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Posts: 1693

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Q: Has living in China taken away your sense of humor?

Since I've been in China, I've met some Expats who were wound tighter than a gnats' ass, and they seem to only be happy when they are complaining. Others I've met are like kids in a candy store! Wide-eyed, laughing, it's like a Scouting Jamboree all over again. Very few I've met are "normal." You know, good days and bad days.

 

Is it just me? Is it them? Is it China? What's up with that?

11 years 30 weeks ago in  Culture - China

 
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Posts: 4397

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  I know what you mean about the miserable ex-pats, i've met my fair share. Fair enough though, starting over in China is challenging. Me, i've always been a miserable bastard, so I don't know if it's changed me, just pushed me to learn another language to complain in.

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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Certainly not.

I laugh my ass off daily just looking at the silly things that happen. As a matter of fact, I would say that I get a good chuckle much more often here than back home. Some of my favorite times here are is when I tell my students stories of my observations. They enjoy the levity and I usually leave them in fits.

They see the world around them much differently than I do and that makes for great storytelling.

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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I've always been like one of those manic depressives on the strong drugs, that prevent them getting depressed but they never get wildly elated either, except in my case I'm not depressed.  Hmm not making much sense here, I'll try another tack.

 

I've never really got extraordinarily happy, I like a laugh, but that's usually to stand up comedy, Billy Connolly Jasper Carrot etc. I'm a pretty serious person, even, (or some would say especially) when I'm drunk. So, no, I don't think China has changed my sense of humour (such as it is) at all. Of course it's changed my outlook on life quite a bit, but that is for another thread.

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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Shifu

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i guess so...........Look at me........i post a joke or two and i get dozens of thumbs downs........i guess they think my jokes are not even a bit funny.........but to say the truth i met some really funny chinese along the way...but to think of it.....those chinese all study abroad so i guess you can understand my point here

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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Shifu

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Just a every now and then session of Eddie Murphy (Delrious or Raw), chuck in some Billy Connolly as well your humor will never go away.

mArtiAn:

  Don't forget Bill Hicks, Steven Wright, Peter Kay, Jimmy Carr, George Carlin, Kevin Hart, Bill Bailey, more Jimmy Carr, LOUIS CK, Ricky Gervais, and Jimmy Carr.

11 years 30 weeks ago
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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
Posts: 497

Shifu

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Increased :) 

Because instead of being angry I usually smile and laugh.

Btw. I understand why we (expats) are taken as "serious" or "still pissed off"... seeing some of them (us) on the street in 90% they look like Vesuvius looking at Pompeii few minutes before blow... 
For me - smile is what I wear everyday Smile Not "kid in candy shop" - this was during first visits... Now... just smiling with sympathy.

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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I am ex-military, so my sense of humor tends to be dark & twisted.  Has China changed it?  I think it has changed how I share it.  In the US, I would be with a friend, see something funny, point and make a snide comment and we would both be in stitches.

 

Here, my humor takes a WHOLE lot more explanation and even then it is often met with blank non-comprehending stares.  Now I use my humor to entertain myself more than others.  In the US it was the other way around.

thedude:

I completely understand.

11 years 30 weeks ago
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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
Posts: 1201

Shifu

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well.....Thumb me down again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again ..ohh.....and again........wait for a minute i need to get a breath here....and AGAIN

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
Posts: 796

Shifu

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These can give you my answer;

世界上最没用的东西就是工资条,看了生气,擦屁股太细.shi jie shang zui mei yong de dong xi jiu shi gong zi tiao,kan le sheng qi,ca pi gu tai xi.

Things of the  most useless in the world are payslips,making people angry just taking a glance at them while being too thin for ass wipe.

 

我从不说谎,除了这句话以外。wo cong bu shuo huang,chu le zhe ju hua yi wai.

I never lie,except this one.

 

广告看得好好的,突然蹦出个电视剧。guang gao kan de hao hao de ,tu ran beng chu ge dian shi ju.

A teleplay pops up while i am enjoying the ads.

 

不吃饱哪有力气减肥?bu chi bao na you li qi jian fei?

How could i get energy to lose weight if i don't eat enough at first?

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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i am sitting in a coffee shop here in hangzhou the waitress has a nametag on that says darcy and i call her by this name she has no idea what i am talking about. i point to her name she looks at like shes never seen it before.  in other there are million things a day to make me chuckle here everyday....

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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I saw a t-shirt today, emblazoned across the front was

 

SCREW ME!

 

I almost fell off my ebike and I still don't know if it was a mistake or on purpose.

 

P.S. If I was single yes I would of.

WhiteBear:

some wears it not even knowing what is written on it ;)
just "english letters" 

and I see that some t-shirt makers also do not know... 

11 years 30 weeks ago
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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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On my first trip to China , the hotel staff told one of my friends that I was drunk again, because I was always laughing and carrying on. I've never been drunk in China, I just always try to have fun. If I can make people laugh around me, it picks me up too.

 In China I can use some of my old stuff without being old too. I found many Chinese liked me because I make them laugh.

 Anything is fair game for me to make fun of, even things I've done. I totalled a collector car one night and a train hit what was left of it. That provided jokes from me and everyone else for along time. I'm a certified maniac. I have to have a sense of humour.

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11 years 30 weeks ago
 
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I think some people get depressed when they're here. 

Hugh.G.Rection:

Nevermind, this is NOT a dig at you, I promise!

 

But, if China makes someone depressed surely they would be better leaving? China, like any nation, is not suitable for all types of people. I just feel for those who are born here who find it unsuitable or depressing.

11 years 30 weeks ago
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lokethebloke:

Well said Hugh.

11 years 30 weeks ago
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nevermind:

I was really depressed when I first arrived. It's a hard move... eventually people get used to it.

11 years 30 weeks ago
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Posts: 18

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One day last winter, I stepped onto the Shanghai metro to go home from work. Everyone was looking pissed off, and nobody was talking. As I tried to walk across the carriage my shoes peeled off my feet, one by one, stuck to the floor.

 

Somebody had spilt some industrial strength glue, and I guess when an ayi had helpfully tried to mop it up, instead she spread it evenly all over the floor of the carriage. So all the way home, I watched people goose-stepping about the carriage, making big velcro-style sticking noises, losing shoes, stumbling over onto each other - and generally they were getting madder and madder about it. The surprise on the faces of people as they joined the train, each stop over and over again...I couldn't contain myself and I started to laugh. Once I started, I couldn't stop. That made everyone even more angry, and they were glaring at me, the crazy laowai sitting on her own with tears dripping off her nose and cheeks, crying crying crying with laughter.

 

I love these things about China. They were the things that upset and confused me when I first arrived because I felt threatened by the unexpectedness of it all. There's an improv artist in the US who started a movement, 'no pants subway' based upon exactly this kind of confusing social situation. I'd like to add it's 'pants' in the American sense of the word (trousers) and not the UK meaning (knickers).

 

Embrace the unexpected! Join the ranks of the hysterical! You'll enjoy it...

Xpat.John:

I think I would also be laughing and crying if I saw that.  Too funny.

11 years 30 weeks ago
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Hugh.G.Rection:

Reminds me of a very old joke:

 

A man walks into a bar and stands in a huge pile of dog shit. He cusses and gingerly removes his shoes walks to the toilets and cleans himself.

Just as he leaves the toilets he sees another man walking into the bar, but before he can say anything the second man stands in the dog shit too.

The first man then says to the second man, "Hey sorry man, I did that!"

So the second man punches him on the nose!

11 years 30 weeks ago
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