菜尾 (Food)

Once upon a time, there had been a Taiwanese course that had no fixed ingredients, but has been a shared childhood memory of my peers. I’ve been told by many of them about how they have been missing the course and how it has made them drool at the thought of it.

This course is called菜尾(cai4 wei3) in South Min Dialect, literally meaning the “tail,” or the “end” of courses. As I said, it doesn’t have fixed ingredients. But mostly it is a mixture of thick soup stock with various kinds of meats, such as pork or chicken, and different veges. To be brief, it’s a combination of leftovers from a banquet.

Yuck! You might think it’s unhygienic 不衛生(bu2 wei4 sheng) and gross. Indeed it might be. That’s why we don’t have this course any longer. I mean the “real” 菜尾, the reheated mixture of leftovers.

In 1961, Taiwan had a GDP per capita of $153. (And in 2011 it is  $20,629.) Food was not as abundant as it is now. It would be lucky for a parent not to have to worry about feeding his kids. And most kids were constantly in a state of hunger, yearning for anything to eat. In the movie Dust in the Wind, 戀戀風塵(lian4 lian4 feng chen2), a kid was scolded by his mom because he was so hungry that he ate all the toothpaste and powder for upset stomach. The scene did remind many people of their hungry childhood and adolescence.

For some poor family, they couldn’t even afford rice every day, not to mention meats. Most people had to wait until festivals such as the Chinese New Year to have meats like pork, chicken or fish. That was what festivals were about, especially for the growing and always-hungry kids—food.

Apart from festivals, it would be occasions such as wedding banquets for people to have a feast, 打牙祭(da3 ya2 ji4), literally meaning worshiping your teeth. Very often all family members, young or old, dressed up and headed for the banquet excited. They had to give their 紅包(hong2 ba), the red envelope as a gift. Getting a full and merry meal was to be expected.

It was the host’s responsibility to feed the guests well. It stood to reason for people to abandon their usual thrift for a while for such occasions like a wedding or a worship to God. Rich and yummy dishes were served one by one until people ate and drank to their heart’s content.

More often than not, there was too much food. People just looked at the later dishes and sighed, “I’m too full for these.” They put down their chalk sticks and gave up.

What about the leftovers? Throw them away? It was considered a sin that would be condemned by God. People of that time never threw anything edible away; thus came this dish菜尾.

The leftovers were gathered in buckets and given to the relatives, good friends or helping neighbors besides the hosting family. They had to be re-boiled so that they wouldn’t rot away. The ingredients all depended on what were served and left.

Frankly speaking, I myself don’t have much memory about this course, even though I’ve read and heard people telling me how delicious it is. I was lucky and was never that “hungry” as many of my peers. I was not born to a rich family, but I’ve never starved as a kid. Perhaps that’s because my parents only had three kids, not 6 or 8 as most of the families had back then. Or perhaps my father, a teacher, thought the course was unhygienic and never brought it back.

I once saw a notice outside a diner in my neighborhood that they served菜尾. Too bad I didn’t have the chance to taste it before it was closed. No matter how it is cooked today, I think, it would never taste the same as it did, the real leftovers.

In the course of my writing this, my 15-year-old daughter approached my computer. “What is 菜尾?” she asked. I explained to her. “Gross!” she exclaimed and left. Same response as I have imaged you would have.

Did it really taste that good? Or is it just that we were too hungry?

不衛生=不卫生

戀戀風塵=恋恋风尘

Black cat vs. 辣妹 (up-to-date term)

What does it exactly mean when you hear someone describing his or her grandma in South Min Dialect as a “black back” 黑貓(hei mao)when she was young?

It was a common expression for a beautiful woman in my mom’s generation. You can imagine the term “black dog,” 黑狗(hei gou3) as a counterpart referring to a good-looking man. Sometimes we’ll add the word 兄(xong), brother to it as黑狗兄.

These days the terms are hardly used. Instead you hear people calling pretty girls正妹(zheng4 mei) (with 妹pronounced as mei instead of its usual tone mei4 .) or美眉(mei3 mei2). Compared with美女(mei3 nu3), beauty, these two terms appeared quite lately and are usually used for those young girls, while the latter has a much broader range. You may call a 70-year-old 美女, but it would sound weird to use正妹 or 美眉to describe her.

The British pop girl group Spice Girls is called 辣妹合唱團(la4 mei4 he2 chang4 tuan2) in Taiwan. 辣means spicy hot, which was originally used for the flavor of food. For pungent or acrimonious remarks, we’ll use the term辛辣(xin la4) for them. With the popularity of the group Spice Girls, 辣妹 is often heard to call those young girls, especially those who dress themselves or act in a revealing, provoking style. I think  it is also influenced by the English word “hot.”

Adjectives like帥(shuai4) ,英俊(ying jun4)，瀟灑(xiao sa3)used to be mentioned quite often to describe good-looking men, and so was the noun 帥哥(shuai4 ge). These days, however, it doesn’t sound so chic to use these terms.

According to Wikipedia, in 1994 a new term “metrosexual” was coined in by Mark Simpson in an article where he described a man (especially one living in an urban culture) who spends a lot of time and money on shopping for his appearance. The term is translated into 都會美型男(du hui4 mei3 xing2 nan2). As a result, 型男(xing2 nan2) has been frequently mentioned to refer to those men with the charisma of Beckham or Brad Pitt. And sometimes we’ll say someone, especially male, is quite有型(you3 xing2), meaning he has his personal style and is uniquely charming.

As to those macho hunks of muscles, we call them猛男(meng3 nan2), which is often used as a counterpart of辣妹. In a 猛男 show, you’ll see dancing men casting their charm to the screaming women.

  

The word “old” has turned a taboo word. For those who have past the age of正妹 or辣妹, somewhere after 30 or so, (some people put 25 as the threshold.) people will call them熟女. 熟 means ripe, mature.

To write this article, I surfed online and learned that age is not the only requirement for a 熟女. To be a 熟女, they got to have their own career so as to be financially independent. With their abundant experiences, they are confident, wise, mature and skillful socially. Carry in Sex and the City is an example. They are divided into 輕熟女(qing shou2 nu3) and 重熟女(zhong4 shou2 nu3) according to their age. 輕 means light while重, heavy. Some people define the latter as women ranging from 36 to 42.

What about women after 42? Haven’t those creative people exercised their brains that are rife with ideas and come up with any innovative terms? Does it mean that few people care about women who have passed 42? Or, they just look much alike anyway?

黑貓=黑猫

辣妹合唱團=辣妹合唱团

都會美型男=都会美型男

輕熟女=轻熟女

 

「婚」了頭 (II) (Chop Suey)

Some people pointed out that an important cause for China’s new marriage law was to curb so-called marriage fraud, 婚姻詐騙(hun yin zha4 pian4) Some people try to cash in on marriage by marrying someone, then divorcing him/her upon getting whatever they want.

In Taiwan, we call a certain group of women 收屍隊(shou shi dui4), “body-burying team,” which refers to those women who deliberately marry elderly men, who might be, like 30 years older than themselves, wait a couple of years until the man dies and inherit part of his property. Those who “wait” are “ethical.” Imagine those who do not.

收屍隊are especially prevalent in communities of the veterans, who moved to Taiwan with Chiang Kai-shek in 1949 from China. A lot of them had never intended to get married in Taiwan when young for they’d never expected that they would be staying here for so long; in most of the cases, the rest of their lives.

Marriage indeed for some people is a quite profitable “investment.” I still remember vividly how a male teacher, an ex-coworker of mine, mocked us, a group of young married career women in the office, commenting that we were much “inferior to,” or “worth less” than an “old” woman (probably in her 50s) he knew, who was to marry a rich widower and got a big house and millions of cash as 聘金(pin4 jin)*. This “old” lady, according to him, though no “fresher” than us and had married several times, didn’t have to juggle between her family and career, working her ass off like us, who had never been married before marrying our husbands. (And probably virgins, he implied.) This woman got all we would probably have after decades of hard work only with a wedding.

Well, all I can say about this is to joke that my parents are to blame, for they never taught me that when I got married, I should have put all the above conditions into consideration.

Women are not the only side that can profit from marriage. Several years ago a scene from a news report impressed me a lot. 許純美(xu3 chun2 mei3), a billionaire from inheriting her deceased husband’s property who became well-known after a stray 12-year-old girl wondering at a mall was found out to be her biological daughter, who later turned a sensation in entertainment by playing a clownish role on TV talk shows for two years or so, was dressed in a wedding gown holding a plate with cash all over it in her engagement to a man much younger than her.

Such a scene incited sarcasm and criticism. One time when I was chatting with my good friend Mary and talked about this, she said in an indignant tone, “This is what a lot of men are doing. Why does it seem especially ridiculous when a woman is doing it?”

Money can’t buy love, but it can buy marriage. When engaged to a girl that was not of his daughter’s, but granddaughter’s age, didn’t Hefner know that such a thing wouldn’t have happened had he been not so famous and wealthy? Xu, later had several similar marriages but all ended with divorces, intermittently reported to have been beaten up by her little husband or paid up her husband’s debts from gambling.

I’ve been surrounded by single people that have never been married even in their late 30s or 40s, which has worried their parents, or the older generation as a whole. Taiwan’s birth rate 出生率(chu shen lu4) ranked the world’s lowest in 2009, which has a lot to do with the low marriage rate.

Why bother to get married when the conventional causes that make and maintain marriage are fading away? When women don’t need or want to get a financial 保障 and men don’t need or want to 延續香火, who will be enthusiastic about getting married and losing “freedom?” Not to mention the troubles you will encounter like the custody of kids or alimony when you unfortunately divorce.

I think China’s new marriage law can be in some way considered a start of a new era and a declining of some conventional notions. Marriage is not about sharing, property or debts, unconditionally any longer. Before you get “昏了頭” and want to get married, you’d better figure it out how you’re gonna arrange your property. For those billionaires, at least it saves their trouble in dealing with the Prenuptial agreement, 婚前協議(hun qian2 xie2 yi4).

(THE END)

*note: If you don’t know what聘金means, please refer to my previous writing with the title Prince white horse and the ring on April 30.

婚姻詐騙=婚姻诈骗

收屍隊=收尸队

婚前協議=婚前协议

「婚」了頭 (I) (Chop Suey)

Last Friday, China’s supreme court issued its third judicial interpretation on the application of China Marriage Law, further clarifying rules in dividing marital properties on divorce.離婚( li2 hun)

In the past, when a couple got married, they shared each other’s property, which means when they got divorced, the wife, or the husband had the right to claim half of the property. But under the new marriage law, real property 不動產(bu2 dong4 chan3) that is registered under the name of one spouse will not be deemed as community property 共有財產(gong4 you3 cai2 chan3).

The news has triggered tons of heated discussions, for or against the new law. Though it includes a lot of details, the general focus is on the different attitude towards marriage, which is, interpreted by many people, no longer a “protection” for the “financially disadvantaged” side, mostly considered as women.

As a result, a lot of attention has been paid to so-called 嫁入豪門(jia4 ru4 hao2 men2), marrying a wealthy man and entering an extremely rich family, which has been a lot of pretty girls’ dream or deemed as their “happy ending,” especially for those stars in the entertainment business. You can live a rich life in a rich family, happily or not. Or “unfortunately,” get divorced and leave taking half of the huge property. But now with the new law, marriage doesn’t seem to be such a good “investment” any longer.

In Jane Austen’s “Sense and Sensibility,” Lucy, on learning that the property that was supposed to be inherited by Edward, who she was to marry, was to go to his brother Robert, changed her mind at once and decided to marry Robert. In “Pride and Prejudice,” When the news that a wealthy bachelor Mr. Bingley had rented Netherfield Park was spread, all the moms with nubile daughters were exhilarated, considering Mr. Bingley “the rightful property of some one or other of their daughters.”

In ancient China when arranged marriage was practiced, marriage was never something personal. It was set to 延續香火(yan2 xu4 xiang huo3), to continue a family’s blood and heritage. Some poor parents might marry off their daughters as concubines of rich families for the sake of money. In Eileen Chang’s novel 怨女, Rouge of the North, the orphaned heroine was married off by her brother and sister-in-law to a husband with osteomalacia and spent a well-off but miserable life.

Marriage had never been based on romantic love until recently. For women of the past, who did not have the equal opportunity to get education as men and the equal opportunity to get financial independence, who had been deemed as nothing more than wives and mothers, marriage indeed was their “protection” or “indemnification.” 保障(bao3 zhang4)

In the past, wedding was usually held at dusk, 黃昏(huang2 hun). That’s why the word 婚 as in 結婚(jie2 hun), getting married, or 婚姻(hun yin), marriage, has昏 as its right half. But 昏 also means dizzy as in 頭昏(tou2 hun), or out of one’s mind as in昏了頭(hun le tou2) So we often jokingly say that only people who are out of their mind, or got “dizzy” by love will get married.

(TO BE CONTINUED)

「婚」了頭=「婚」了头 

離婚=离婚

不動產=不动产

共有財產=共有财产

嫁入豪門=嫁入豪门

延續香火=延续香火

十年河東，十年河西 (Proverb)

                                     

Previously I wrote an article with the title 債多不愁(zhai4 duo bu4 chou2) in May when the issue of raising America’s debt ceiling was reported on the paper. Now as it has been settled, it seems to have turned out that the whole world is worried about it. At least the financial markets have shown so.

Later China, as one of its big creditors, noted that the U.S. should quit its “addiction to borrowing.” 舉債成癮(ju3 zhai4 cheng2 yin3) Hearing this remark and remembering what I have read the other day that Goldman Sachs expects China's GDP to top America's by 2027. I thought to myself, “it really corresponds to what we often say, 十年河東，十年河西(shi2 nian2 he2 dong, shi2 nian2 he2 xi).

Twenty years ago when some Taiwanese businessmen went to China to invest, they received grand and wholehearted welcome. Chinese people embraced those investors, who created jobs and brought prosperity. These days Taiwan’s tourist business have opened their arms to the Chinese tourists, hoping their amazing consuming ability will benefit them.

This is what we call十年河東，十年河西. Here the 河, river, refers to the Yellow River, 黃河(huang2 he2), which is notorious for its shifting of path. Every time when a flood occurs and the Yellow River has a major change of its path, those who originally live on the west of the river might turn out to living on the east of it. Such a situation is extended to refer to a change of a person’s or a country’s conditions. Twenty years ago, could a businessman from Taipei have predicted how “poor” he will feel himself to be in Shanghai twenty years later?

Another similar expression is 風水輪流轉(feng shui3 lun2 lie2 zhuan3), The table has turned. I think many of you have heard of the term Feng shui風水, which literally means wind and water. Some people believe it is related to your luck. 輪流is taking turns. 轉means to turn or spin.

I’m no expert in economics or finance. But I’ve noticed Chinese or Taiwanese, compared with Americans or Westerners, are more in the habit of saving money for a rainy day. Some people say perhaps it has to do with our history. For thousands of years we’ve learned that there could be wars or natural disasters anytime. Plus the fact that our social welfare system has not been so advanced as the western countries. We’ve been taught to 量入為出(liang4 ru4 wei2 chu), to keep both ends meet, since we were young. Spend only 7 or 8 dollars if you make 10.

I read a report that in 2008, Taiwan had the top saving rate for three consecutive years. I think that’s because most of Taiwanese have the notion of 未雨綢繆(wei4 yu3 chou2 mou2). The meaning of the idiom refers to a kind of bird that will fix its nest before it starts to rain.

Some people, unfortunately, can’t make their both ends meet. They have to borrow to live. They are spending their “future” money. In that case, we’ll say they are 寅食卯糧(yin2 shi2 mao3 liang2). 寅、卯are two of the twelve Earthly Branches, 地支(di4 zhi), which is a Chinese system of reckoning time. 寅is followed by卯. If you’re eating 卯year’s food in the year of寅, you’re eating the food of your future.

I have no intention to comment on any political or economic conditions of any country, which is way beyond my knowledge. But as a person, if he has to keep borrowing to pay for his old debts, that would be what we call飲鴆止渴(yin3 zhen zhi3 ke3), drinking poison to quench your thirst. Perhaps the only solution will be 開源(kai yuan2), to find new ways to earn money, and 節流(jie2 liu2), to save money.

十年河東，十年河西=十年河东，十年河西

債多不愁=债多不愁

風水輪流轉=风水轮流转

量入為出=量入为出

未雨綢繆=未雨绸缪

寅食卯糧=寅食卯粮

飲鴆止渴=饮鸩止渴

開源節流=开源节流

Sweet potato (Food)

If you ask a Taiwanese what crop can represent Taiwan, possibly he will choose sweet potatoes 蕃薯(fan shu3) , or also named地瓜(di4 gua). Why?

        sweet potato 

 (from fm4715/魯獅 flickr.com)          

Taiwan
(from yfps.tpc.edu.tw )

  

Well, first of all, the map of Taiwan is shaped like an erect sweet potato. Second, the sweet potato is tough, full of vitality and easily planted, which hardly needs any care. It will survive even when cut into pieces. Recalling Taiwan’s history of the past century, you’ll know why.

Before we moved to Taichung, I put a shooting sweet potato that was supposed to be cooked to the earth in my little backyard. Every other few days I got a dish of 蕃薯葉(fan shu yie4), sweet potato vege on my dinning table. It’s very safe cause no chemical is needed when growing it.

The word 番(fan) or 蕃is used to refer to those non-indigenous crops, such as 蕃茄(fan qie2), tomato. It is said sweep potatoes have been introduced from the south America by the Spanish.

During the Japanese-ruling era (1895-1945), sweep potatoes had been the staple food of Taiwanese people. Though Taiwan produced rice itself, the crops were mostly sent to Japan. People who broke their backs planting rice ended up eating little of their produce. What was put on their table was mostly sweet potatoes that were dried and shredded. Some elders have told me that they hated to eat sweet potatoes because they’d been fed up with them when they were young.  

Another peer of mine once told me that she kind of felt reluctant to eat蕃薯葉because it used to be called 豬菜(zhu cai4), pig’s vege. Being a city child, I’ve never had the experience of what some of my peers had as a kid. They had to chop up the leaves of sweet potatoes to feed pigs. That’s why it was called豬菜in the past.

Who could predict that this “pig’s vege” later would be considered a healthy food and consumed a lot by the modern people? It’s the same with 蕃薯, which used to be the poor’s staple.

I once read that Taiwanese called themselves 蕃薯仔during the Japanese-ruling era to distinguish themselves from the Koreans, who were also colonized by Japan then. It was not only because of the shape of this island, but also the perseverance spirit and vitality it symbolized.

After 1949 when Chiang Kai Shek 蔣介石 led his troops to Taiwan from China, those soldiers from China were called 芋仔, taros in the South Min Dialect as a contrast of 蕃薯仔. Later as they grew older, the word “old” 老(lao3) has been added as老芋仔. Two names for crops have now become labels for people from different places.

The Beatles has a song “Let It Be.” In Taiwanese we have a proverb that conveys a similar notion, which goes in the South Min Dialect as 時到時來擔，無米再煮番薯湯, Do not anticipate troubles and worry too much. You can at least cook sweet potato soup when running out of rice.

So when you see online the name 蕃薯藤(fan shu3 teng2), sweet potato vine as an entrance website, you certainly know its origin.

蕃薯葉=蕃薯叶

豬菜=猪菜

蔣介石=蒋介石

時到時來擔，無米再煮番薯湯=时到时来担，无米再煮番薯汤

答案 (Music)

Here I am sitting at my desk staring at my computer. It’s about time that I posted something on my blog. I have some topics to talk about, but my mind has failed me like a crashed computer, with messy codes flashing and rumbling in it.

Ever since I invited two of my college classmates to my new place and chatted last week, I’ve been in a bit of nostalgic 懷舊(huai2 jiu4) mood. I started to look for songs of my college days when I log on to Youtube.

When I was in college, besides those prevalent English pop songs, I only listened to music written by 李泰祥(li3 tai4 xiang2) with modern poetry as lyrics. I love them till today. Well, I may as well call it a lazy day and introduce you a song, a very short modern poem.

The title of the poem/song is答案(da2 an4), the answer, by the poet 羅青(luo2 qing) and the singer, 齊豫(qi2 yu4)

天上的星星，
(tian shang4 de xing xing)
為何像人群一般的擁擠呢？
(wei4 he2 xiang4 ren2 qun2 yi4 ban de yong3 ji3 ne)
地上的人們，
(di4 shang4 de ren2 men2)
為何又像星星一樣的疏遠？
(wei4 je2 you4 xiang4 xing xing yi2 yang4 de shu yuan3)

Why are the stars in the sky
So crowded like people?
And why are people on the ground
So alienated and faraway like stars?

My new place is on the top two floors of a building, with half of the top as a garden, where we can lie in the chair and watch the stars above. When it’s clear we do see a lot of stars. (And hear the croaking of frogs raised by my next-door neighbor!) I wonder if I can get my “answer” by watching those stars.

You can hear the song here:
 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=51yuTGncItA&feature=related

懷舊=怀旧

羅青=罗青

齊豫=齐豫

擁擠=拥挤: crowded

疏遠=疏远: alienated

矮冬瓜 (Food)

Summer in Taiwan is hot and humid. The scorching sun makes people dehydrated, craving for something that can quench their thirst and cool them off. The cold drink shops that stand around almost every corner of the street can prove what I have just said. No wonder in Taiwanese we had a saying that went as “The best way to get rich is to sell ice/cold drink.” (And the second best, to be a doctor.)

Before the emergence of the modern cold drinks such as pearl milk tea 珍珠奶茶(zhen zhu nai3 cha2), a traditional popular cold drink would be 冬瓜茶(dong gua cha2), which is made from , 冬瓜(dong gua), winter melon.

冬瓜 (from vegoo.net)

It is also called “white gourd” and is eaten as a vegetable. Simmered for hours with sugar and water, it turns to a drink, 冬瓜茶. For busy modern women who do not have the time to cook it from scratch, they can get a冬瓜茶磚(dong gua cha2 zhuan) , a “brick” of dried winter melon with sugar. Boil it with water, you get a pot of冬瓜茶in fifteen minutes or so.

冬瓜茶磚  (from blog.hetai.com.tw )

Short people are often called矮冬瓜(ai3 dong gua),short winter melon. It doesn’t seem fair to relate winter melon to shorties. Compared with other melons such as luffa or cucumber, winter melons actually are bigger. They are bigger but seem “stouter.” Perhaps that’s why we have the term  

矮冬瓜.        

Winter melon is good to eat in summer. (But strangely, it is called “winter” melon.) It is urinative and “reduce the internal heat.” 降火氣(jiang4 huo3 qi4). Usually we’ll cook it with some ginger to balance because it is catalogued under the “cold” food.

In my previous April writing “Thousand-year egg,壞蛋?” I talked about some egg-related terms such as 笨蛋(ben4 dan4)，傻蛋(sha3 dan4). Similarly we have some “melon-related” terms. For example, 傻瓜(sha3 gua), a foolish “melon,” means the same as傻蛋, a fool. 笨瓜(ben4 gua) is also similar to笨蛋. Just replace the word蛋 “egg” with 瓜“melon,” you’ll get a term with similar meaning. Funny we have a term 呆瓜(dai gua), a “foolish melon” referring to a fool, but we don’t say 呆蛋(dai dan4)

Some ancient wise man advised us not to bend down to put on shoes in a melon farm, and not to adjust your hat under a plum tree. If you do so, people would think you’re stealing melons or plums. Accordingly a wise man should avoid acts that could cause others’ doubts or negative assumptions. Thus we get an idiom 瓜田李下(gua tian2 li3 xia4), (in) a melon farm or under the plum tree.

For example, your son is taking a selection exam for a position, but you’re a member of the committee in charge. What should you do? You’d better withdraw from the committee to avoid being suspected that you’ll pull the strings. You should 避瓜田李下之嫌(bi4 gua tian2 li3 xia4 zhi xian2), avoid being suspected.

茶磚=茶砖     

降火氣=降火气

壞蛋=坏蛋