Day 27: How The Brochure For Our Great Wall Tour Should Have Read

[brochure front cover:

SEE THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA AND MING DYNASTY TOMBS!!!!!!!!!!!!

Day 23: Adios, Qingdao; Ni hao, Shanghai

We wake up surprisingly refreshed after yesterday’s, well, depravity. Given our recent penchant for studying all day to prepare for the bar, I think I drank more beer yesterday than in the previous three months combined. But we stayed up late enough and ate enough delicious, delicious Ali Baba chuanr that we weren’t spinning when we went to bed. So there is no hangover to ruin our sublime hotel buffet.

Day 16: Mt. Qomolangma (aka Everest)

This mountain road is incredibly beautiful.  And it’s a good thing, because we’ve been driving for days.

Scenes from the road:

Lhasa: A Map of Our Old Haunt

While in Lhasa I sketched out a map of the city in my battered leather journal. It’s an outrageously inaccurate map, containing such trivial sites as “the place where we always bought water from the woman with horrible teeth,” “the place the cop lost control of his motorcycle and went into a slide,” and “the place Sam always wanted to go shop in because it had pretty paper lanterns hanging outside.”

I’m not sure if anyone other than Sam and Kristy will get anything out of this (or if they will even get anything out of it), but click on the pic and then mouse over the notes to see the captions.

Butchered English

Another installment of Butchered English On T-Shirts (And Some Other Places Too)!!! This time with a couple of appendage related shirts:

• Derby the world in my finger.  (What could that possibly mean?)
• Come in hot pinky.  (I’m afraid I might have an idea about what this could possibly mean.)

Butchered English: One Letter Away!

The hat in Lhasa proudly proclaiming “PESPECT” made me think of all of the Butchered English On T-Shirts (And Some Other Places Too)!!! that was just one or two letters away from spelling actual English words.  While this blog has proven that using actual English words doesn’t necessarily mean that the expression would make any sense and remove it from the exalted Butchered English list, at least it would have been closer.  Here are a few more close-but-no-cigar examples.

• Animal Kingdom.   Moniky Story.
  • (Monkey story?)
• Sisters. Heartfrings.
  • (Heartstrings?)
• Sprotvoguesprotvoguesprotvoguesprotvoguesprotvoguesprotvogue…(repeating)
  • (Sportvoguesportvogue etc?)

So, you can see that even if they had said monkey, heartstrings, and sport, they would still be worthy candidates for Butchered English.  In the end, a spellcheck function wouldn’t really be worth much when you don’t really have a firm grasp on the actual meaning of the words.  And I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Day 11: G.I. Joe in Mandarin

Barkhor Square and Jokhang Temple

It is weird to be in Tibet and doing little chores around town like it’s Sunday afternoon at home.  Today we went to a bookstore, the movie theater, and window shopping.  But for the Chinese soldiers camped out on every corner and losing my breath walking down the street, it would have been just like a weekend at home.

Day 10: Wandering the Streets of Lhasa

Potala Palace

Since we arrived in Lhasa several days before our tour is scheduled to start, and we can’t begin the tour now because we have to wait for one more person, we are going to spend several days just wandering around.  And since we have to be on a tour to even be here, and the tour company wants to get money for these days, we’re going to have our tour guide, Tsering, with us.  I guess.  I don’t really know what we’re gonna be doing.

Butchered English on T-Shirts

Two more additions to the Butchered English On T-Shirts (And Some Other Places Too)!!! saga.  Both on t-shirts:

1.  Hi nice to meet you.  It is a whole new sea.

2. Ancient treasure generous hearted dinosaur.

It’s no wonder we just walked around reading people’s shirts out loud.

Butchered English, Because Apparently I’m Too Lazy To Write A Real Post

Another edition of Butchered English On T-Shirts (And Some Other Places Too)!!!

Spotted on a t-shirt: Share Glitz Life is Delights

Share glitz indeed.  Life certainly is delights.