Embarrassing mix-ups
Chinese is one of those languages where just getting a tone wrong can result in something completely different from what you’d intended, although every language has certain words that are very easy to mix up. The worst is when you are absolutely convinced that you are using the correct word, but it turns out that you just asked for something ridiculous.
The other day, I was telling my teacher that it was OK to eat steak rare, as long as it’s fresh (鲜, xian with a high tone). Unfortunately, it sounded like I was saying 咸 (xian with a rising tone, meaning ’salty’). Obviously, it’s easy to be misunderstood in these situations (and I need to be more careful with my pronunciation).
My teacher then told me a story (I think to make me feel better about my slip up) about a mistake that one of her other students had made. Apparently he was convinced that the word for aubergine (茄子 qié zi) was 孩子 (hái zi, meaning child). So, when he went in to a restaurant and asked for fried child with his rice, the proprietors were so freaked out about a big foreigner asking for something barbaric that they told him they were closed and pushed him out the door. It wasn’t until he wondered why my teacher had been playing with an aubergine (when it was really a child) that he realised his error.
What was your most hilarious (or embarrassing) mix up?
3 Comments »
RSS feed for comments on this post · TrackBack URI
Entries RSS 
Aaron G Myers said,
March 28, 2011 @ 8:40 am
Okay here’s mine. I was in Tijuana, Mexico talking to a principle at a local school whose husband was a pastor of a church I was working with. I was telling the teacher that I would call her husband later that day. She just looked at me with this funny look. My friend Travis snickered, but said nothing! I said it again. And again. Then it struck me. I had been saying - “lavar” - to wash instead of “llamar” - to call. So after telling this lady I was going to “wash her husband” several times, I turned beat red as I clarified and apologized and said that I would in fact “call” him. And my friend Travis said not a word to help me out of that one.
doug said,
April 4, 2011 @ 10:50 am
I remember the time you told a little scottish lass that her pants were nice. When a person says pants in Scotland, they are referring to their underwear. The poor girl was shocked.
Wendy said,
April 18, 2011 @ 3:33 am
I hope you mean you and not me.