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So tonight the restaurant I work in had a function where we served a little over 100 Chinese tourists, who I think were on some sort of all inclusive holiday to London where they were being guided around by Chinese speakers.
Part of this trip included a meal in our restaurant, which I guess was supposed to be a traditional English meal or something like that. Unfortunately the boss overruled our head chef, so they were served the traditional English dinner of minestrone soup, steak and chips, with chocolate vanilla and strawberry ice cream as the desert.
This function highlighted the massive cultural differences between China and England (and I guess the rest of the west), and this along with the frustration of most of them not being able to communicate with our staff very well gave me the impression that most of the customers didn't enjoy themselves, which is unfortunate.
At the end of the night we found this note on a napkin.
![[image loading]](http://i.imgur.com/tdBWg.jpg)
Maybe its a glowing review of the night or maybe its a shopping list accidentally left on the table, but now I have to know, and since I don't know anyone with good enough Chinese to translate it for me I figured I'd turn to the website that we all know would form the perfect society if we could all come together and populate a small piece of land. So if someone would please be kind enough to translate this for me it would, at least, make my week. Otherwise its just going to eat at me.
Also while I've, hopefully, got the attention of a person well versed in Chinese society I have some questions.
-Quite a few people weren't fans of the minestrone and steak, is this just because its different to food in China or could something be done to make the customers enjoy them more (we have another group on Sunday).
-Apparently a couple of people were much happier with the steak once they had English mustard (but then again the manager that said that is a bit of an ignorant asshole so I don't know), is meat in China generally spicier?
-And finally, apparently people were expecting their next course as soon as they'd finished, is this how the culture in China works, compared to how in England you wait for the table to finish before the next course is served, or were people just hungry?
Thanks for your help.
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Oh, crap - now I _have_ to know as well. Someone please help the guy out, I can't go to bed until this mystery is solved.
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Those characters are so messy lol. I'm not that well versed in Chinese culture, but I think that the Chinese typically don't eat large portions of meat so eating a steak could be sort of weird for some of them.
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So I asked my dad and he says the writing is REALLY messy. For someone that is really well versed in Chinese, its not very often that he says that. Pretty much it is a poem or a journal of some kind talking about the food he ate (red wine in the first column), then relating it to something else?? Didn't really get what he said either, but in the last column he talks about the year of the dragon. He said it wasn't written well and didn't really mean anything -.-
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I wont be satisfied until we have a character for character translation that is 100% accurate!!!
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On February 10 2012 09:29 GenesisX wrote:
So I asked my dad and he says the writing is REALLY messy. For someone that is really well versed in Chinese, its not very often that he says that. Pretty much it is a poem or a journal of some kind talking about the food he ate (red wine in the first column), then relating it to something else?? Didn't really get what he said either, but in the last column he talks about the year of the dragon. He said it wasn't written well and didn't really mean anything -.-
Sounds like the guy writing it had a little too much red wine. :D
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It is a poem, here is the translation:
First column: 10 thousands killometers away in February of the year of the dragon.
Second column: flying snow embraces the journey to London.
Third column: the western world creates the feeling of homesickness.
Fourth column: red wine, the year in the west, and the drink that speaks feelings.
Basically, whoever wrote this misses home and wanted to express his feelings while he's in London England. I translated as accurate as possible. But there is no way to translate Chinese to English without losing significant amount of meaning, that's why it doesn't sound as good after translation.
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On February 10 2012 09:29 GenesisX wrote:
So I asked my dad and he says the writing is REALLY messy. For someone that is really well versed in Chinese, its not very often that he says that. Pretty much it is a poem or a journal of some kind talking about the food he ate (red wine in the first column), then relating it to something else?? Didn't really get what he said either, but in the last column he talks about the year of the dragon. He said it wasn't written well and didn't really mean anything -.-
First column is actually the left most, your dad is still reading from the old Chinese way - right to left. If you read it right to left, it doesn't make sense logically and the ending clearly is the 4th column the right most.
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United States2822 Posts
On February 10 2012 09:16 Eufouria wrote:
Also while I've, hopefully, got the attention of a person well versed in Chinese society I have some questions.
-Quite a few people weren't fans of the minestrone and steak, is this just because its different to food in China or could something be done to make the customers enjoy them more (we have another group on Sunday).
-Apparently a couple of people were much happier with the steak once they had English mustard (but then again the manager that said that is a bit of an ignorant asshole so I don't know), is meat in China generally spicier?
-And finally, apparently people were expecting their next course as soon as they'd finished, is this how the culture in China works, compared to how in England you wait for the table to finish before the next course is served, or were people just hungry?
Thanks for your help.
While I can't really make heads or tails of that chicken scratch (my grasp of Chinese is definitely not to the point where I can gander what that means) I can hopefully help with some of the questions you have.
I can see why the Chinese customers wouldn't be huge fans of minestrone soup. Soups in China are not nearly as thick as most minestrone soups are, and minestrone (at least in my experience) has a very strong broth. A lot of Chinese soups (depending on where in the country they're from) tend to have weaker flavors in the broth that serve to highlight more what is contained in the soup. As far as steak is concerned, Chinese people do tend to heavily season and condiment their meat dishes (again, preference depends a lot on where in China they're from as regional cuisines differ greatly from region to region).
And Chinese dining culture doesn't really revolve around "courses" that much. Many meals, especially larger meals in China, are done in a "grab what you want" style. Usually, most of the courses are laid out in the table in front of them, with each person having their own bowl of rice. They pick and choose out of the main courses in front of them to accompany the rice they have, so it's understandable that they expected to always have some sort of food in front of them.
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On February 10 2012 09:54 Tryndamere wrote:
It is a poem, here is the translation:
First column: 10 thousands killometers away in February of the year of the dragon.
Second column: flying snow embraces the journey to London.
Third column: the western world creates the feeling of homesick.
Fourth column: red wine, the year in the west, and the drink that speaks feelings.
Basically, whoever wrote this misses home and wanted to express his feelings while he's in London England. I translated as accurate as possible. But there is no way to translate Chinese to English without losing significant amount of meaning, that's why it doesn't sound as good after translation.
this is a pretty accurate translation
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Also while I've, hopefully, got the attention of a person well versed in Chinese society I have some questions.
-Quite a few people weren't fans of the minestrone and steak, is this just because its different to food in China or could something be done to make the customers enjoy them more (we have another group on Sunday).
Chinese cuisine is very different from the western cuisine. A lot of emphasis is put on the taste, marinade and sauce. They don't really care if it's healthy, they just care about the taste. So for steak and minestrone, they are just too generic, lack of taste. The soup itself is probably inferior to what they eat at home and the steak is just bland piece of meat.
-Apparently a couple of people were much happier with the steak once they had English mustard (but then again the manager that said that is a bit of an ignorant asshole so I don't know), is meat in China generally spicier?
Like what I mentioned earlier, it is all about the seasoning, sauce, marinade. The mustard is probably a sauce for them, just like they add soy sauce to sushi to enrich the taste.
-And finally, apparently people were expecting their next course as soon as they'd finished, is this how the culture in China works, compared to how in England you wait for the table to finish before the next course is served, or were people just hungry?
If you ever go to a Chinese restaurant, they send out shit really quickly because most of the stuff are stir fried and that's why it is fast or the food is always being cooked. The downside is that the service really sucks because they put more emphasis on food less emphasis on service.
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Ya know......for a start you could actually rotate the pic 90 degrees clockwise before uploading it so that we can read it more easily......instead I had to turn my entire monitor 90 degrees............ -.-"
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On February 10 2012 10:47 Clazziquai10 wrote:
Ya know......for a start you could actually rotate the pic 90 degrees clockwise before uploading it so that we can read it more easily......instead I had to turn my entire monitor 90 degrees............ -.-"
Can't you just do that in any image manipulating program, like paint?
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On February 10 2012 10:49 Mr. Wiggles wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2012 10:47 Clazziquai10 wrote:
Ya know......for a start you could actually rotate the pic 90 degrees clockwise before uploading it so that we can read it more easily......instead I had to turn my entire monitor 90 degrees............ -.-" Can't you just do that in any image manipulating program, like paint?
That's what I did. Clazz I thought you are Korean... wait, you post count doesn't match with that other Clazz. Similar names perhaps?
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On February 10 2012 09:54 Tryndamere wrote:
It is a poem, here is the translation:
First column: 10 thousands killometers away in February of the year of the dragon.
Second column: flying snow embraces the journey to London.
Third column: the western world creates the feeling of homesickness.
Fourth column: red wine, the year in the west, and the drink that speaks feelings.
Basically, whoever wrote this misses home and wanted to express his feelings while he's in London England. I translated as accurate as possible. But there is no way to translate Chinese to English without losing significant amount of meaning, that's why it doesn't sound as good after translation.
IMO, that's not a bad poem! (albeit translated)
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On February 10 2012 09:54 Tryndamere wrote:
It is a poem, here is the translation:
First column: 10 thousands killometers away in February of the year of the dragon.
Second column: flying snow embraces the journey to London.
Third column: the western world creates the feeling of homesickness.
Fourth column: red wine, the year in the west, and the drink that speaks feelings.
Basically, whoever wrote this misses home and wanted to express his feelings while he's in London England. I translated as accurate as possible. But there is no way to translate Chinese to English without losing significant amount of meaning, that's why it doesn't sound as good after translation.
can you provide the chinese text please? :D
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On February 10 2012 12:34 forelmashi wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2012 09:54 Tryndamere wrote:
It is a poem, here is the translation:
First column: 10 thousands killometers away in February of the year of the dragon.
Second column: flying snow embraces the journey to London.
Third column: the western world creates the feeling of homesickness.
Fourth column: red wine, the year in the west, and the drink that speaks feelings.
Basically, whoever wrote this misses home and wanted to express his feelings while he's in London England. I translated as accurate as possible. But there is no way to translate Chinese to English without losing significant amount of meaning, that's why it doesn't sound as good after translation. can you provide the chinese text please? :D
Look at the pic lol... I can't type it out here, don't have the software to type Chinese.
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my chinese isn't good enough for that  owell
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Your boss overruled your head chef for a menu like that? Sounds terrible
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On February 10 2012 09:16 Eufouria wrote:
Also while I've, hopefully, got the attention of a person well versed in Chinese society I have some questions.
-Quite a few people weren't fans of the minestrone and steak, is this just because its different to food in China or could something be done to make the customers enjoy them more (we have another group on Sunday).
-Apparently a couple of people were much happier with the steak once they had English mustard (but then again the manager that said that is a bit of an ignorant asshole so I don't know), is meat in China generally spicier?
-And finally, apparently people were expecting their next course as soon as they'd finished, is this how the culture in China works, compared to how in England you wait for the table to finish before the next course is served, or were people just hungry?
Thanks for your help.
1) different tastes
2) asians generally like meat "flavored", they don't like just the taste of meat (aka steak)
3) traditionally all the food comes out at once so you can pick and grab at the dishes. they may not be familiar with western dining tradition.
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Minestrone is a bad choice, since we have our own soups and it tastes very different. Personally, I really dislike the taste, although I only had it a few times and i am sure the ones I've tastes were not that well made.
As for steak, I found that generally chinese people prefer a more "well-done" steak. They generally (GENERALLY, so not everyone), dislike pinkness and blood in their meat. Obviously I am not saying you should cook all the steaks well-done, but maybe cook it so when they order "medium", make it actually "medium-well", and so on.
And yes, we do generally have sauces or seasoning with our meat. I am not sure about China, but Taiwanese steak houses generally serves the steak with either a mushroom based sauce or a black pepper sauce.
Also, yea they hate waiting. So they do expect the food to be out pretty fast.
edit: clarification
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At first I couldn't make out the characters, but after reading the translation, I could puzzle it out. It's a pretty good poem, considering that it was written during a meal 
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Nice poem. Pretty awesome person to go to a new country, eat a meal and come up with something like that to leave behind.
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what a storybook like encounter :D
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On February 10 2012 09:54 Tryndamere wrote:
It is a poem, here is the translation:
First column: 10 thousands killometers away in February of the year of the dragon.
Second column: flying snow embraces the journey to London.
Third column: the western world creates the feeling of homesickness.
Fourth column: red wine, the year in the west, and the drink that speaks feelings.
Basically, whoever wrote this misses home and wanted to express his feelings while he's in London England. I translated as accurate as possible. But there is no way to translate Chinese to English without losing significant amount of meaning, that's why it doesn't sound as good after translation.
Thank you so much! That's actually a really nice poem, I was actually expecting a message about how terrible the night had been but instead it was a little glimpse into the feelings of the mystery person. Hopefully he gets home soon.
On February 10 2012 10:47 Clazziquai10 wrote:
Ya know......for a start you could actually rotate the pic 90 degrees clockwise before uploading it so that we can read it more easily......instead I had to turn my entire monitor 90 degrees............ -.-"
Tbh I wasn't actually 100% sure which way round the writing was, I was pretty sure but I figured 90 degrees wrong is better than possibly 180 degrees wrong.
On February 10 2012 12:56 forelmashi wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2012 09:16 Eufouria wrote:
Also while I've, hopefully, got the attention of a person well versed in Chinese society I have some questions.
-Quite a few people weren't fans of the minestrone and steak, is this just because its different to food in China or could something be done to make the customers enjoy them more (we have another group on Sunday).
-Apparently a couple of people were much happier with the steak once they had English mustard (but then again the manager that said that is a bit of an ignorant asshole so I don't know), is meat in China generally spicier?
-And finally, apparently people were expecting their next course as soon as they'd finished, is this how the culture in China works, compared to how in England you wait for the table to finish before the next course is served, or were people just hungry?
Thanks for your help. 1) different tastes 2) asians generally like meat "flavored", they don't like just the taste of meat (aka steak) 3) traditionally all the food comes out at once so you can pick and grab at the dishes. they may not be familiar with western dining tradition.
On February 10 2012 13:05 chennis wrote:
Minestrone is a bad choice, since we have our own soups and it tastes very different. Personally, I really dislike the taste, although I only had it a few times and i am sure the ones I've tastes were not that well made.
As for steak, I found that generally chinese people prefer a more "well-done" steak. They generally (GENERALLY, so not everyone), dislike pinkness and blood in their meat. Obviously I am not saying you should cook all the steaks well-done, but maybe cook it so when they order "medium", make it actually "medium-well", and so on.
And yes, we do generally have sauces or seasoning with our meat. I am not sure about China, but Taiwanese steak houses generally serves the steak with either a mushroom based sauce or a black pepper sauce.
Also, yea they hate waiting. So they do expect the food to be out pretty fast.
edit: clarification
Ok I see. Tbh this menu is actually really bad, considering its supposed to be traditional English when all the food is French and Italian. If it was English food and they didn't like it, then that's because English food isn't for them.
I don't know what we can do about the minestrone, but I'm going to pass on the message about cooking the meat more and maybe serving some sauces like mustard, peppercorn and maybe some red wine jus as well.
Thank you so much Team Liquid. Hopefully the mystery Chinese Wordsworth does enjoy the rest of his trip to London, despite the weather and the homesickness.
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The writing is not messy, it's actually written in stylish caligraphy. The person who left this behind is probably a fairly old man. Tryndamere's translation is pretty accurate.
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On February 10 2012 09:55 Tryndamere wrote:Show nested quote +On February 10 2012 09:29 GenesisX wrote:
So I asked my dad and he says the writing is REALLY messy. For someone that is really well versed in Chinese, its not very often that he says that. Pretty much it is a poem or a journal of some kind talking about the food he ate (red wine in the first column), then relating it to something else?? Didn't really get what he said either, but in the last column he talks about the year of the dragon. He said it wasn't written well and didn't really mean anything -.- First column is actually the left most, your dad is still reading from the old Chinese way - right to left. If you read it right to left, it doesn't make sense logically and the ending clearly is the 4th column the right most.
No he read it top down...
and yeah your translation pretty much correct.
I asked more people from my school today and they said whoever wrote it misses their home... and its the year of the dragon. Lol.
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Wow, so many CN readers. Anyone want to help me start a TeSL translation project?
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There are some guessing here and there but
龙年正月万里外
瑞雪纷飞伦敦来
西城更惜故乡情
红酒西餐叙情怀
btw he used the simplified version of 餐
Yeah the translation previously were accurate. Pretty cool poem.
@Primadog, you sure people will care? I'm happy to translate if you think it's worth it, just PM the articles/stuff you want translated? That said I'm in China so not Youtube/Twitch/Blip/FB/Twitter/so on so if everything is on there... TT
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On February 11 2012 12:56 Mobius_1 wrote:
There are some guessing here and there but
龙年正月万里外
瑞雪纷飞伦敦来
西城更惜故乡情
红酒西餐叙情怀
btw he used the simplified version of 餐
Yeah the translation previously were accurate. Pretty cool poem.
@Primadog, you sure people will care? I'm happy to translate if you think it's worth it, just PM the articles/stuff you want translated? That said I'm in China so not Youtube/Twitch/Blip/FB/Twitter/so on so if everything is on there... TT
I see, then the last part should be changed to red wine, western "meal" instead of world.
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wait the OP is a bit confusing
It says they were supposed to be served a traditional english meal, but instead they got a traditional english dinner? Sorry what's the difference? (tho i think what you are saying is basically the head chef was gonna cook something he felt the chinese would like, but the boss disagreed?)
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Wow, this actually brightened my day. This whole situation is beautifully human.
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I know this is an old blog, but that's not Chinese; it's Japanese. Why didn't whoever translated this mention that? o.o
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On August 26 2012 12:51 EsX_Raptor wrote:
I know this is an old blog, but that's not Chinese; it's Japanese. Why didn't whoever translated this mention that? o.o
what?
it's chinese...
although someone who knows japanese would probably be able to piece together the meaning if they had really good kanji.
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17053 Posts
On August 26 2012 12:51 EsX_Raptor wrote:
I know this is an old blog, but that's not Chinese; it's Japanese. Why didn't whoever translated this mention that? o.o
It's 100% Chinese; dunno what you're smoking.
EDIT Source: I'm Chinese.
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On August 26 2012 12:51 EsX_Raptor wrote:
I know this is an old blog, but that's not Chinese; it's Japanese. Why didn't whoever translated this mention that? o.o
0_0 its chinese and its actually pretty simple to tell chinese from jap and from korean. the pic is also on its side
granted there are some chinese/japanese characters that look the same but the style of the characters are all chinese, so if there were some Japanese styled characters along with Chinese it could be jap, but there are no Japanese characters
turn 90 degrees clockwise
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On August 26 2012 15:00 ieatkids5 wrote:Show nested quote +On August 26 2012 12:51 EsX_Raptor wrote:
I know this is an old blog, but that's not Chinese; it's Japanese. Why didn't whoever translated this mention that? o.o what? it's chinese... although someone who knows japanese would probably be able to piece together the meaning if they had really good kanji.
I guess it's remotely possible assuming that the Japanese is writing the entire note using Kanji, maybe some sort of poem?
However it's very rare to see Japanese do this though, also the average Japanese person almost never use calligraphic Kanji in hand writings.
The absence of hiragana and katakana is very telling me thinks.
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As late as I am to the party...
That was a great poem with a great story
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Interesting napkin, funny bump.
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Oh, really? For a second there, I thought there were hiragana characters in that note. For example:
![[image loading]](http://i50.tinypic.com/izw3nd.png) ![[image loading]](http://i49.tinypic.com/34smfr6.png) ![[image loading]](http://i45.tinypic.com/2zpuk9g.png)
I thought they were ね, を, and ろ, respectively.
Anyway, it's good to know that it's in Chinese; I was beginning to go crazy because I couldn't understand the assumed Japanese then (student).
It's a beautiful poem, too!
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On August 27 2012 01:59 EsX_Raptor wrote:Oh, really? For a second there, I thought there were hiragana characters in that note. For example: I thought they were ね, を, and ろ, respectively. Anyway, it's good to know that it's in Chinese; I was beginning to go crazy because I couldn't understand the assumed Japanese then (student). It's a beautiful poem, too!
Ahh gotcha. I'm not knowledgeable about the japanese language and its history, but i think hiragana were derived from what certain chinese characters look like when written quickly in a cursive style.
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17053 Posts
On August 27 2012 01:59 EsX_Raptor wrote:Oh, really? For a second there, I thought there were hiragana characters in that note. For example: I thought they were ね, を, and ろ, respectively. Anyway, it's good to know that it's in Chinese; I was beginning to go crazy because I couldn't understand the assumed Japanese then (student). It's a beautiful poem, too!
Haha those are actually Chinese characters written in cursive. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caoshu
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EPT
