Amusing false friends (Sorry it's a long article. But if you have time, please correct it)
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I visited Taiwan with my friend last week. It was our first time to visit an Asian city outside Japan. So at first we were a little worried about the language and the cultural differences. But in the end, we found ourselves enjoyed there very much.
We visited many famous places in Taipei, Tamsui and Jiufen. We enjoyed various Taiwanese cuisine and aromatic Oolong tea (I bought a Chinese style teapot so I can enjoy Oolong tea in a Chinese style at home!). And Taiwanese people were so amicable and helpful to us.
But for me, the most fascinating thing there was the fact that I could understand written Chinese really well. I hadn't studied Chinese so I had no idea how to pronounce each kanji in a Chinese way but just looking at the letters, I could fairly clearly understand what each sentence meant as far as simple sentences are concerned, such as the subtitles on TV and the signboards.
To some extent, I think this is a similar feeling to which English speakers experience when they see a sentence in a Latin-based language. You can't quite work out the pronunciation (or perhaps pronunciation is not problematic among European languages...) and the very exact meanings, but you can have a rough idea of what it says because there is a similar word or at least an affix in your language which was derived from Latin. As for the reason why I could understand Chinese sentences, it's the same. It ascribes to the fact that there are thousands of words which we borrowed from Chinese over the centuries. So in spite of that Japanese language is not directly derived from Chinese, We can understand written Chinese quite well.
Until the Middle Ages, China was the center of the latest technology and culture all around Asia. So Chinese played the same linguistic role as the one which Latin used to play in Europe in the Middle Ages giving a big influence to the other languages spoken around them.
But this time in Taiwan, I found rather confusing but amusing "false friends" between Chinese and Japanese too.
①汽車
I saw signboards saying 汽車 hundreds of times in Taipei. In Japanese, this means "steam-engine train." But in Chinese, it seems to mean "car."
②飯店
This is a well-known example of false friends in Japan. It looks like "restaurant" to Japanese speakers because of the signification of the two letters. But in fact it means "hotel" in Chinese. I think in Chinese 飯店 is used because its sound is similar to the English word "hotel." Even knowing this, how many times nearly tricked we were while walking in the city!
③先生
This is "teacher" in Japanese. But in Chinese, this word is used to address a man politely. In English, it's "Mr." I think I had heard of this before but who can remember this when the news clip was about a clever kid who had invented a highly technogical equipment and just after that an adult man appeared with a subtitle saying "先生" and talked about probably how clever the kid was??? He really couldn't look anything else but the kid's 先生(in Japanese). (if the whole story was not only my imagination...my listening conprehension in Chinese is zero.)
We really liked Taiwanese people's welcoming and friendly nature, so we'll definitely go to Taiwan again! This time, all I could say in Chinese was "Xie Xie" and "Ni hao" but by the next time I'll visit there, I'd like to learn more Chinese phrases!! And from now on, between my friend and me, a convenience store will be called 便利商店 and an elevator will be called 電梯. We particulary liked these two Chinese translations.
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"False Friend" is a linguistic word. When a word is used in two languages but the meaning of it is different between the two, it's called "false friend." For example, history(EN) and histoire(FR), 汽車(CH) and 汽車(JP).
We visited many famous places in Taipei, Tamsui and Jiufen. We enjoyed various Taiwanese cuisine and aromatic Oolong tea (I bought a Chinese style teapot so I can enjoy Oolong tea in a Chinese style at home!). And Taiwanese people were so amicable and helpful to us.
But for me, the most fascinating thing there was the fact that I could understand written Chinese really well. I hadn't studied Chinese so I had no idea how to pronounce each kanji in a Chinese way but just looking at the letters, I could fairly clearly understand what each sentence meant as far as simple sentences are concerned, such as the subtitles on TV and the signboards.
To some extent, I think this is a similar feeling to which English speakers experience when they see a sentence in a Latin-based language. You can't quite work out the pronunciation (or perhaps pronunciation is not problematic among European languages...) and the very exact meanings, but you can have a rough idea of what it says because there is a similar word or at least an affix in your language which was derived from Latin. As for the reason why I could understand Chinese sentences, it's the same. It ascribes to the fact that there are thousands of words which we borrowed from Chinese over the centuries. So in spite of that Japanese language is not directly derived from Chinese, We can understand written Chinese quite well.
Until the Middle Ages, China was the center of the latest technology and culture all around Asia. So Chinese played the same linguistic role as the one which Latin used to play in Europe in the Middle Ages giving a big influence to the other languages spoken around them.
But this time in Taiwan, I found rather confusing but amusing "false friends" between Chinese and Japanese too.
①汽車
I saw signboards saying 汽車 hundreds of times in Taipei. In Japanese, this means "steam-engine train." But in Chinese, it seems to mean "car."
②飯店
This is a well-known example of false friends in Japan. It looks like "restaurant" to Japanese speakers because of the signification of the two letters. But in fact it means "hotel" in Chinese. I think in Chinese 飯店 is used because its sound is similar to the English word "hotel." Even knowing this, how many times nearly tricked we were while walking in the city!
③先生
This is "teacher" in Japanese. But in Chinese, this word is used to address a man politely. In English, it's "Mr." I think I had heard of this before but who can remember this when the news clip was about a clever kid who had invented a highly technogical equipment and just after that an adult man appeared with a subtitle saying "先生" and talked about probably how clever the kid was??? He really couldn't look anything else but the kid's 先生(in Japanese). (if the whole story was not only my imagination...my listening conprehension in Chinese is zero.)
We really liked Taiwanese people's welcoming and friendly nature, so we'll definitely go to Taiwan again! This time, all I could say in Chinese was "Xie Xie" and "Ni hao" but by the next time I'll visit there, I'd like to learn more Chinese phrases!! And from now on, between my friend and me, a convenience store will be called 便利商店 and an elevator will be called 電梯. We particulary liked these two Chinese translations.
****************************
"False Friend" is a linguistic word. When a word is used in two languages but the meaning of it is different between the two, it's called "false friend." For example, history(EN) and histoire(FR), 汽車(CH) and 汽車(JP).



Very interesting :)
Your English is quite fluent. I'm very impressed. You must've worked very very hard at it. Congrats! :)
But in the end, we found that we enjoyed it (there) very much.
"we found ourselves enjoyed there very much" is clear but just a bit strangely worded.
keep it up!!
haha 手紙... another funny example of false friends ^^
I'm sorry I'd always like to leave you a comment on your entry but the level of your French articles is too high for me...:(
The level of my french articles are too high? Haha, I know you write French much better than I do ;-) If my articles are not easy to understand for you, it's because of my poor ability to write articles in French :-<
Amusing "False Friends"(Sorry it's a long article. But if you have time, please correct it)
It's a good habit to capitalize titles. Although blog conventions throw all rules out the window.
False Friends is also an unfamiliar term to most, so without quotes, it initially sounds like your English is wrong, when in fact, I'm just ignorant :)
We enjoyed various a variety of Taiwanese cuisine and aromatic Oolong tea. (I also bought a Chinese-style teapot so I can enjoy Oolong tea prepared in a Chinese style at home!).
These are style preferences. As your English writing is at a very high level, there is little grammar to correct, but you may want to start learning better style, like us native speakers have to :)
I also have the feeling that "various" doesn't work well with uncountable nouns like "cuisine".
And Taiwanese people were also so amicable and helpful to us.
But, for me, the most fascinating thing there was the fact that I could understand written Chinese really well.
I hadn't studied Chinese, so I had no idea how to pronounce each kanji in a Chinese way. But just by looking at the letters, I could fairly clearly understand what each sentence meant as far as simple sentences are concerned, such as the subtitles on TV and the signboards.
You can't quite work out their pronunciation (or perhaps pronunciation is not problematic among European languages...) and or their very exact meanings, but you can have a rough idea of what it says because there is a similar word or at least an affix in your language, which was derived from Latin.
As for the This is the same reason why I could can understand Chinese sentences, it's the same.
You should avoid using conjunctions and large topic markers so often. I sometimes see very, very long 何々何々何々何々は。。。 sentences in Japanese too and that drives me crazy. But perhaps it works better in Japanese. It's an odd style in English.
Also, using "could" implies impossibility or a conditional "if". Here, you either can understand, or you can't.
It ascribes to the fact that there are thousands of words which we have borrowed from Chinese over the centuries.
So, in spite of the fact that the Japanese language is not directly derived from Chinese, we can understand written Chinese quite well.
Until the Middle Ages, China was the center of Asia in the latest technology and culture all around Asia.
you can't be "in the center" and "all around" at the same time
So Because of this, Chinese played the same linguistic role as the one in which Latin did used to play in Europe in during the Middle Ages. They both giving a big greatly influenced to the other languages spoken around them.
You seem to like using "so" at the beginning of sentences. Do you mean だから?従って?そのため? "so" is a pretty weak conjunction, and is also used as a "pause" word like あのう。。。 It is better to use within a sentence then at the beginning.
Other corrections are mostly style. Simple past works much better and more cleanly.
But, this time in Taiwan, I found some rather confusing but amusing "false friends" between Chinese and Japanese too.
This part would be a good opportunity to use the definition of false friends, then use the term.
I think in Chinese 飯店 is used because its sound is similar to the English word "hotel." Even knowing this, I can't count how many times we were nearly tricked while we were while walking in the city!
The exclamation "How......!" only works well in shorter, simple statements. And even then, is rarely used these days.
In English, it's "Mr." I think. I had heard of this before, but who can remember? this There was a when the news clip was about a clever kid who had invented a highly technological machine, equipment and just after that, an adult man appeared with a subtitle saying "先生". and I think he talked about probably how clever the kid was???
He really couldn't look anything else but the kid's 先生(in Japanese).
I can't understand your meaning here. He did or didn't look like a teacher in the news clip?
(if But this whole story was not may only be my imagination...
my listening comprehension in Chinese is zero.)
We really liked the Taiwanese people's welcoming and friendly nature, so we'll definitely go to Taiwan again!
This time, all I could say in Chinese was "Xie Xie" and "Ni hao" but by the next time I'll visit there, I'd like to learn more Chinese phrases by the next time I visit!!
You also have humbled me. I had never heard of "false friends" and thought you were confused and meant "false cognates"! Thanks to you and the internet, I am now a better linguist!
Your English writing level is obviously very advanced. You write like I did in my early college years... however, just like me, you make very, very long run-on sentences and include unnecessary parentheses. May I guess you are/were a graduate student? I have seen many graduate papers with this kind of technical, long-sentence flow. I mimicked it for awhile, but it's not easy or fun to read.
As for me, who knows Japanese and Chinese and lives in Taiwan, I think you'd be surprised how much "Chinese" you think you know, but are "false friends". You may have misunderstood those subtitles more than you realize! I find perhaps only 20% of common Chinese words mean exactly the same thing in Japanese *and are used in a similar way.*
This correction took me a long time, so I hope it is helpful to you. I haven't written Japanese in a very long time, but I hope you are a 嚴格的老師 (厳しい先生)when I do :).
Tonight I'm tired so I don't think I can write a lot in English (no matter how long I've been studying it and how much fluently I can speak in it, it's still not my first languge. So sometimes it's just too tiring particulary when you're tired, isn't it???) I'm sorry if this sentence is not making sense ...
I'm happy to meet a linguist here on this website like you. Thank you very much.