Wandering between air gates with a lot of time on my hands, I entered a book shop in Shanghai Pudong airport with the vague hope of finding an alternative to Vogue Australia or How to succeed in China in 5 minutes.
And for once, my low expectations weren’t disappointed : the title “NIUBI ! The Real Chinese you were never taught in school”, says it all. This book, brace yourself, contains words and phrases that would embarass the sneakiest passenger next seat looking over your shoulder..
You will learn many useful stuff including that Niubi means literally “cow cunt”, how to write the original character for “fuck” that actually disappeared of phones and computers typing systems and many, many other phrases that my education forbids to disclose here because my mum reads this blog sometimes.
I’ll just say it contains anything from flirting and dating to gay slang, internet slang, sex, and even words for the kind of action you regret the next morning (you, not me, cause of course I never do such thing as regret).
A short introduction
Niubi ! is abso-niubi-lutely hilar, and not in a gross stupid ha-ha way, because the author Eveline Chao conducted her research religiously and to the point of adding historical references, Chinese characters, pinyin pronunciation and even notes on regional slang differences. Don’t laugh, there is some serious work involved there. The book does carry some flaws that only a true connoisseur of Chinese language with sharp eyes would spot, but this only calls for a second edition. Would be fun for Eveline Chao to include some high-profile language specialists in the process for a brush-up. Just sayin’..
Available in any indecent bookstore or on Amazon here
PS According to China Smack, it did cause some controversy among Chinese netizens, if you have nothing else to do, read their comments
