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Chinglish-Excerpt
Some instances in life happen with such intensity that they may well be regarded as the starting point for a wonderful friendship or a lifelong passion. I had such a moment on July 25, 2000. I was about to get off a taxi near the Shanghai Foreign Languages University, where I had recently started my scholarship year as a Chinese major, when a neat sticker on the inside of the door told me: “Don’t forget to carry your thing.”
I was immediately fascinated, and I began to look everywhere for signs of “Chinglish.” I traveled the provinces and spotted it throughout, often in the most unexpected places. I found it on hotel room doors and brightly lit highway billboards, construction sites and soccer balls, condoms and pencil boxes.
Chinglish exists because people travel and their language travels with them. Chinglish also exists because of China’s opening to the world, the tourism industry, state propaganda mechanisms, and the Internet. In preparation for the 2008 Olympic Games, Beijing is gearing up an immense amount of manpower to eradicate Chinglish from the capital, and the Chinese government plans to extend this linguistic cleansing to the rest of the country as well. My aim is to show the nowadays endangered species of Chinglish in its natural habitat.
