Tag: china

the unwritten rules of chinese culture

“… cultural interpretation is a key business skill, as your writer points out. of course, that’s easier said than done. i have studied english for more than a decade, but I still become lost in some situations.

one time i attended a housewarming party held by a foreign friend. when asked whether i wanted a second helping of food, i replied politely in the traditional chinese way: “no, thanks” which actually means “yes, i do, but just a little“. needless to add, i went home hungry, and i’m sure many foreign businessmen have gone home “hungry” too due to miscommunication.

and so, when in china, it would be wise to “ask twice” when discussing matters of import. after all, for chinese, “beating around the bush” is a form of politeness, one that saves the face. “

spotted on a letter to the editor of a local magazine.

Post author By ana
Post date February 20, 2008
1 Comment on the unwritten rules of chinese culture

in china photography

anita na china . com

anitanachina.com é um projecto novo: uma foto por dia durante o ano do rato, para ajudar a mostrar a (nossa) vida na china nos dias que correm. vem na sequência das muitas vezes que nos fizeram a pergunta “como é a china?”, e da vontade de a mostrar, de forma mais coerente e explicada, aos amigos e família.

é ao mesmo tempo um exercício fotográfico (para me obrigar a saltar da cadeira e ir fotografar) e uma maneira de me obrigar a escrever em português – tarefa complicada nos dias que correm.

o nome surgiu de um comentário no flickr, pela joana. :)

anitanachina.com is a new project: a photo a day for the year of the rat, to help portray our daily life in china.
it’s a photographic exercise, but at the same time, it’s written in portuguese because i miss writing in my mother tongue (a task that is becoming increasingly difficult). english readers should find it quite easy to navigate though.

the name “anita na china”, literally “anita in china” is a play with some portuguese child books that used to feature a character, anita, discovering the world around her: anita in the train, anita goes to the farm, anita in the theater, etc. the idea for the name was given to me in a flickr photo comment, by joana. :)

in china

and on the 5th day…

… of ~~christmas~~ chinese new year, it’s the “god of fortune and wealth” birthday. to invite him in, what do you do? fireworks, of course.

because p.’s company wouldn’t pass the opportunity to attract wealth (and having fun firing some big artillery), we were invited to join the party on the boss’ house rooftop, still covered in snow.

for a couple of hours or so, we marvelled at the view from the 40th floor: everywhere we looked, fireworks and strings of firecrackers exploded loudly and bubbles of color filled the air. it’s one of those sights that really takes your breath away. (but if you dared to close you eyes for a second, i reckon the noise around you and smell of gunpowder would certainly prompt imaginary visions of armageddon)

anyway, all in all, it was fun. i don’t know how to efficiently photograph fireworks (especially with frozen hands and toes) so these are my humble tries.

you can find a lot of better pictures of it on flickr.

in china

so how was the chinese new year?

in a word: crazy. or genious. :D
i don’t know how to describe it, since i had never seen anything like this before. on time blog, someone wrote “…roughly the same as Christmas Eve (with the pyrotechnics of July 4 thrown in.)”

it was like being inside a computer game where you conquer and win everything and then at the end of the level everything erupts in joy and fireworks. something like that. surreal yet inexplicably beautiful, putting any fireworks show i’ve ever seem to shame. the city just exploded, and for hours wherever i looked there were fireworks, or strings of firecrackers on the floor!

here’s how it sounded like from our little window on the 31st floor: chinese new year.

crazy, right? as if you were in the middle of an air raid. i bet that if china had been attacked at midnight, no one would notice.

(and we can still hear them sparsely, now and then. yesterday we had to interrupt a movie we were watching more than a couple of times because we couldn’t hear anything with the noise… )

Post author By ana
Post date February 9, 2008
3 Comments on so how was the chinese new year?

in china

新年快乐! happy new year!

before it all gets too crazy (china is about to turn into a “warzone”, with all the firecrackers), i just want to quickly say that a lot has been going on, through ups and downs, busy productivity sprints and mellow lazy days – hence the lack of regular posting as of lately.

today is a special day though: it’s the last day of the year of the pig. china is entering the year of the rat, with noisy fireworks celebrations. it’s their way to send out the old year and invite the new one in.

i like new years, whether chinese or not, so here’s wishing you all a healthy & wealthy year of the rat!

ps – i need to go outside. all this new year fireworks is making me itchy! :)