Okay, I confess to laughing out loud on the subway this morning when I heard that a still-beating heart was going to be inserted into the cold, lifeless body of Forrest Gump. Well done.

Guys,

It's a short but stunning dialogue.

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com

@stratman1,

Well, I guess maybe you just met some "90后" or some girls trying to sound cute (although they are not). Those sentences/phrases are more like 网络用语. If people on the street speak this way, it's actually pretty strange and improper.

Also, haven't heard from you for a while, how's everything? :)

--Echo

echo@popupchinese.com

Hey Max,

Huh? This woman *told* you she was selling it to others for 80 RMB and then doubled the price for you when you asked? Even if you weren't wearing the exact same pair that behavior is totally ridiculous. Maybe she was just struggling with cognitive dissonance at having you talk to her in Chinese. There's also - quite seriously - the lead poisoning hypothesis. Chinese stats are off the charts.

For some reason as soon as I walked off I thought of Popup Chinese, a site for learning Chinese. While entirely fictional (I think!) their site features funny little dialogues in mandarin Chinese like the one above. My one is true though!

Awesome. I'll admit that yesterday's podcast was entirely fictional, but some of the stuff we record actually has happened. We change the names to protect the innocent, except for the ones involving Apple.

--dave

p.s. you can always give your blog some Pagerank love by wrapping links in any comments in HTML tags. Site supports basic HTML markup.

stratman1,

偶同意Echo滴观点。但似偶觉滴桑网滴时候则么用的确挺cute滴。。。

ggjjddmm们追啦，平时苏话似不能这样滴。

Translation:

我同意Echo的观点，但是我觉得上网的时候这么用的确挺CUTE的。。。

哥哥姐姐弟弟妹妹们注意啦，平时说话是不能这样的。

@trevelyan - lead poisoning wouldn't surprise me. Also nice to attribute my own failures at communication to the basic cognitive deficiencies of the other party.

As far as the sandals go, I'd have offered 10 or 20 RMB less than I purchased them for originally just to see if she'd go with the sale. Less than $10 for a decent pair of sandals is a good deal if you're happy with them. I pay about 150 RMB for decent shoes here.

@orbital

Where do you buy your shoes??

I didn't find it was worth it to buy shoes in China, at XiDan it was about 150RMB (after a long bargaining process) for uncomfortable, piece of shit shoes (at least they looked good) that would fall apart in a month or two. I love fake shit, but for something as important as shoes I'll pay for quality.

There is a problem downloading the character writing sheets.