*golf clap*

Villagers in eastern China has been forced by the country's unbending bureaucracy to change their family name as the character is so rare it cannot be typed.

Apparently they're not forcing grammar on journalists.

You might, but it wouldn't make any sense.

Sybarite: DamnYankees: Can anyone find a picture of this character? I'm interested.

www.theepochtimes.com

Three pancakes floating over a top hat.

Weaver95: /obscure.

The Cthulhu Mythos is never obscure anywhere.

Microsoft Word includes the characters 'S' 'h' 'a' and 'n'.

hitchin' bed line, subby!

/shake a tower
//shake a tit

Kudos, Subby.
+1

Sources says the new names will be determined by throwing pots and pans down the stairs...

/ugh

Yes, that's a +1 for subby.

Hot drinks? Try the shanty down the road.

I do not normally golf clap

But Subby .... that deserves a golf clap

Sybarite: DamnYankees: Can anyone find a picture of this character? I'm interested.

It's an ass hat?

I don't speak, much less read, any of the languages that use writing systems in any way derived from Chinese writing, but it really does make me wonder sometimes.

Japan has to limit the number of characters names can be written in, to avoid an explosion of rare characters being used in names. And in Japanese (I don't know about Chinese), a given character can be pronounced many different ways, leading to a real problem of not knowing how to pronounce someone's name. Japan has sort-of addressed this issue with Rubi script, which are little phonetic characters next to the main character to give hints as to pronunciation...

I remember reading an essay about a guy who was getting his doctorate in Mandarin. He said that in no other language on Earth could you have studied a language for six years and not be able to read a novel without a dictionary. A big problem is that if you've never seen a given character before, there's nothing you can really do to determine how it is pronounced, and very little you can do to guess its meaning. He contrasts this with any of the alphabetically-written languages, where you can at least guess the pronunciation, if not the meaning of previously unseen words.

So, anybody out there learn to read Chinese as an adult? Is it as hard as this guy seems to make it sound?

I wouldn't normally do this, but I want to see if anyone gets it.

Next up, people named Biang.

I might NOT say that.

-1, subby.

Boooo!

AntiNorm: How do you type "squiggle squiggle line line line" anyway?

First thing I thought of...

ChadM89: I might NOT say that.

-1, subby.

Boooo!

If the strongest objection to subby's submission is purely speculative in nature (you MIGHT not), he doesn't deserve to get a -1. You would need to DEFINITELY NOT SAY THAT to warrant a -1. Its in Fark's bylaws somewhere.

BadKarma86: I wouldn't normally do this, but I want to see if anyone gets it.

I'll answer your photo with a photo or two...

The name might be 单 which is usually "dan", which means "single", but pronounced "shan" when it's used as a surname (which is rare). So, when using the Pinyin romanization system to input it, "shan" won't bring it up.

Then again, it sounds like it could be a character that doesn't have a standardized electronic version.

Amazing how they have no way of representing "Shan" on a computer, and yet I know from the article that the name that can't be represented on a computer is Shan. If only somebody could come up with a way to write Shan using readily available characters, they wouldn't have this predicament...

/Shan
//ShanShan

sboyle1020: Sources says the new names will be determined by throwing pots forks and pans spoons down the stairs...

/ugh

FTFU

You know who ELSE made people change their names for the purpose of convenient data entry?



(what, did you think I was going to say the other guy?)

Lord Dimwit: So, anybody out there learn to read Chinese as an adult? Is it as hard as this guy seems to make it sound?

Yep, it's tough. The point about not knowing pronunciation is important; I read the Harry Potter series in Chinese and spent a lot of time with the dictionary... even when I knew what an unfamiliar word was by context (e.g. Harry puts on his 斗篷 and turns invisible... ah hah, 斗篷 means cloak!), I would still have to look up how to say it.

Plus it's filled with made-up fantasy words that don't even make sense in English. But at least it wasn't another tragic/depressing Cultural Revolution autobiography.

It's spelled "Shan" but it's pronounced "Throat-Warbler Mangrove".

Xian of the Dead?

Lord Dimwit: I don't speak, much less read, any of the languages that use writing systems in any way derived from Chinese writing, but it really does make me wonder sometimes.

Japan has to limit the number of characters names can be written in, to avoid an explosion of rare characters being used in names. And in Japanese (I don't know about Chinese), a given character can be pronounced many different ways, leading to a real problem of not knowing how to pronounce someone's name. Japan has sort-of addressed this issue with Rubi script, which are little phonetic characters next to the main character to give hints as to pronunciation...

I remember reading an essay about a guy who was getting his doctorate in Mandarin. He said that in no other language on Earth could you have studied a language for six years and not be able to read a novel without a dictionary. A big problem is that if you've never seen a given character before, there's nothing you can really do to determine how it is pronounced, and very little you can do to guess its meaning. He contrasts this with any of the alphabetically-written languages, where you can at least guess the pronunciation, if not the meaning of previously unseen words.

So, anybody out there learn to read Chinese as an adult? Is it as hard as this guy seems to make it sound?

The complex characters (used less frequently) are usually made up of subparts which can give clues as to their meaning.

The traditional example of this is 'trouble' which is two characters for 'female' under a 'roof'. I vaguely remember the character (in chinese or japanese) for rape is 3 women under a roof... Which I suppose says a lot.

But long story short, Japanese is a royal pain in the ass.

krelborne: *golf clap*

Second. Best headline I've seen all week.

lukelightning: Yep, it's tough. The point about not knowing pronunciation is important; I read the Harry Potter series in Chinese and spent a lot of time with the dictionary... even when I knew what an unfamiliar word was by context (e.g. Harry puts on his 斗篷 and turns invisible... ah hah, 斗篷 means cloak!), I would still have to look up how to say it.

Related question: how does a Chinese dictionary work in terms of ordering, if you don't know the name of the symbol? I remember the Beijing Olympics coverage saying something about ordering countries by the number of strokes in their Chinese names, are dictionaries the same thing?

Lord Dimwit: I don't speak, much less read, any of the languages that use writing systems in any way derived from Chinese writing, but it really does make me wonder sometimes.

Japan has to limit the number of characters names can be written in, to avoid an explosion of rare characters being used in names. And in Japanese (I don't know about Chinese), a given character can be pronounced many different ways, leading to a real problem of not knowing how to pronounce someone's name. Japan has sort-of addressed this issue with Rubi script, which are little phonetic characters next to the main character to give hints as to pronunciation...

I remember reading an essay about a guy who was getting his doctorate in Mandarin. He said that in no other language on Earth could you have studied a language for six years and not be able to read a novel without a dictionary. A big problem is that if you've never seen a given character before, there's nothing you can really do to determine how it is pronounced, and very little you can do to guess its meaning. He contrasts this with any of the alphabetically-written languages, where you can at least guess the pronunciation, if not the meaning of previously unseen words.

So, anybody out there learn to read Chinese as an adult? Is it as hard as this guy seems to make it sound?

Yes. Even my Chinese friends complain about how farking difficult and totally god damned arbitrary their written system is.

Here's an "interesting" piece of information: China has a long history of mandated name changes. When someone became Emperor, it was taboo to use the Emperor's name, so people had to change their names.

Oh, and the word for fan in Chinese is pronounced "shan".