Election time (and more on the Chinese language)

Well I received my absentee ballot in the mail today, which was both exciting and a relief. I wasn't sure if it would get here in time, and as I've been watching the time to the election tick down day by day, I've been getting more and more nervous; this is one election I don't want to miss, and Minnesota has recently become something of a swing state, so I feel like my vote really could make a difference.

Interestingly, the address on the front of the envelope read "China" at the bottom, even though I specifically remember writing in "Republic of China" on the absentee ballot request form. I was told repeatedly by other expats to make sure that anyone sending me anything be sure to write "Republic of China" on the envelope or package, or else there's a chance it'll end up somewhere in the backwaters of mainland China. Oh well. I'm just relieved the ballot made it here with a bit of time to spare.

On the language front, I was talking with Alex a couple days ago when he dropped his pen and cursed. In Spanish. I remembered he'd said he lived with a Panamanian roommate in Beijing a few years ago, and had picked up a few words, but I couldn't help laughing when "puta madre" came out of his mouth in the middle of the entertainment district in Taipei. We started talking about the, er, grittier aspects of the languages we speak, and we both agreed that Spanish is the best language for cursing.

Which leads me to a recent irritation I've found with Chinese, and, more broadly, East Asian languages as a whole. It's probably partly due to culture shock, but I think part of it is just what sounds good to my own ear.

Mandarin Chinese is a language that really lends itself to a sort of whiny, high-pitched tone, especially among women. Across the board, when I hear women on campus talk, their voices are really high and often a bit whiny-sounding to my ear. Some people say it's "musical," and I agree in the sense that sentences are often "sung," with long vowel sounds at the end to punctuate certain sentiments, but when I hear it, it just sounds really whiny and irritating. And like I said, maybe it's a bit of culture shock, but I hear plenty of older women speak Chinese in a much more solid, down-to-earth tone.

Korean is the same way, perhaps even more so. Listen to some Korean girls talk for a few minutes and I guarantee you'll think they're doing nothing but whining. And it's even worse if they're talking to guys. I'm sorry, but that's what I hear, and it makes me glad in some ways that I don't speak Korean.

I think maybe Spanish is just better suited to my personality, especially Mexican Spanish. There's something very crisp and sharp to Mexican Spanish that appeals to me. The staccato, almost commanding sound every sentence has just sounds good to my ear. It sounds stronger and more substantial than Chinese or Korean, and truly, there is no better language for swearing than Spanish. Curse words in Spanish just have a certain fire to them, a certain bite and venom that doesn't exist in a language like Chinese, which relies more on context and tone of voice to get the point across. For instance, if you ask someone in Chinese "ni zuo shenme?" it can come off as a polite "What are you up to?", or it can be, "What the hell are you doing?"

Now don't get me wrong, I enjoy studying Chinese and I hope I become proficient by the end of my nine months here. But I most definitely will not be speaking like a cute little four-year-old, and when I want to say something slightly less savory, I can assure you I will revert to Spanish.