Fuddland

After arriving in China and starting to converse with a few of the English-speaking locals—whether it be for teaching or a real job-type job—you will, without any doubt, be greeted with a variation on the following phrase:

Hi, how about your weekend?

Variations obviously depend on the day of the week and the time of day [“How about your lunch?”]. It’s as if they are continuing an abruptly-ended chat that you were having at some point in the past. You are seemingly greeted with, “How about you, recently?” and all you can think is, did I just ask her a question and then have my memory erased? Is my name Leonard?

What they really mean is, “How was your weekend?”, “How was your lunch?” or, “How have you been?” The problem lies in a deep-seated mistranslation of the Chinese phrase “zenmeyang”, which has various meanings depending on the context, such as:

• Your weekend zenmeyang? — How was your weekend?
• The weather in London zenmeyang? — What’s the weather in London like?
• Watch a film this evening zenmeyang? — How about watching a film this evening?

Only one of these can legitimately be translated using, “How about…?”, but more often than not you’ll be asked, “How about the weather in London?” [By the way, having grown up on Sherlock Holmes novels, they already expect you to answer: “Foggy. All the time. Can’t see a thing. And yes, all men wear bowler hats and open doors for ladies.”]

For some reason, at some stage of their English learning, people are taught that zenmeyang should always be translated as “how about”. So, in a bid to reverse this bad habit, at some point during a course all of my students get a stern lecture about the correct uses of “how about”, and any incorrect usages from that point on are dealt with a my-fist-your-nose-zenmeyang? approach.

#1

sarah | 2009 / 05 / 04 – 11:14

I like this one. I got it all the time: how about your weekend…

#2

Wurlinator | 2009 / 06 / 01 – 14:22

Yeah this sure is a biggie. I’ve also had to think clearly about why we can’t say that when I’ve tried to explain it to students. I think its most used as a follow up question scenario - let’s do something - when - ‘how about tomorrow’ etc etc… but then, we do use it informally for emphasis like - how about North Korea!

Anyway, how about my comment?

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