棋子 (song)
Chinese singer
Faye Wang has a song entitled “棋子 (qi2 zi3),” Chess, where she compares herself to a
chess, who is stuck and manipulated by something stronger than herself, be it a
lover or fate or God.
象棋 (xiang4 qi2),
or Chinese Chess, is a strategy board game for two players. 象means elephant; 棋,
chess. Why elephant? I really don’t know. (Some people express their ideas
about this online but I’d rather skip the part I’m not sure.) The chess board
looks like this:
Chess
of different color, red and blue (or black), represent the two sides of the
game, each of the chess with a name slightly different from their counterparts.
For example, the “king” of the red chess is named 帥 (shuai4); while 將 (jiang4) for the blue. Both mean general, the highest ranking commander in
the army. (But帥哥(shuai4 ge) refers to handsome guy.) The two sides confronts with each other with a
border zone 楚河(chu3 he2)、漢界(han4 jie4) between them. The side that captures the king of the other side
wins. That’s why we often use楚河漢界to
refer to the boundary.
The
lowest rank of the chess are 兵(bing) for the red side or 卒(zu2), the blue side. They both mean
soldiers. We often use 無名小卒 (wu2 ming2 xiao3 zhu2) to refer to small potatoes, or
nobody. In this song, it uses 不起眼的小兵 (bu4 qi3 yian3 de xiao3
bing)
to mean the same. (In your eyes I’m not the unique general but an obscure soldier.)
In
Xiangqi’s rule, 兵 and 卒can only move forwards, not backwards. Once
they cross the borderline楚河漢界, they
can move both forwards and aside, but still not backwards. That’s why when we
are a condition that allows us only to go forwards and there’s no backing down,
we’ll use過河卒子(guo4 he2 zu2 zi3) to describe ourselves. We’ll say “Now I’m a 過河卒子and all I can do is go forwards without
looking back.”
Another
example of such a “chess expression” is飛象過河 (fei xiang4
guo4 he2),
referring to those rule breakers who cross the line. Because when playing
Xiangqi, 象 of the blue side or 相of the red side, can’t cross 楚河漢界. So if an “elephant” flies across the river, he’s
breaking the rule.
There are not only
rules for the player, but also rules for the watchers. Sometimes it’s hard for
some people to keep quiet and let the players play the game on their own. They
just can’t help expressing their opinions and interrupting the game. So for the
watchers, we say 觀棋不語真君子(guan qi2 bu4 yu3 zhen jun zi3), when watching a game, those
who are silent are really gentlemen. Here 君子means gentleman.
What
follows it is 起手無回大丈夫(qi3 shou3 wu2 hui2 da4 zhang4 fu), those who won’t change their moves once
done are real men. This is a regulation for the players. For some hesitant
players, they might sometimes regret their moves and would like to move back
and do it again, which is considered improper and despicable. In Wong’s song,
she uses 舉手無回 (ju3 shou3 wu2 hui2). It’s the same idea.
Not
every Chinese play Xiangqi, but they do use these related expressions in their
lives.
Here
you can hear the song with lyrics.
楚河漢界=楚河汉界
無名小卒=无名小卒
過河卒子=过河卒子
飛象過河=飞象过河
觀棋不語真君子=观棋不语真君子
起手無回大丈夫=起手无回大丈夫
舉手無回=举手无回
