We’re in the third week of our #ChineseChallenge and it now gets very exciting. This week, my words are quite random (again), but listen — one of them is actually so basic that we tend to ignore it!
But why did I add a familiar word to the list?
Hey, listen. Yes, the word is “listen” — and there’s more meaning to it if we consider its traditional character that has a whopping 22 strokes! But before we go to that, let’s run down through the other words of this week, starting with…
July 15: 信心 (xìnxīn, adj. “be confident” or n. “confidence”) – Given to me by my Chinese teacher when he asked me to describe my experience of taking the HSK 3 exam. I told him I was confident to get a passing score of 180. Quite big-headed, huh? Actually, the exam is difficult though I just have a feeling that somehow I will pass. Somehow. I don’t know. Well, I’m very hopeful!
July 16: 赞助 (zànzhù, v. “to sponsor”) – This is a technical word related to our community cookbook project, but it doesn’t hurt to know this, right? On this day, I finished several sponsorship plans for that project and I got intrigued how locals find benefactors.
July 17: 飞行 (fēixíng, n. “flight”) – I was invited to a dinner by Rommel, our Kusina ni Kabayan co-volunteer who will fly to the US together with his wife, Aileen. Rommel said they will be taking a long-haul flight soon, so this may be the last time (for now, this year?) that they will see us. We have had good times together at our community events, and these would have not happened without his and Aileen’s salesmanship. I wish you both a safe journey, and of course, enjoy your time in the US!
July 18: 剧巨幕 (jù jù mù, n. “drama theater”) – I went to a meeting with a potential sponsor and her office is close to the Beijing Chaoyang Drama Theater, whose facade uses the characters 剧巨幕. Upon checking on Pleco and Google Translate, no such a word exists so I guess these characters are somewhat a shortened form of something. If taken character by character, that word group means “drama/musical”, “huge”, and “tent” or “curtain”.
July 19: 总统 (zǒnɡtǒnɡ, n. “president”) – Actually, my word for this day was supposed to be 群主 (qún zhǔ, “group leader”), which refers to WeChat group administrators. I got a message from someone who wants to be added to my Blogging in Beijing group. But when I went to my tailor later in the afternoon, he asked out of nowhere about 总统. Since I didn’t know this word at first, I responded “I don’t know” in Chinese, much to his surprise. Then he blurted out the syllables, “dù tè ěr tè“, and of course, everyone knows him. The tailor went on and explained in Chinese how much he likes President Duterte and how much he hates Duterte’s predecessor, Benigno Aquino III. Oh well, I went to my tailor to have my pants fixed, not to talk about politics.
July 20: 倾心交谈 (qīnɡxīn jiāotán, n. “heart-to-heart talk”) – I had a dinner meeting with Ann, another Kusina co-volunteer, in Wangfujing. We talked about several things in life during a smoggy night… who cares about your lungs if you can laugh your heart out?
July 21: 聽 (tīnɡ, v. “to listen”) – This is the focus of this week’s Chinese Challenge. Tīnɡ is 听 in simplified Chinese, using the 口 kǒu, “mouth” radical and 斤 jīn, “ax”. But this word has a lot of meaning in its traditional form. At the Mass, the priest talked about the Biblical story of the sisters Mary and Martha of Bethany, with the latter asking Jesus to tell her sister to help with the preparations that had to be made. The priest focused on the liturgical interpretation of the story as “listen to the word of God in spite of all stresses and distractions in life.” But what made the homily more interesting was the priest’s explanation of the idea of “listening” in the context of the Chinese language.
From the photo above, the traditional character for “listening” has six characters:
– 耳 ěr, “ear”
– 王 wánɡ, “king”
– 十
There are 22 strokes in the character 聽 and there are various explanations to the placement of each component. One site interprets it as
“If you listen with your ear when you come before the king, it is equivalent in value to having ten eyes to understand his one heart.”
Another says,
“In listening, one does not only have to use the ears; one also has to use the eyes to make eye contact and use the heart to fully understand the subject. One listens with a concentration of the mind.”
Another site explains,
“Hearing the words through our ear is the most important part of the listening process,” and that “ten eyes suggest a great level of attentiveness and readiness to take heed of what’s being communicated” while the bottom characters “tell us that if we listen in this way, with our ears, mind, eyes, and heart, we can become of one heart.”
The right group of components is also found in the character 德 dé, “morals”, used in the words 恩德 ēndé, “kindness”, 积德 jīdé, “to do good (deeds)” or “to give to charity”, and 品德 pǐndé, “integrity” or “moral character”, as well as the idiom 同心同德 tónɡxīn-tónɡdé “to be of one heart and one mind”.
And to make things more exciting, my name, when directly transliterated into Chinese, is 阿曼德 āmàndé, which uses the very same 德! How cool is that, right?
So there you have it! I truly enjoyed writing this week’s challenge. How about your words? Share ’em with everyone! week’s
See my previous #ChineseChallenge entries here.
Photo: Spencer Selover via Pexels, GIPHY