“Ren shan ren hai!” “Dui bu dui?”

This is what we say to people when we squish on the subway. They laugh and wonder where we are from. When we reply “meiguoren (american), then they are not surprised by our cheesiness. “Ren shan ren hai” is one of those cool Chinese idioms meaning, “Mountains of people, seas of people!” “Dui bu dui?” basically means, “Right?” The equivalent of this in English would be like if a Chinese person walked up to an American and said with a grin, “Birds of a feather, stick together! Am I right?!” Yup. I would laugh too.

We have fun fitting on crowded subways and buses. It’s hard to explain what it’s like to barely fit on a di tie (subway) without your leg getting caught in the door and you’re smashed against a bunch of Asians, and you smile at them, and say, “Ni hao ma?” (how are you?) And then you strike up a conversation. Once in a while they want nothing to do with you, but most of the time, they are surprised and thrilled at the opportunity to liao tiar (chat) with a wai guo ren (foreigner) that is speaking han yu (Chinese). Excuse me for my hen duo de(a lot) of Chinglish. It seems so normal after a long day of studying. Anyway, there has been so many funny moments using the Beijing transportation, but I thought I would tell three funny experiences…

#1 Can I sit on your lap?

Sometimes, the subway can be jerky. There I was, holding onto the pole on the subway, talking with my peng you (friends), when all of the sudden the subway slowed down slightly. Somehow, I flew backward, grabbing onto the pole for dear life, swung around and landed on some lady’s lap. I quickly jumped up and said, “Dui bu qi, bu hao yi si” (sorry, excuse me) The lady glared at me and did not look happy. So I turned around. Five seconds later, I turned back and said a second time, “Dui bu qi.” She still had that same friendly glare, staring right at me. So I turned away again and that was the end of that. Guess I should ask next time I want to sit on someone’s lap.

#2 “I like it.”

   (Disclaimer: This happened a couple of weeks ago. Hopefully if this conversation were to occur again, I would be able to understand what the person is saying to me)

So, there I was talking to this guy on the subway. He had kind of a strong accent that was hard to understand. My friend Adam, who served a mission in Taiwan, Chinese speaking, was listening to my conversation to see how well I would do on my own. He later told me what the translation was of our conversation and what the guy said to me. This how it went. We will call the guy on the subway “Joe.”

Me: Have you eaten Beijing Duck? (Beijing is famous for their duck)

Joe: Oh, yeah it’s really good.

Me: Do you like it?

Joe: Yeah, have you tried it?

Me: I like it.

Joe: But have you tried it?

Me: I like it.

Joe: Ok, so you’ve tried it?

Me: (I just shook my head at this point, because I had no idea why he kept asking me what I thought was, “Do you like it?” And I also realized that I didn’t know why I was telling him that I liked it, because I actually haven’t even tried it. We got to our stop, and Adam had told me that he wasn’t asking me if I liked it.)

#3 “Your Chinese is very good”

This conversation took place with Josh and a Chinese guy on the subway, but Adam and I were listening. We’ll call the guy he was talking to “Ted.” So Ted and Josh were talking for a short time and Josh was able to carry on a conversation with him pretty well, and then…

Ted: Ni shuo han yu shuo de hen hao. (Your Chinese is very good)

Josh: huh?

Ted: Ni shuo han yu shuo de hen hao. (Your Chinese is very good)

Josh: Wo ting bu dong. (I don’t understand)

My friends who have served foreign speaking missions have told me that the motto when you don’t understand what someone is saying to you is, “When in doubt, bear your testimony.” Here, I’ve found that the motto is, “When in doubt, say “bu cuo” (not bad) and ask another question.” You can never go wrong.

现在我跟我的朋友去吃晚饭因为我饿死了.好吧!