大核民族 vs 鹽荒子孫 (Joke)

It has been reported that some Chinese were fighting to buy salt as they believed in the hearsay that salt鹽(yan2) , with iodine 碘(dian3) in it, could alleviate the damage from radiation 幅射(fu2 she4) . The news revealed how people have panicked after the nuclear crisis hit Japan.

This fever for salt has triggered heated discussions on the internet. Some parodies were made to mock such a phenomenon, which shows the ignorance and lack of confidence in the government. One of them is presented in the form of 對聯, couplet.

The former part of it is「日本大核民族」(ri4 ben3 da4 he2 ming2 zhu2), with the latter as「中國鹽荒子孫」(zhong guo2 yan2 huang zi3 cun) The

across short one is 「有碘意思」(you3 dian3 yi4 ci)

This parody is making use of the abundant homophones in Chinese. We generally call the Japanese people as “Yamato people“大和民族(da4 he2 ming2 zhu2), which is pronounced exactly the same as 大核民族, with核 meaning nuclear. 「炎黃子孫」(yan2 huang2 zi3 cun), “Descendants 子孫of Yan 炎and Yellow 黃Emperors” is an ancient Chinese term to refer to the Han Chinese. Here the parody uses the term with similar pronunciation 「鹽荒子孫」to mock those people. 鹽荒 means a famine of salt.

As to有碘意思, it has the identical pronunciation with有點意思, which means somewhat interesting.

Remember the Chinese philanthropist 陳光標(chen2 guang biao), who I’ve mentioned about in my previous writing 高調行善 vs 不食嗟來食? He once said, “The most painful thing in life is that you haven’t used up your money when you die.” Based on this quotation, someone wrote on the Internet, “What is the most painful thing in the world?—You run out of your salt when the radiation comes. What is the most most painful thing in the world?—It doesn’t work to eat salt when the radiation comes. What is the most most most painful thing in the world?—The radiation doesn’t come but you got too much salt. What is the most most most most  painful thing in the world?—You die but you haven’t used up your salt!

As I’m writing this article, I’ve heard the news that people had stopped purchasing salt like crazy. In some areas some people even started to ask for refund. Looks like people now are worrying that the “most most most most” painful thing will happen to them.

鹽荒子孫=盐荒子孙

對聯=对联

中國=中国

陳光標=陈光标

高調行善 vs 不食嗟來食=高调行善 vs 不食嗟来食