It refers to people who accidentally–and of course this “accidentally” is totally on purpose–let slip their own strengths and the strengths of their family members. This is called the “Versailles” genre of writing. So, for example: “Ugh! I told my husband not to buy me anything else. He’s so annoying! He only went and bought me a new maserati!”
After a bit of a search on Chinese social media, I realized that it can mean humblebragging, or satire of humblebraggers. As well as the obvious reference to the subtlety of the Palace of Versailles, the phrase (like a lot of popular Chinese slang) originated in Japanese manga. The Rose of Versailles / ベルサイユのばら / 凡爾賽玫瑰(玉女英豪 in Taiwan) was originally serialized in 1972-1973, but was revamped from 2013-2018. There have also been an anime series and a film.
I liked the Wu Ming-yi-style magical realism conjured up by the title of this poem, however, the non-sequiturs kind of threw me off and I didn’t really vibe with the discussion between the disembodied voices. It’s possible I’m missing something in the interpretation of the poem and welcome any alternates in the comments section. I have to say that I’m not really a fan of Under Milk Wood-style stream-of-consciousness poetry that relies on dreams.
Ye Yu-ting has published two volumes of poetry, the self-published A Père David’s deer in peppermint-colored sleep (一隻麋鹿在薄荷色的睡眠裡) and The Invisibility in the Details (鉅細靡遺的透明)which was illustrated by Shiho So(a Taiwanese illustrator living in Tokyo). Ye graduated from the Chinese masters program of National Central University in Taiwan, where she headed up a poetry society. She has been the recipient of the Ye-Hung Female Poetry Prize and the Council for Cultural Affairs(now Ministry of Culture) poetry prize. For more information, you can see a profile of her here.
The fun thing about Taipei is that political opinions are often very in your face, whether it is a taxi driver going on about how the ruling party is driving the economy into the ground or a random bit of graffiti scrawled on a traffic box about the Taoyuan Mayor that piques your curiosity as to the context:
太子鄭文燦 Crown prince Cheng Wen-tsan
The frame of reference for this fantastic piece of “artwork” dates back to the words of Taipei City Councilor Lo Chih-chiang (羅智強) back in May. He suggested that there were double standards going on, in that the 1st Mayor of Taoyuan Cheng Wen-tsan (鄭文燦) had received special treatment when it came to the Novotel outbreak of coronavirus because of his favorable position in the ruling Democratic Progressive Party, as Lo put it he is a 「綠朝太子」 “the crown prince of the Green dynasty” – here green is a reference to the colors of the DPP vs the blue of the opposition KMT (Lo’s party). The accusation is that Cheng was able to push all of the responsibility on to the central government because of this special treatment, while other mayors got lambasted for doing the same. Lo then went on to taunt Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), asking him if he was jealous of this special treatment (an attack based on Ko’s tumultuous past relationship with the DPP).
Ko–who always seems to have a quip at the ready–.replied that if he’d pushed all the the responsibility to the central government, the situation would have been f*cked long ago and he doesn’t have it as easy as some (pointing no elbows at Cheng I’m sure).
