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Lost While Translating

March 16th, 2007  |  Published in general  |  26 Comments

Quick, I need help translating the following into Chinese. URGENTLY!

  1. Please believe in toilet paper. I know all of you haven’t believed in it in the last 3 months, but it’s really quite useful (I know you don’t believe in water pipes either, since we don’t have any). What can I do to make you believe in the importance of toilet paper other than to buy them for you?
  2. You know these things we call sanitary pads. Wrapping used sanitary pads with something — anything! toilet paper? plastic? renminbi? — is supposed to come before disposing them into the sanitary bin. If you don’t, the adhesive undersides will stick on the tray and therefore not fall into the bin. Bloody side up and exposed, all it takes is two of them before the ENTIRE BIN becomes unusable (cos no one wants to touch that thing with a barge pole, and we don’t have a maid). I’m not sure you realize this and if you are going to live in Singapore for 4 years, I hope you do, soon.
  3. I understand all of you are the products of your country’s One Child Policy. But from one spoiled Singaporean brat, only two generations removed from China, to another: could you please NOT leave your expired bread rolls, preserved vegetables, cups and dishes in the sink for more than 3 days, and also clear the bin on your way out?
  4. BTW the person who cleans the house, the sink, and who removes the locks of your hair from the toilet isn’t me, it’s my “best friend”, the one gawking at you in your underwear (for all the wrong reasons).
  5. P.S. To get back at you, and because I can’t really say all that in Chinese without stammering, I’ve been stealing your toothpaste and fruit juice.

Responses

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  1. Night says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 9:25 am (#)

    toothpaste and fruit juice only? get more, hahaha :p

  2. budak says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 9:48 am (#)

    TMI in pt. 2!! :O

  3. w. says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 10:02 am (#)

    Ugh I feel ill.

  4. milo says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 11:23 am (#)

    Hillarious!!

  5. ... says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 12:12 pm (#)

    housemates… hehe!!!

    i used to have housemates too.

    There is a rubbish bin outside my room.
    the gal living opposite my room whom i think have eyesight problems or aiming problems or something else.. she can never put her rubbish into the bin but all ard the bin and she don even care picking it up and put it in.( even when she know i saw her doing it. imagine a dumping area right outside your room.

    there is another one who can peel her apple above a 40cm diameter rubbish bin in the kitchen and still have all the apple skin ard the bin and the apple skin shall stay there till the cleaning lady comes.

    cups and dishes they used shall stay there till their next usage which can be as long as one week or more.
    (my mum suggested that i shud wrap up all their dirty dishes and throw it so that they will washed it next time)

    i didn had sanitary pad problems cuz when i moved in, there was notices of appropriate disposal of sanitary pads in the toilet and outside the toilet by the hostel management. i cant imagine wat happened before the notices were there…yee!!
    But one of my friends have a foreign housemate. and she has a basket which she keeps her toiletries in the toilet. so after she moved out. the basket still stayed in the toilet. as time passed, there was disgusting smell in the toilet even after they clean it and they found numerous used sanitary pads in that basket under the toiletries. (this is yucky)

  6. naes rimu says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 12:34 pm (#)

    å¿«, 我需要帮助翻译以下成汉语。迫切地! 1. 请相信在卫生纸里。我知道你们大家不相信它在前3 个月, 但是它是真正地相当有用的(我知道您不相信在水管里或者, 因为我们没有任何) 。我可以做除什么之外使您相信卫生纸的重要性买他们为您? 2. 您知道我们叫有益健康的垫的这些事。包裹被使用的有益健康的垫以某事- 任何! 卫生纸? å¡‘æ–™? renminbi? - 应该来在配置他们之前入有益健康的容器。如果您不, 黏着性下面将黏附在盘子和因此不会分成容器。它采取的血淋淋的边和被暴露, 所有是二他们在整个容器变得不能再用之前(cos 没人想要接触那件事与驳船杆, 并且我们没有一个佣人) 。我不是肯定的您体会这和如果您住在新加坡4 å¹´, 我希望您, 很快。3. 我了解你们大家是您的国家的一个儿童政策产品。但从一损坏了Singaporean 贬小儿, 只有二个世代从中国被去除, 到另一个: 请您不留下您的到期的面包卷, 保存了菜、杯子和盘在水槽超过3 天, 和还清楚容器在您的出口? 4. BTW 清洗房子, 水槽, 并且从洗手间去除您的头发锁不是我的人, 这是我的”最好的朋友”, 那个呆视在您在您的内衣(为所有错误原因) 。5. P.S 。批评您, 和因为我无法真正地说所有用中文没有结巴, 我窃取您的牙膏和果汁。

  7. Raelene says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 1:35 pm (#)

    This girl I used to live with once left a used tampon in the shower.

  8. alvin says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 2:46 pm (#)

    we used to have a similar problem in NUS (donno whether it’s still happening tho). specifically, with someone persistently squatting on a sitting toilet in the ladies loo. Our frustrated lab tech had to draw a picture diagram about not squatting (thereby leaving dirty shoe prints on the toilet seat) since she didn’t know Chinese.

    P.S. this is not meant to be derogatory to Chinese nationals. just a statement of what happened…

  9. Evie says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 3:13 pm (#)

    I changed some of the words to aid the translation, and I only have time to do 2 at work! I hope someone else contributes too//

    1) 请用厕纸.我知道在过去3个月里你们都不理,但是它真的蛮着用的-(也知道你们不用水管,因为我们这里没有)除了帮你们买以外, 你们要我怎样才能让你们了解厕纸的重要性呢?

    2)你知道什么叫卫生棉吗?当你用东西来包卫生棉的时候 (什么都行!纸,塑胶袋,人民币?) 你要在丢进垃圾桶之前就把它包起来了.要不然底面的黏胶会黏在垃圾桶上.只需两片血腥的卫生棉黏在垃圾桶就会搞到没人敢用了(因为没人会想去碰你那脏东西,而且我们也没佣人) 我不知道你们是否还在发皇帝梦, 因为如果你会在新加坡多呆4年的话,你最好赶快醒醒吧.

  10. vick says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 5:09 pm (#)

    What…do you mean she doesn’t understand the value of toilet paper? Has she been using a leaf? Newspaper?

    …HER HAND??

    I’ve made myself ill now.

  11. nAL says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 5:31 pm (#)

    My husband used to work as janitor of a building of female students. Once he entered the ladies toilet to clean it, and was greeted by a horrible smell. He traced it to the last cubicle and on the floor was a used sanitary pad, half burnt and still smouldering.

    Someone had set the damn thing on fire.

    After that story, nothing surprises me in this area anymore.

  12. Her Highness says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 9:27 pm (#)

    I’ll say, come stay with me for 3 days and leave the house to them. You’ll be worshipped upon return.

  13. me says:

    March 16th, 2007 at 11:22 pm (#)

    I’d say that this is part of accepting the fact that not everyone is civilised enough to be hygienic, and since u’ve travelled so much to third world countries you should be used to their standards. And even Singaporeans,who have been educated by campaigns for decades, do not possess good toilet etiquette like FLUSHING.

    what ever you say would be ignored, because it simply is their way of life, just like not separating our trash into recyclables and non-recyclables would probably freak out Germans who think that that is the natural thing to do.

    What would work is if you outdid them and left a big steaming turd in the middle of the bathroom floor. Then the concept of consideration would germinate in their minds. In Chinese, this is called yi3 du2 gong1 du2 (fighting poison with poison).

  14. A says:

    March 17th, 2007 at 12:49 am (#)

    Once, there were a few drops of blood (and I can safely assume this is menstrual blood since the bin was chock full of sanitary pads) on the toilet floor in the apartment I previously stayed in.

    The blood stayed on the floor for over a week until it dried up. And disappeared.

    It probably disappeared because some bleary-eyed housemate accidentally stepped on it one fine morning (and I can assume this too because there were tiny remnants of blood left and the toilet hadn’t been cleaned yet). And walked all over the house.

  15. xav says:

    March 17th, 2007 at 12:55 am (#)

    girls are kinda icky and gross now.

  16. kisekino says:

    March 17th, 2007 at 6:04 pm (#)

    我知道你们都是你们祖国“One Child Policy”的“产物”.但是一个被宠坏（祖父其实和你来自同一片土地的中国，对，我们只有两代之隔）的新加坡人在这里要请求你：能不能请你们不要把过期的面包、发臭的酸菜、脏杯子、脏碟子留在水槽里面？清不要把这些东西留在那里超过3天。还有，清顺便在离开的时候把垃圾桶清一清。

    *em.. i dunno what’s “One Child Policy” in chinese

  17. kisekino says:

    March 17th, 2007 at 6:06 pm (#)

    我知道你们都是你们祖国“One Child Policy”的“产物”.但是一个被宠坏（祖父其实和你来自同一片土地，对～我们只有两代之隔）的新加坡人在这里要请求你：能不能不要把过期的面包、发臭的酸菜、脏杯子、脏碟子留在水槽里面？请不要把这些东西留在那里超过3天。还有，请顺便在离开的时候把垃圾桶清一清。

    *em.. i dunno what’s “One Child Policy” in chinese

  18. kisekino says:

    March 17th, 2007 at 6:09 pm (#)

    i think ur command of english is too strong, reflects well in ur writings.. but think need an expert 才可以翻译得像个样

  19. alexis says:

    March 18th, 2007 at 12:53 am (#)

    One Child Policy = 独生子女政策

  20. popagandhi says:

    March 18th, 2007 at 3:05 am (#)

    I seem to have opened up a can of worms here! It’s all for laughs, I’m really on quite good terms with all of them ;)

  21. keith says:

    March 18th, 2007 at 9:21 am (#)

    a can of funny worms. hilarious! :)

  22. soph says:

    March 20th, 2007 at 7:26 pm (#)

    haha you’re funny. having stayed in boarding school (with many PRCs) I fully concur.

  23. joyce says:

    March 21st, 2007 at 11:02 pm (#)

    Adri… if this stuff gets to you… you’re going to a hell of a fun time living amongst americans (and i mean that sarcastically).

  24. popagandhi says:

    March 21st, 2007 at 11:45 pm (#)

    No it doesn’t get to me at all ;) Some of the other locals here have run off screaming back home.. I’m just looking at this as a… cultural exchange. I don’t think I would have noticed half the stuff if not for other picking out every single thing. I’m quite blind that way — I can happily ignore everything except the sanitary pads.

  25. ade says:

    April 2nd, 2007 at 11:30 am (#)

    yea i got that too, the wide opened sanitary pad stuck to the tray, some blood stains on the lid…when i was working in an office that shared a toilet with a chinese company.

  26. dennis says:

    April 7th, 2007 at 3:14 pm (#)

    Just:
    你们进化了吗？

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