Blow Wind Machine

To the mind of the Westerner, the Chinese language is inherently poetic. Its (modern) vocabulary is largely bi-syllabic, comprised of two characters with distinct meanings who when combined create a new idea. There are many words, generally newer, in which three or more characters all lend their individual meanings to create a larger idea. Some examples follow:

电话 (diànhuà) = “electric speak” = telephone
饭馆 (fànguăn) = “rice establishment” = restaurant
能力 (nénglì) = “can power” = ability
洗手间 (xĭ shŏu jiān) = “hand wash room” = bathroom

There are many, many more that do not conform to this rule of relative sense-making [why 小心 (tiny heart) means “be careful” or 东西 (east-west) means “thing” no one may ever know] but that’s a subject for another blog entry.

Strangely, the Chinese seem to be largely oblivious to the atomic building block nature of their language. Take for instance the scene that transpired a few mornings ago between myself and a couple Chinese girls. We were pointing to things around the room which we did not not know how to say in the opposite language. One thing neither of us knew was how to translate was hair dryer. They told me that it was called “chuī fēng jī.” In order to remember new words, I always think about the constituent characters and given the large number of homophones in Chinese, it’s always necessary to specify these as soon as you learn the new word. I knew the last two characters had to be 风机 or “wind machine” but I wasn’t sure about the chuī, so I asked which it was. One of the girls promptly explained, ignoring my previous deduction, that the machine was for drying hair. After several minutes of linguistic teeth-pulling I finally found that it was the chuī that means “blow.” Blow wind machine. Of course. It was so simple. But when I said this out loud, I was met with puzzled looks.

I’ve had situations like this several times. 香草 “fragrant grass” means vanilla, and 山东 “eastern mountain” is a place, but when I say this aloud, the Chinese think I’m being silly. They seem incapable of separating words into the individual meanings of their characters the vast majority of the time. Despite the fact that you won’t get much help from native speakers, I still recommend thinking of words in this way. I find it very helpful when trying to memorize characters, which I think I’m doing fairly quickly. I wonder if there are any aspects so seemingly obvious about English to which native speakers are systematically blind.