These days in Taiwan
For the past decade, Taiwan
But those criminals get to become extremely rich! And the punishment is so ridiculously mild. The bitter Taiwanese thus jokingly put the blame on the presidents’ names, the incumbent’s and his predecessor’s. If you combine President Ma’s surname 馬 and part of the former president Chen’s name扁, you get the word 騙, deceive, swindle. No wonder we have so many scam gang 詐騙集團(zha4 pian4 ji2 tuan2) these days.
So you think you’ve heard too much about them to get cheated, but there’s always something new that they get even the well-educated like professors or police officers. This is really what we always say 道高一尺，魔高一丈(dao4 gao yi4 chi3, mo2 gao yi2 zhang4), literally meaning the diao (law) is one Chi (1/3 meter) high, but the devil is one Zhang (10 chi) tall.
Recently there’s something new that’s often heard. (Actually not so “new” at all, but was not so “organized” and permeating.) It is mainly aimed at men, lonely men who are desperate for women or who are especially “sympathetic,” to be exact. Those victims will get phone calls from girls they’ve never met, who sometimes pretend to be, say, a classmate from elementary school. They would ask the victims to go to the bars where they work to consume and cheat them out of money with all kinds of excuses, such as they (or their old mothers) get sick or they are fired. . . etc after they’ve won those men’s affection with their fake promises.
We call this kind of bar or tavern 剝皮酒店(buo pi2 jiu3 dian4). 剝皮means to skin. The way you get cheated out of money is like getting skinned. Here the 酒店does not refer to the hotel. It’s more like an expensive bar with “working girls” for men to drink and party.
Sometimes you might feel that you’re being exploited. For example, you boss takes part of you pay for the insurance. And after that, you have to pay the tax. Under the circumstances, you may say you’re like a bull that has been skinned several times, or several layers of your skin have been ripped off. 一條牛剝好幾層皮(yi4 tiao2 niu2 buo hao3 ji3 ceng2 pi2)I guess this is probably why 剝皮is used to refer to this kind of bar.
One night after reading a piece of news about how a man had wired about twenty thousands US dollars to a girl that he’d never even gotten to meet, I talked a little bit about this with my students. I said I couldn’t believe how credulous a man could be! Some students replied that they were not surprised at all. Men, in their words, think with their “lower half.” 下半身思考(xia4 ban4 shen si kao3). Another expression of theirs is that their “sperms rush to their brains.” 精蟲衝腦(jing chong chong nao3)
Joke as it is, there’s some point there. You wouldn’t have gotten cheated had you not coveted anything. Just as what a Xiehouyu goes, 姜太公釣魚—願者上鉤(jiang tai4 gong diao4 yu2, yuan4 zhe3 shang4 gou)
姜太公(jiang tai4 gong) or 姜子牙(Jiang Zi3 ya2) is a Chinese historical and legendary figure, a sage and military strategist about 3,000 years ago. He once worked for the Shang government as a low-ranking official, but resigned later as the government was full of corruption and people were having a hard time. He retreated by the Weishui River
As a recluse, Jiang often fished by the river in an exclusive way. He would use a long rod, a short line along with a “straight hook” to fish with his back to the river.
How could he get any fish this way? Thus comes the Xiehouyu mentioned. Only those who are willing jump at the bake. It’s translated as “Grand Duke Jiang fishes” in Wikipedia. It’s used to refer to the situation when someone puts his own head in the noose.
In fact Jiang did get his fish-- a big one. Later he was called upon by King Wen of Zhou to serve as prime minister. He fished in a seemingly unlikely way but got big fish, so do those girls from the scam gangs.
Moral--Think with your “upper half,” gentlemen! J
詐騙集團=诈骗集团
一條牛剝好幾層皮=一条牛剥好几层皮
精蟲衝腦=精虫冲脑
姜太公釣魚—願者上鉤=姜太公钓鱼—愿者上钩
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