Very funny and vaguely on-topic.

[Serpent]

I met this guy on the weekend. He had the Chinese character for "dragon" tattooed on his forearm. "Born in the year of the dragon then?" I asked him.

He smiled sheepishly. "Actually, no."

"Oh. Why the dragon character then?"

"Well," he answered with a sigh, "I got this tattoo when I was 16. You have to be 18 to get a tattoo. So I lied about my birthday and said I was 18. I thought the 12 Chinese zodiac characters referred to the 12 months, so I thought if I told him my correct birthday, but made the year like I was 18, then I'd be all right."

I did laugh!

[joedoe]

It is like the craze that just went by with the Chinese characters on t-shirts (or just about anything). Most people wearing them had no idea what they had written on their shirts, they just thought it looked cool. Too funny. :)

[Serpent]

Have you seen any that you've read and understood? What sort of things have you seen?

[joedoe]

No, my Chinese is pathetic. However when you see 13-14 yo girls walking around with a big Chinese character spashed across the chest of their t-shirt you can be pretty sure they don't know what it says. It would be funny if it was the Chinese word for 'idiot' or 's|ut' or something similarly insulting :D

[Laughing Cow]

Originally posted by joedoe
It would be funny if it was the Chinese word for 'idiot' or 's|ut' or something similarly insulting :D

I have seen the reverse many times in asia.

Shirts with engrish and you can be sure that the wearer doesn't have a glue of the meaning.

Best one was still the young girl with the wording "Pat my P@*%y." across her Chest.

[Serpent]

Did you comply?

[Laughing Cow]

Originally posted by Serpent
Did you comply?

Nope, not into cradle snatching.

;)

[dezhen2001]

i saw one with a chinese friend and it basically said "see you in HELL" or somehting like that... we were in a shopping centre and p|ssed ourselves at the teenage gal wearing it :D

dawood

[Marky]

Hi all,

I've seen girls (and guys) walking around with the "love" character printed on them. I saw one with the words "big dragon". One guy had the words "gold power" tatooed on his arm (he wanted it to say "money and power", but he didn't know how to write it. Nor did the artist, apparently). I've seen people with tiger tatooed on them, and I've seen "patience" on some shirts, as well as "beauty".

I also have one friend who wore a tie-dye shirt with the character for "homeless" on it, the sight of which cracked me up.

My sifu has also told me a story about a friend of his at Augustine Fong's wing chun school. He was so impressed with one of Fong's books, he decided to get the Chinese characters on the front cover tatooed on his arm. He later discovered (from Fong's wife, no less!) that he now had the phrase "Fong's Wing Chun Book #7" printed on his arm! That's probably the funniest one I can think of.

[Former castleva]

"I thought the 12 Chinese zodiac characters referred to the 12 months"

As one link for legendary cycle of 12,yes.

[Souljah]

anyone know where i can find a t-shirt with the OX symbol on it?

[kenso]

Here's a nice example of engrish:
http://www.engrish.com/recent/image/friendlyhokkaido.jpg

[Serpent]

Originally posted by Marky
My sifu has also told me a story about a friend of his at Augustine Fong's wing chun school. He was so impressed with one of Fong's books, he decided to get the Chinese characters on the front cover tatooed on his arm. He later discovered (from Fong's wife, no less!) that he now had the phrase "Fong's Wing Chun Book #7" printed on his arm! That's probably the funniest one I can think of.

Ah, I'm going to be laughing about that one all day!

:D