Shiny Stuff

Today is my birthday, I am 60 years old and I can definitely say that I am more than halfway through this job called life.

I have less than one month left in Tainan and less than 2 weeks before my wife arrives in Taiwan. I have to step it up on doing blog entries if I'm going to finish before I leave. So the blog will come out more often than MWF, maybe back to everyday. Forwarned is forarmed.

Every once in a while, I see an English word used in Taiwan that seems out of place. Usually the translation from Chinese to English misses some nuance in English. One such word is the word: "shiny".

I think of the word "shiny" as being dismissive or deprecating, like in the sentences:

His bald head was as shiny as a cue ball.

or

The cop with the shiny badge didn't look so tough now.

So it was strange to see "shiny" as a superlative. After a little research, I have an explanation. (It's probably full of shit but I like it.) In Chinese Characters, the store's name "Shiny Tea" is given as

嚮茶
the first character is an old version of the current character for xiang4

向 
which means 'in the direction" . There is another version of this character for xiang4
曏
in this version the sub character on top
日
is the character for the Sun, and of course looking in the direction of the sun is nothing if not "shiny".  With more than 2ooo years of Chinese characters there are plenty of older versions to choose from. This use of old versions is like the use of olde English as a marketing ploy(Ye Olde Shoppe... ).

Beside this chain of Tea Shoppes there are other users, shiny furniture:

 Maybe I'm stretching it with the next example,  I don't know what this "pole shine" is all about.

 















Here I am with my buddy in KaoHsiung. It was my first time in Taiwan at Mickey Ds. I have to say that a McChicken Sandwich, a Soft Cone, an Apple Turnover and a black coffee tastes EXACTLY the same in Taiwan as in the US. Although why someone would choose McDonalds is still a mystery to me.