Wednesday, September 24, 2008

Turkish stars in the Arabic TV

Sorry for the delay, I am spending two weeks vacations in Morocco so my Chinese learning is rather slow. To shift direction, I want to talk today about some new stars in Morocco.

The first one is called Mohannad (Mohammad in Turkish), he is a TV star in Arabic world. Mohannad is handsome, very gentle with his wife. I heard stories that he made Arabic women go wild.

In fact, he is so popular that his pictures are banned in Saudi Arabia. He is so popular that his picture are next to pictures of Yasser Arafat in Palestine. You can always buy a cup or Tshirt with the face of Muhannad.. The divorce rate in the Arab world has increased since the broadcast of his programs.



The female star is called Lamiss. a cute Turkish girl and she is very trendy. In UAE, women are having the same hairstyle as Lamiss. In Syria, a tribe had a big ceremony when Lamiss, acting as a pregnant woman, gave birth.

A friend of my family fought with her husband because he said Mohannad is not a man. So she was upset and did not talk to him.

Tuesday, September 16, 2008

The Chinese Dragon

The dragon is a symbol of China. It is so embedded into the Chinese culture, that I had once asked my History teacher about its meaning..


And she checked her note and answered smilingly..
The dragon can have three meanings:
1- Dragon: The ancestor of all the Chinese people
Chinese grand grand father is the Dragon.
However, when I asked about my anestors, they did not know, but they knew it was not the dragon.

2- Dragon: Symbol of the Emperor in the feudal society
In fact, if a common person has a dragon symbil, that would be a majot violation, and he deserves to die.

3- Dragon: Symbol of Success
There is an old Chinese saying that all parents repeat: "Hope Son Becomes Dragon"


Uyghur food

My reader asked about how the Uyghur food looks like, and how it is different from the Arab food.

I don't cook, but I like to eat. So I can tell you a bit about the restaurant experience..


First, pork is not in the menu. This is big news as the Chinese cuisine is famous with its pork meals.




On the other side, every Uyghur restaurant, I have been to, serves beer, which was surprising.


In fact, the perfect meal is supposed to be beer + mutton skewer. I guess this is where East meets West (or rather far east meets middle east):
The Uyghur skewers are almost identical to the Turkish/Greek/Lebanese/Moroccan skewers, if you have some doubts, here are two pictures:






Monday, September 15, 2008

Uyghur language



As I don't read Chinese, I normally walk around Beijing with my eyes wide open to capture anything I can decipher.


One day, I saw a big restaurant poster with some Arabic writing "Islamic meals"

So I started investigating, and found out that one of the many languages in China, there is one called Uyghur, and their language uses the Arabic script:

I will keep scratching this surface slowly slowly..

The mooncake

During the last month, Chinese were joyfully eating and sharing nice little cakes called "moon cakes". They celebrated the mid autumn and the moon lady. But this tradition has a more interesting root:


The Mongols were controlling China 800 years ago. However, the Mongols were too oppressive, and Chinese were not happy. So the Chinese rebels had a plan.
Few days before the moon festival, the rebels distributed round small cakes to the other Chinese people. They claimed to celebrate the Emperor longetivity. When the Chinese people received the cake, they found a secret message to organize a rebellion again the Mongols on the moon festival day.

The Mongols were overthrown and the mooncake became a national tradition.

Saturday, September 13, 2008

The White Snake Lady

I just came back from the beautiful city of Hangzhou and everywhere I went, there was a talk about the white snake lady.. This is what I understood:

There was a snake that spent hundreds of years meditating, and slowly became more intelligent and gained other super powers (if you don't know what this means, read about immortality in China).

One day, the snake was moving around, and saw a handsome gentelman. The snake fell in love.

The snake then used its superpowers and morphed to a beautiful woman, and went to meet the man. The man fell in love with her, and they lived happily together.

The snake/woman quickly gained fame and respect in society. She was beautiful, warm-hearted and used her skills to cure people from diseases.

The monk, who was the teacher of the man, suspected that the woman was a monster. And the laws of heaven disapproved a marriage between animals and humans. So he prepared a magic drink to reverse the morphing (to get the woman to her original shape -> snake). The monk then captured the snake, and put it underneath a big building (pagoda).




In 1924, the immortals decided to pardon the woman snake, so they destroyed the pagoda then the whitesnake woman was free.


The Moon Lady

Tomorrow is a national holiday in China. We are celebrating the mid-autumn festival (or moon festival).
The celebrations started 3000 years ago. At that time 10 suns were turning around the earth. One day, the 10 suns aligned around the earth, and the temperature rose so much, that the harvest burned and people starved.

Then, a dude, Houyi, took his arch and shoot 9 suns.




Houyi became a hero and the king rewarded him with the a pill of immortality.
Houyi was in a serious relationship with this girl Changae. So he decided to save the pill for some other day.
Changae found the pill by accident, and ate it. She lost control of her superpowers and started flying. She did not stop till she reached the moon
Anyway, the girl lives in the moon now (some say that there is a rabbit there too), while the guy built a nice house in the sun and he goes to visit his girl once a year. And that is what we are celebrating next monday.

China launched its first lunar probe in 2007, and named it Chang'e; probably to rescue her.


Apollo 11 crew failed to find Chang'e back in 1969. This is a segment from a discussion they had with earth:


"Roger. Among the large headlines concerning Apollo this morning, there's one asking that you watch for a lovely girl with a big rabbit. An ancient legend says a beautiful Chinese girl called Chang-o has been living there for 4000 years. It seems she was banished to the Moon because she stole the pill of immortality from her husband. You might also look for her companion, a large Chinese rabbit, who is easy to spot since he is always standing on his hind feet in the shade of a cinnamon tree. The name of the rabbit is not reported.


Okay. We'll keep a close eye out for the bunny girl."


Friday, September 12, 2008

The Chinese Fox Spirit




As I explained in my previous post about Immortality in China, it is believed that all things are capable of acquiring human forms, magical powers, and immortality, provided that they receive sufficient super power.


The most famous example is the Fox Spirit. A fox with superpower traditionally changes its body to a woman of an extreme beauty. The woman/fox will then seduce men and take their power in order to get more superpower to achieve the ultimate immortality.





If you see a woman with 9 tails, she is probably a fix spirit.




This story is so common in Chinese culture, that if you describe a girl as "Fox Spirit ("狐狸精"), that would mean:"Very beautiful girl but she will take your energy.." or "a gold digger woman"




Thursday, September 11, 2008

Immortality in China

In the Chinese culture, immortality is a serious topic that has been researched for thousands of years. This creates a fantastic popular culture. For now, I will share with you what I learned. There is so much depth into this topic that I am really just about to discover the surface..




So you want to become immortal. You have a chance. In fact, everything has a chance to become immortal. A stone can become immortal; a tree can become immortal, humans too.




To become immortal, it may take few hundreds/thousands years and it goes through stages:







So a tree, for example, can reach some certain higher level, and hence some type of super power. The most notorious superpower is intelligence. The tree, for example, after thousands of years can learn to become intelligent, just like or better than humans.

Another famous superpower is morphing (change the physical appearance)




So the tree can, for example, take the shape of a human, if it likes.

In the next blogs, I will share with you some famous stories of animals who morphed into humans.

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

The Four Hot Chinese Chicks




沉鱼、落雁、闭月、羞花



Four hot Chinese chicks used their beauty to change the history and have their name eternal.


The first girl, XiShi, is so hot that the fish sink by looking at her face.



The second girl, Zhaojun, is so good, that flying birds fall down as they lose balance when they look at her.



The third girl, Diao Chan, makes the moon feel ugly and hides behind the clouds.



The last girl, Yang Guifei, makes the flowes feel ashamed in front of her.



Slowly, slowly, I will tell you about women in Chinese history.



Saturday, September 6, 2008

足球小將 Oliver y Benji الكابتن ماجد

الكابتن ماجد

Oliver y Benji

足球小將
Captain Tsubasa


Chinese Humour

Chinese people speak loudly and laugh loudly when they are confortable together. But their humour is not well understood by the foreigners. So they decided to learn about the Western humour to make the tourists have pleasant time in Beijing.

I met these two Chinese men in the streets of Beijing:





For those who are not familiar, this is a reference to Charlie Chaplin...



Chitchat

I had this discussion today:

- How big is your country?
- 30 millions
- Oh! 2 big cities? How many cities do you have in your country?
- I don’t know. Many cities..
- They should be very small cities.
- No, Morocco is big.
- Really? I keep thinking that when if somebody gets lost in your country, he will probably crosses the borders by mistake.

That was not supposed to be a joke...

Friday, September 5, 2008

Minarets


So much can be said about a country from the architecture of its minarets!







Ramadan in Beijing

One fifth of the human population of this planet are currently celebrating the holy month of Ramadan. I have celebrated Ramadan in different countries.

In Morocco, the government officially changes the working schedule, the people change their eating habits; most people fast but all enjoy delicious dinner feasts.

In Spain, Spaniards would recognize Ramadan, and frequently criticize the fasting as a backward practice. Then, they would start discussing the history of Spain starting from 1492.

In US, Americans would politely congratulate the Muslims for this month, and then ask if this is related to the holy war, Jihad.

In Kurdistan Iraq, last year the Kurdish Government allowed opening restaurants during day time on Ramadan, but requested to cover the windows. Christians, Yazidis and some Muslims can eat confortably now.

In Beijing, it is a different story. Most people do not know what is Ramadan. As most Chinese dont believe in God, the first question raised is not:

- Why do you fast?

- You can't even drink?

It is after all:

- Why do you need a religion?

Ibn Battouta in Hangzhou

Ibn Battouta (Ibn Batota, Ibn Batuta) is the name of a traveler back on the 14th century. He started his journey from Tanger (Tangier) and allegedly reached Beijing.
My secondary school back home (in Tanger) was called Ibn Battouta. The classical ferry from Tanger to Alegecias is named Ibn Battouta. But once I left Tanger, this name just disappeared from the common vocabulary.

As I was preparing for a trip to Hangzhou, I searched internet and discovered that Ibn Battouta was there about 700 years ago.
Back then, Ibn Battouta liked the silk, porcelain, and even the plums, watermelons, and huge chickens of Hangzhou. But he praised the artists and performers the most: "The Chinese are of all the peoples the most skillful in the arts." He was displeased with ""The Chinese themselves are infidels who worship idols and burn their dead like the Hindus... eat the flesh of swine and dogs, and sell it in their markets." ".
Hangzhou is about 10,000 Km away from Tanger.