Mandarin FAIL

[ausare]

こんなの天気いらない！
こんなのてんきいらない！
Kono tenki iranai!
(I) don't want this kind of weather!
—

It felt as if it wasn't too warm, but when I step outdoors, the meh-temperature was very conducive for sweating. Especially so because there was no wind at all. AT NIGHT. Seriously.

I went grocery shopping with my mother right after dinner just now and on the way home (or, the lift ride up to our house), we talked about SJ, my PE for my degree course, and my feeling indignant that he was letting his other students (my seniors) taking advantage of him.

(Long story. Short version? Senior suggested a leaving party for one of our lecturers who wouldn't be teaching them anymore and is going back to Australia before returning for next trimester. She dumped everything to him: grocery shopping, cooking, bringing everything to school... I got annoyed that she didn't offer to help and that he just went ahead doing everything anyway.)

So I was telling my mother that I'm annoyed that he let himself get taken advantage of. And she said (in Mandarin), "Maybe he just sees it as being at a losing end."

Wait, huh, what? Was she phrasing it as a somewhat good attribute of his? Because 'being at a losing end' (吃亏) is not good and is not opposed to 'being taken advantage of' (被占便宜) as a good virtue!

After much questioning-and-leading, I finally made her explain that what she meant was that he was not letting himself be bothered about all the work. Goodness. That (不介意) is not the same as 'letting himself be at a losing end'.

HONESTLY! She was always going on and on about how because I've studied in Taiwan for two and a half years and am half-Taiwanese that my Mandarin has to be better than any Singaporean. Yeah, well, make that to include you, dear mother, who is 100% Taiwanese yourself and is so rubbish at the only language you know that I'm constantly correcting your use of said language.

SERIOUSLY! RAWR!!!

(She still insisted that her use of that phrase was not incorrect. Kill me, please.)

So. I've started watching Black Books and IT IS BRILLIANT. Why didn't anyone tell me about this sitcom before? Dylan Moran as Bernard Black was hilarious in a crazy and annoying way by being both an old man with the common old people illness of being sick with the world and thinking that everyone owes him something and should also leave him the hell alone, and at the same time being a stubborn, childish teenager who refuses to pick up after himself and demands the world of everyone and that they should all leave him be. Brilliant, brilliant acting. And the humour? Was wow.

—
以上、Chii です。