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Q: Anyone ever use your Chinese to pull a fast one?
Have you heard Chinese people talking about you, or talking about pulling a fast one on you, and then you doing something that totally threw them off? This is under the assumption that you can't understand Chinese of course. I just want some funny stories that's all. For me, I overheard an old lady tell her grandkid to practice English with me, then I just smiled and said "konichiwa" to them. I do that a lot actually now that I think about it...
When I hear 'laowai' or 'waiguoren', I always reply: 'Nie shi laowai' with my finger pointing
, and get embarrassed laugh out of Chinese.
I can still bear it when they refer to me as waiguoren, but have to object when they call me Meiguoren
When locals try to practice their English but I want to be left alone I switch to my mother tongue German instead and pretend to not speak any English.
In other cases I only use Mandarin and refuse to speak any English, you should see their face going from joy (OMG that foreigner speaks Mandarin) to disappointment (why won't he teach me some English vocabulary).
Also people assuming that just because you are in the subway, the bus or any public place and don't speak with them you don't understand Mandarin, I ask them if they speak with every strangers? No, so why should I talk with them? And I do so in front of everyone else, causing them a massive loss of face.
I used it to expose my new bosses plan to try and scare teachers, she didn't know I could easily understand her. The better I get at Chinese the more it pisses me off knowing what they say.
Lord_hanson:
You should play down your ability to speak Chinese. Sometimes you learn important things when they think you don't understand. Exposing plans is good but make sure they don't know it was you or you won't hear anymore plans.
ironman510:
I agree, I did that in METEN when I worked part time a few yers back. There are schools or companies that dont want us to have the chinese speaking skill.
