Overcoming the Language Barrier: Chinese Hip Hop

25
Jul
2008

In the 1990s, two cultures crossed paths as they travelled to opposite ends of the earth. In 1993, specifically, nine rappers from New York would release their first album, launching their careers as one of the most commercially successful and critically acclaimed hip hop groups of all time. The Wu Tang Clan (named after the mountain Wu Dang in central China) were heavily influenced by Chinese culture and martial arts mythology, giving them a style and a sound which infiltrated popular culture through music, films, and fashion for many years to come.

At roughly the same time, hip hop was leaving American shores and making its way to mainland China. Although hip hop in China began to manifest itself during the early ‘80s, it was almost purely an imitation of the US import, with artists rapping in English rather than in their own languages. This began to change with the arrivals of American hip hop connoisseurs like Kyle Ching an  Dana Burton, whose influence helped Chinese artists to adapt and create a style of their own.

Rhythm & Rhyme

As hip hop began to creep its way into microphones across China, the rapping was mostly done in English. For a long time it was believed that Chinese wasn’t a suitable language to rap with, using drastically sentence structuring and rhythm patterns quite different from English, with the main obstacle being that Chinese is a tonal language, where words change meaning according to the pitch used for each syllable. [view video]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laXqwR9hfJo

But according to Detroit-native Dana Burton, the one responsible for bringing rap-battling overseas and who is now considered the godfather of hip hop in China, this is no longer the case:

“I’ve actually come to like these Chinese battles more than the stuff going on at home in America. It’s a totally different direction they’re taking it, with the rhyming skills and the wordplay and how they perform. The energy level is much more intense with Chinese rap. There are more theatrics. The flow is faster. They’re rhyming words at a faster pace. And they’re starting now to use rhythm a bit more.”
Shanghai Rap Battle - Iron Mic Semifinals 2007 [view video]:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMeQeyURJa4

For the love of the music

The fledgling hip hop scene in China resembles the pre-bling golden era of its American counterpart. With fewer radio stations than the US and even fewer who are willing to play anything other than pop and rock, there simply aren’t millions of dollars to be made as a Chinese hip hop artist. As a result you won’t hear rappers bragging about their pimped out rides, their diamond-studded gold chains or their bottles of Crystal, because they just don’t have all the materialistic stuff associated with American hip hop these days. Instead you’ll hear from people who love the music without the fame and fortune, and you’ll hear the type of hip hop that used to exist when the streets influenced the rappers and not the other way around.

Polite Hip Hop

As is the nature of most Chinese art, Chinese hip hop is a reflection of their culture, as opposed to the western obsession with the self. Often referred to as “polite hip hop,” Chinese artists are more prone to rap about the monotonies of everyday life, love, and even food. It’s extremely rare to hear profane lyrics about drugs, violence, and racial oppression. Then again, theirs is not a musical genre that was forged in the fires of systematic and institutional racism, broken homes, drug-infested neighborhoods, a lack of well paying jobs, police misconduct, and inadequate educational facilities in the same way American hip hop was born. [view video]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prt5OTalPN4

The following song is rapped using a dialect from the province of Sichuan [view video]:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djBLYQhKr3M

Here’s a sample of the lyrics translated to English:

You do not have real ability, why must you be a singer?
You think you sing something and you think you are smart.
With the spotlight on the stage, you go mad and you are taken bad
I say dude, you should consider others’ mood
Facing your fans, you should be honest and conscientious
Do not stay there wordily
Those children are simple
To be an idol, you need to control your words and actions
You do not have the real strength/ability, do not come out to show off
Do not be too arrogant, do not use abusive words to insult others’ mothers
In conclusion, do not pretend to be famous, do not show your authority, do not be huffish
Do not think you are a star or feel you have some international reputation, even if your pictures are on global section of entertainment magazines
You need to change, change, change, but must not be conscienceless
Do not lose the face of Chinese (do not let others feel ashamed of Chinese because of your behaviours)
Do not think you are somebody because you have some powerful backers

While the song shares the American rap tradition of “dissing” another MC, the lyrics emphasize respect for the music and the fans. The song promotes improvement as a person and as an artist, and is less interested in hurling nasty, violent insults at one another. Chinese hip hop is often accused of being weak and soft and too polite. This is naturally a western point of view, coming from people who don’t understand that politeness, respect, patience, and love, constitute many of the foundations of Chinese art and culture.


By admin | Posted in Culture, Uncategorized | Comments (7)

Olympic Lockdown

22
Jul
2008

Olympic Lockdown

July 20th marked the start of Beijing in Olympic Lockdown Mode. For approximately the next two months, the city will turn blue in the face while attempting to hold in its proverbial gut while showcasing itself to the world as a sleek, modern, clean, and efficient capital city ready to assume its place among the world’s great powers. If all goes according to plan, the air will be clean, the traffic negotiable, athletes will make their venues on time without gridlock, there will be no protests or demonstrations, undesirable elements will be keep out of the city, tourists will gasp in wonder from hotels without vacancies at the architectural marvels of the new city, and all will be green and harmonious. That, at least, is the idea. And the restrictions and bureaucratic hurdles imposed by the city with their all-or-nothing plan are what will make it all possible. Here I’ll address two Au Yun Hui problems and their “solutions” as dealt with by the powers that be.

Item number one on the list, a two part quandary: improve air quality from pea-soup pollution (wuran) levels to something close to breathable, and reduce traffic (duche) from snarled congestion to somewhat tolerable.

Solution:

  • Highly polluting factories in Beijing were forced to shut down earlier this month, while cement and steel plants and chemical factories in the surrounding provinces have been told to scale back production some 30% by July 20th.
  • Antiquated heavy industrial trucks (some dating back to the ‘60’s and ‘70’s) which could otherwise only ply the roads at night were banned from entering Beijing on the 1st of July.
  • All construction projects in the city (which kick up incredible amounts of dust in addition to other undesirables) were halted on the 20th. Several new billion dollar lines on the city’s metro system were opened on the 20th to help ease the burden on the public transport system.
  • Depending on odd and even license plate numbers, half the cars (not including taxis) are banned each day from the city’s roads, with a fine of ¥100 fine imposed for violations.
  • An Olympic lane on the major thoroughfares will allow official Olympic vehicles to bypass regular traffic, allowing athletes to make their game times but cutting down available lanes for other traffic by 1/3 or ½, depending on the road.

Item number two: Keep out undesirables and ensure a safe Olympics.

Solution:

  • A crackdown on visas for foreigners ensuring that those already in the country legitimately must jump through diplomatic hoops to remain with no guarantee that they will be able to do so.
  • Security checkpoints set up on roads leading into the city with police boarding buses and inspecting private vehicles entering Beijing and performing metal and ID checks on both Chinese and foreigners, with special emphasis on ethnic Tibetans and Uighers (profilingwhat?) who might, theoretically, have something of an agenda to pursue in Beijing.
  • A battery of surface-to-air missiles set up not far from the “bird’s nest” National Stadium.
  • One particularly irritating measure for local students has all universities (including my own ) closed to everyone but students and employees of those universities. Gone be the days of riding through BLCU for a car-free shortcut to the Wudaokou subway station.

The measures taken have inspired some to warn of a “Fortress Beijing” mentality overtaking the host city which could prove to be security overkill. Furthermore, in addition to the installation of some 265,000 security cameras (Da Ge is watching), restrictions on foreign media have ensured that should anything “embarrassing” occur, the only people who will cover it will be Beijing friendly or censored. While I try to avoid touching on political issues here, Op-Ed pieces like this one in the Washington Post complaining of heavy-handedness and stage management on the part of the central government are hard to argue with.

And indeed, stage management has been the operative phrase for this coming Olympic Games. The environmental cover-up (it is nothing less) may prove successful but when the Olympics are come and gone, factories will once again kick into overdrive, cars will return in swarms to the streets. Significant protests may be avoided, but in the end, domestic grievances will remain unsolved. And while the whole country holds its breath for two months, perhaps the happiest people will be found after the Games have passed and millions of Beijingers will breathe a sigh of relief that they can finally return to life as normal, sans ma fan.

Words to Know

Àoyùnhuì Olympic Games 奥运会

Wūrǎn Pollution 污染

Dǔchē Traffic Jam 堵车

Wǔdàokǒ (Area in Haidian District, Beijing) 五道口

Dàgē Big Brother 大哥

Màfàn Hassle, troublesome, bother 麻烦


By ryan | Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (0)

The Gypsy Road

17
Jul
2008

Following an extended hiatus exploring the geopolitics and security status of China’s energy sector at the end of the Chinese academic year, your gallant correspondent has returned once again to fire away at the idiosyncrasies of life in Beijing and Greater China as a whole. Today, a commentary on the gypsy trail of Chengfu Lu and Yiheyuan Dong Lu, the path pedaled by tens of thousands of denizens of the Beijing “suburbs” (as they are called by the locals) to and from the impromptu sidewalk farmers markets that dot the city’s secondary roads, hutongs and side streets.

Every morning that I wake up to mount my black and rusty Flying Pigeon bicycle and qi on down to old Bei Da has its moment of dreadful apprehension, as I know that outside in the morning humidity and heat awaits a blaring ocean of traffic: cars, buses and trucks, klaxons wailing, barely moving in one lane, while in the other, a flood of electric bikes, motorcycles, Forevers, Giants, and Pigeons fighting for space and jockeying for position behind the Hummers of the Beijing bike scene - the flatbed-pickup style grown-man’s tricycle loaded high with produce, products, office furniture, recyclable plastic vegetable oil containers, or whatever else the nongmin have decided to pile 15 feet high back there. And as often as not, the driver of said oversized man’s tricycle isn’t a man, but a woman, just as rough, just as red-faced and dark from the sun as the rest of pedaling hordes. With automobiles accelerating and bumper kissing on the one side and the masses of riders pedaling along and looking for an opportunity to pass on the other, to get stuck behind one of the nongmin’s pickup truck bikes is the Chinese biker equivalent of being stuck behind a semi on a one-lane highway in the U.S.: it stinks. Yet there’s not much that can be done about it except wait for the opportunity to pass, thumb working the little bike bell just in case the person in front of you wasn’t aware of the throngs behind them.
Read More »


By ryan | Posted in Culture | Comments (1)

On the Bargain Road

1
Jul
2008

One of my more embarrassing moments as a student of Chinese came not here in China but back in Maine in the fall of 1998, when I returned from a year in Beijing to the University of Maine at Farmington along with a teacher from the Chinese department of Beijing University of Technology. As I’d known this professor prior to her year as a visiting scholar, I’d taken it upon myself to act as her guide, driver, and concierge while in the US, at least when I had the time and wasn’t otherwise involved in my studies. It was a good arrangement for us both, as I was able to keep my Chinese skills up to snuff and she was able to get out and do some shopping in a country where car ownership is pretty much essential. I was unprepared, however, for just how much of her Chinese heritage she’d brought with her. I had dropped of Wang laoshi in a box clothing store while I went to do some groceries, returning 10 or 15 minutes later. To my everlasting horror, when I walked up to her, I found her engrossed in a conversation with the clerk, not talking about sizes or fits or styles; no, she was bargaining!

Bargaining in China is one of those skills that’s essential for survival here. The Chinese bargain at vegetable stands, grocery stores, restaurants… pretty much everywhere. In some places, bargaining isn’t just recommended, it’s expected. Places sometimes have signs in English reading “No Bargaining! All Prices are Final!” although such signs are more often than not simply another tactic at getting the highest possible price. And while the China of 1998 certainly is much different from the China of 2008, bargaining is still very much part of the accepted practice and being lihai at bargaining is a skill which will never let you down. Let’s take a look at a couple different examples.

Of the commercial enterprises that somehow manage to make the tourist’s guide to Beijing, at the top of the list are Silk Street (which used to be an actual street near the American embassy but is now in a building) and the hongqiao pearl market. With the disproportionate number of tourists who visit these places, looking for knockoff goods from Prada purses to iPods, come disproportionate prices. What goes through the storekeepers mind the moment they lay eyes on you is what will determine the opening price on that knockoff Columbia jacket you’ve got your eyes on. If you are a local, you’ll get their cheapest opening offer. If you’re a Chinese but from another part of China (speak with an accent), you’ll get their second lowest offer. If you’re a foreigner with semi-fluent to fluent Chinese who has obviously lived or spent a lot of time in China (and consequently should know about what these things ought to cost), you’ll get their third lowest opening price. Lastly, if you are a bumbling foreigner who uses lots of hand signs and the calculator (omnipresent) to bargain, you’re going to get the hose, as whatever is being offered will already be offered at a price somewhat cheaper than you can have it – the authentic deal, keep in mind – in the U.S. It’s just the way it is. Keeping a few things in mind, however, will keep you from getting soaked.

First, if you are the Olympic tourist straight off the plane and negotiate in broken English because it sounds more Chinese-y, and you’re shopping at the Silk Market, your opening price is going to be about 8 – 10 times more than the shopkeeper would be willing to accept. This, actually, can even pertain to standard foreigners even if they speak Chinese. The Silk Market just operates this way.

For example:

Ryan: How much for this jacket?

Shopkeeper: This jacket? It’s of the highest quality, a really nice jacket.

Ryan: Yes, but how much?

Shopkeeper: If you want it, because you speak such amazing Chinese, I’m going to give it to you for a very low price. It’s 1200 RMB.

Ryan, laughing: You must be joking. I’ll give you 50 RMB.

Shopkeeper: You are trying to insult me? I could never accept such a price. But since you are such an old hand at this, I will let you take it for 700RMB.

Ryan: I like the jacket, and I like you, but I could not live with myself if I gave more than 100 RMB for this jacket. It’s obviously a fake.

Shopkeeper: Fake? No, it’s the real thing. Never mind that the tag says Ralph Lauren and the logo is North Face. But listen, you know about these clothes, so for you, I’m going to give you the special price of 450 RMB.

Ryan: No, no, no. I could not possibly go higher than 150 RMB, and only then because you are such a friendly person.

This could go on and on until a price is reached, usually about 75% off the original starting price. And granted, this is an extreme example as it is using xiushui and hongqiao, two of the most overpriced haggle-marts in Beijing, home to some of the more aggressive sales tactics seen outside of timeshare sales. It sounds ridiculous in English, but it is all part of the game, and in Chinese can even be fun. For the unaccustomed Westerner, it just takes some time to get used to, especially when trying to shave a few jiao off the price of market tomatoes. In the end, you will inevitably come away thinking that you could have gotten it down a little bit. A rule of thumb is that if the shopkeeper seems somewhat irritated with you after arriving at a price the both of you could accept, then you got a good deal. And even if you didn’t, remember, the price agreed to was acceptable to the both of you, even if both consumer and seller seem a little peeved.

Returning to Wang laoshi in the clothing store back in Maine, as I stood there completely mortified watching the manager come out from the back office to undoubtedly explain the way things operated here in the United States, I began to contemplate intervention. You could imagine my shock when instead of booting the both of us from the premises with a command to never return, the manager actually agreed to knocking a few dollars off the prices printed on the price tag there in the store. While I don’t think I could bring myself to going bargain hunting in a U.S. department store, my already high respect for Chinese fortitude and bargaining skills shot up considerably.

Here’s an interesting article for some further reading on what negotiating in China is all about.
http://www.jazzviolin.com/china/2007/09/29/buying-things-how-to-negotiate-bargaining-in-china/

Useful Words and Phrases:

厉害 This is one of those words that can be interpreted in many different ways and really has no direct translation into English except in the context you’re working with. Here’s the definition direct from www.nciku.com, one of the better Chinese/English/Chinese dictionaries on the Net.
1. (of a wild animal or of one’s temper , words , etc .) fierce ; terrible
2. (of a person ) strict ; stern ; harsh
3. (of illness , heat , cold , etc .) intense ; severe ; terrible
4. heavily

秀水市场 Silk Street Market
红桥市场 The Pearl Market
太贵了! It’s too expensive!
这是假的 This is fake
给我便宜一点儿 Can you make it any cheaper?
买不买？ Will you buy it?


By admin | Posted in Culture, Uncategorized | Comments (7)

Park Life

24
Jun
2008

When spring rolls around in Beijing, it means more than just the appearance of green  after months of grey and early darkness, more than singing birds and flowers and the occasional rain shower.  To old school Beijinger’s, springtime means the beginning of park time, and Beijing’s many parks begin to show signs of life after barely stirring during the winter months.
There are a million reasons to go to Beijing’s parks for the average city resident, myself included.  Chief among those reasons is the desire to see the color green and to escape the seemingly inescapable hum of the city, blaring of cars, and squash of teeming people so omnipresent throughout the city.   Whether they are free or it’s necessary to pay a few jiao for a ticket, once inside a city park, the atmosphere outside just melts away. It’s no wonder that parks are such a popular place for the elderly, who seem to show up in them at the crack of dawn and don’t leave until past dark.  On a day where it just makes sense to get out of the city – without actually getting out of the city – a retreat to Ritan, Beihai, or Xiangshan seems to make perfect sense.  And seeing the types of activities that go on in the parks in the spring and summer months makes them all the more interesting to visit.
Read More »


By admin | Posted in Culture | Comments (1)

The Mother of All Tests

19
Jun
2008

Things that China lacks: oil, a decent network of highways, a quality control system for food and drugs, clean air in its cities.  One thing that China absolutely does not lack: people.  Everywhere you go in China, with the exception of some of the more sparsely populated Western provinces, you can’t help but feel surrounded by humanity.  From the early hours of the morning until late in the evening, Chinese cities are teeming with them, from the very young to the very old. But spend any time in Beijing or elsewhere and you’ll begin to notice the absence of one particular age group: kids from middle school to high school age.  During the school year, if you see them, they are either on their way to school or on their way home.  Kids in this age group have school for about 6 hours per day, then have an average of 6 hours of homework every night. When Chinese students reach the age of 10 or so, they simply vanish, not to reappear until after they’ve sat for the test that will determine pretty much their entire future – their career, their financial status, everything.  Just imagine that the 8-10 years of primary school through high school is nothing more than preparation for a two-day exam, known as the gaokao, with the direction of your life hanging in the balance.  Each year, millions of high school kids complete the test in competition for a place in the countries universities, institutions which can accommodate only about 60% of their numbers.  Now that’s pressure.

If you want to read more about this test of tests, check out this excellent article by Manuela Zoninsein in Slate.


By admin | Posted in Culture | Comments (0)

Examining the Chinese Menu

12
Jun
2008

The first thing you learn: nobody’s even heard of General Tsao’s chicken. Negative on the tangerine chicken as well, and the shrimp lo mein is nowhere to be found. The good news is, there’s mooshu pork a plenty, but if you’re going to survive for very long, you’d better have some idea of what to expect in your typical Chinese greasy spoon, especially if you’re a student, on a budget, or otherwise trying to fit into the average Chinese person’s daily routine.

Within hours of a Beijing arrival, or arrival anywhere in the north of China for that matter, a visit to a typical Chinese restaurant could be the first place outside of your accommodations on your sightseeing agenda, and a glance at the menu won’t bring back memories of the takeout place back home, places that, if I memory serves me correctly, are invariably called “Great Wall” or “Ming Garden” or some variation thereof, all promising a tasty bounty of inedible red food of which you will eat approximately half. No, the real deal is much less hygienic, and certainly not FDA certified. That said, real Chinese food bears very little resemblance to the scrumptious cuisine served in the U.S. and elsewhere in the Western world, and in this reviewer’s opinion, is much the better for it.
Read More »


By admin | Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (1)

Misunderstandings: Do You Want it Or Not?

8
Jun
2008

When I first started coming to China and getting involved speaking Chinese on a daily basis, I was often confronted with a situation in which I thought I knew what was being said because I understood each of the words used. It’s an easy approach if you’re translating directly, but direct translation has its faults. Often, it will lead to misunderstanding and get you into a bit of trouble that with a more perfect understanding you would have been able to avoid.

One standout example is the phrase

要不要？
Yào bù yào?

Now translated directly, this means “want no want,” which to me came out to something very close to “Do you want it or not?” Walking down a street full of vendors in Yabaolu (雅宝路), each of whom shouts at you “do you want it or not?” over and over again even after you’ve passed on by can be, and has been, interpreted as both annoying and aggressive. Add to that the onslaught of another variant on the phrase:
Read More »


By admin | Posted in Uncategorized | Comments (1)

Flying Pigeons Forever

3
Jun
2008

More than any other city in any other country on earth, Beijing is a bicycle town. It is home to more than 10 million bikes and is accommodating to its bikers. Every road has a wide, sometimes very wide, bicycle lane on each side, and Beijingers make sure that the space is used. At all hours of the day, but especially for the several hours each morning and evening that comprise rush hour, bicycle lanes throughout the city are swarmed with riders. Riding a bike in China is not at all about being an environmentalist. You don’t ride for your health, or to make a statement. Since the days of the revolution, the Chinese ride because they need to get places.

Of the 100 million bicycles produced in the world every year, over a quarter of them are produced in Tianjin, a city about an hour’s train ride southeast of Beijing. While the city itself does not have much to offer, in the cyclist’s mind, it does produce at least one glorious product: the Flying Pigeon (Feige) bicycle. Fifty pounds of iron with rod brakes and little stopping power, the gearless Flying Pigeon was once the most ubiquitous bicycle in China. Deng Xiao Ping, Mao’s successor and the architect of China’s transition from a purely socialist command economy to a “socialist market economy” himself made the Henry Ford like declaration “A Flying Pigeon in every household” to showcase what economic progress had in store for the Chinese people. The company complied, offering the bike in any color you like, so long as it’s black. The Flying Pigeon’s chief competition, the Forever (Yongjiu) brand bicycle, looks very much the same: large tires, fenders, chain guard, kickstand, irritating bell, back package carrier, and handlebar basket. Together, the two brands serve to clog the bicycle arteries of Beijing and other biker friendly cities throughout China.
Read More »


By admin | Posted in Culture | Comments (0)

The Chatty Beijing Taxi Driver

29
May
2008

It’s 6:30am when Wang Zhifeng steps out of his 14th floor 1200 RMB/month apartment in the Haidian district , waving goodbye to his wife as he closes the door behind him and lighting up a Double Happiness cigarette on the way to the elevator, elbowing-grabbing his fruit jar of green tea to do so. Ling, the elevator lady, is already at her chair in the elevator, hard at work knitting a new pair of socks for her niece, the same position she’ll occupy for the next 12 hours pushing the buttons to take people up and down. Even though they’ve lived in the building for years, they exchange no pleasantries, as is their custom, and Wang Zhifeng smokes his cigarette the whole way down. The lights in the hallway still aren’t working and the paint is peeling off the ceiling, but it’s home, and Wang Zhifeng steps out into the daylight and heads to his cab, a shiny new Volkswagen that he rents from one of the many taxi companies in Beijing and splits in 12 hours shifts with his next door neighbor. It’s not cloudy, but there’s a haze of pollution and it’s going to be another long day in Beijing traffic. Nestling his tea jar into the space beside the passenger seat with the emergency brake, he drives for a couple minutes to the end of the street with a stop by the jianbing (an oniony egg crepe around a crunchy fried dough) stand for a quick breakfast. For the next 3 hours, he tackles stop and go traffic driving a businessman to work in Dongdan, an elderly couple to Beijing’s West Train Station, and several minutes just driving around looking for the next fare: Me.
Read More »


By admin | Posted in Culture | Comments (0)