@yingtai@zirk.us
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

yingtai

@yingtai@zirk.us

Singapore, she/her, Xennial. Today I learnt. ADD, myofascial pain, long covid, mental health. Occasional BDSM. Four-footed kitten furry!

All images are described. Boosts OK. Note: I have a lot of mute settings on. My apologies if you get caught in them.

I am my own avatar/banner artist. My avatar is a boxed A that looks like Chinese calligraphy, and my banner is Chinese calligraphy held in an open palm.

This profile is from a federated server and may be incomplete. Browse more on the original instance.

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

Undersea cable breaks “happen every other day, about 200 times a year. The reason websites continue to load...is because of the thousand or so people living aboard 20-some ships stationed around the world, who race to fix each cable as soon as it breaks.” https://www.theverge.com/c/24070570/internet-cables-undersea-deep-repair-ships

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

I remember someone compiled a list of platforms that don't mind explicit content, but I can't seem to find it again. Does anyone have the link? Boosts welcome.

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

This journey through #Mandarin Chinese has got me wondering. Will there be a simplified English one day? Will there be some mirror image of me trying to learn traditional English as an adult, wondering how the hell people put up with this for so long?

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

Damn. The malicious xz code came from someone with a very Singaporean name. It's so local that it jumped out at me when I first saw it, and it confuses people trying to compare it to official Chinese transliteration standards.

The Singaporean government would never pick a name like that for a clandestine international operation. But if someone is trying to look like a generic Singaporean or Malaysian Chinese, they're doing an unusually good job.

@rakyat any thoughts?

https://boehs.org/node/everything-i-know-about-the-xz-backdoor

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@rakyat agreed, Tan is probably the most common surname in Singapore, and Tan Jia Cheong looks like a really generic male-coded Hokkien name to me. Though my Hokkien is terrible and I don't know any other dialects, so I can't do dialect forensics. :)

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@rakyat hang on, I guess I'd better check whether we really agree. You said "Malaysia and elsewhere"? My impression was that people outside Singapore and Malaysia would not use that three-word format (Tan Jia Cheong) or mix Mandarin with southern dialects in the English transliteration of the name.

EllieK, (edited ) to animals
@EllieK@mstdn.ca avatar

Technical Cat Question

Edit: I have decided, as we have no guests, to store it in the guestroom cupboard, which has 2 doors!
Zaz has become obsessed with chewing my exercise mat, even rolled up. She finds wherever I hide it, no matter where I put it. If I can reach it, so can she, only more easily. I don't have a cupboard with a door (if I did she would work out how to open it or scratch the door to pieces to try to get in).
Help!

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@EllieK sympathies, I wake up to find bits of my exercise mat scattered around the floor too! And an innocent-looking cat nowhere near them ...

liztai, to random
@liztai@hachyderm.io avatar

Creating a Mandarin-learning routine for myself

Not easy when your brain rebels at the thought of routines and quickly forgets them. But I'm going to focus on one tiny thing at the time and adjust as I go along. This post is part 1 of a series of logs of the process.

http://elizabethtai.com/2024/03/19/creating-a-mandarin-learning-routine-for-myself/

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@liztai it's always interesting to hear what your experience learning Mandarin is like, because mine is so similar and yet so different. We're both heritage learners in Southeast Asia, and we're both trying to level up to HSK4.

But you have a great foundation in speaking Mandarin. I sound like a 3-year-old! I did calligraphy and Mandarin in school, so I can copy beautifully. But I did the bare minimum for school, so I can't read the newspaper even at my snail's speed.

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

I am charmed to learn that #Mandarin has a measure word for small things one has to be cautious with. The word is 枚 méi, and you can use it for eggs, grenades, and rings.

I've never heard it used myself, so I'd love to have this confirmed by someone else.

https://chineseedge.com/complete-list-of-mandarin-chinese-classifiers-and-measure-words/

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@rakyat Thank you! I always value your opinion on Mandarin because it's so hard to find out from online sources what sounds right in our part of the world.

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@rakyat That's fascinating, and not in my dictionary at all! And thank you for the explanation, because when I saw your example, my first interpretation was grenades rather than the eggs or rings. :D

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

Guide Dogs UK has a very important announcement for anyone with tattoos, a beard, an unconventional hairstyle, etc. You are needed to play with puppies.

"We’re issuing a national appeal for volunteers with distinctive characteristics to help socialise the next generation of guide dogs. Our new research shows that 1 in 5 (20 %) of dog owners revealed their dogs have shown signs of fear or confusion when encountering unfamiliar physical attributes." https://bit.ly/3PgRTOc

A woman with blonde and brown hair and facial tattoos and piercings wearing Guide Dogs branded navy blue scrubs whilst holding and smiling at a young black Labrador guide dog puppy. There is a grassy area and fence in the background.
A man with a long beard and long hair tied in a ponytail wearing navy blue branded Guide Dogs scrubs holding a young yellow Labrador guide dog puppy and smiling. There is a grassy area and fence in the background.
From left to right sitting in a row, a man with numerous blue coloured facial tattoos, a woman with facial tattoos and piercings and another man with long hair and a very long beard – all are wearing navy blue Guide Dogs branded scrubs. The first man is holding a toy for two young guide dog pups (yellow Labradors) to play with. The woman holds a young yellow Labrador puppy in her lap and is also holding a stuffed duck. The last man is holding a young yellow Labrador guide dog puppy on his lap, whilst holding a stuffed toy that the pup is playing with. There is a grassy area and fence in the background.

ThunderHoneySnow, to linguistics
@ThunderHoneySnow@mas.to avatar

I've got a seven-day streak going in both French and Mandarin on duolingo. Sadly, duolingo doesn't do traditional Chinese so I have to supplement with my textbooks from Taiwan but I'm enjoying it for listening and vocabulary. And the French is not Canadian! The app doesn't believe that 'bon matin' is 'good morning'.

#Mandarin #TraditionalChinese #SimplifiedChinese #French #CanadianFrench #Language #DailyPractice

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@ThunderHoneySnow I'm trying to learn simplified and traditional Chinese at the same time too! I rely a lot on that little shortcut in Pleco's sidebar to give myself traditional practice on their ebooks.

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

On this beautiful sunny day, I discovered that if I look up stroke order for the traditional character 肅 in three different places, I get three different results.

Taiwanese Ministry of Education https://www.moedict.tw/%E8%82%85

Hong Kong Ministry of Education https://www.edbchinese.hk/lexlist_en/

The Pleco mobile app seems to represent mainland China. Why does China have official guidelines for traditional characters, you ask? I know not. Singapore certainly doesn't. But China does.

Welcome to Babel.

#Mandarin

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@rakyat that's what Pleco did! And I think that's the China stroke order for simplified characters. I've heard that their traditional stroke order is similar to their traditional stroke order so it is nice to see an example of it.

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@rakyat true! But the cool thing about this learning journey I've been on has been the realisation that even simple characters have different orders. Like 木 can be written with the shu first in cursive so the heng and pie and na can flow into each other.

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

It's interesting, what I'm seeing in the current Chinese Primary 1 textbooks. They're using Singaporean terms like 巴士 for "bus", but they're also teaching the formal pronoun 您 that nobody bothered with during my childhood, and so far I haven't caught a single concession to local pronunciation. #Mandarin

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

My brother was disgusted to hear they're working so hard to teach the polite pronoun, but I think it's nice that the next generation will be able to insult our cousins from the motherland on purpose instead of accidentally. :) #Mandarin

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

Funny thing about getting better at mending. I'm getting fast and sure, yes - but I'm also unpicking a lot more. Because now I have standards!

While celebrating this with my brother and my buddy, they told me they don't know how to mend. Huh. I never thought about it, but I had years of needlework in school, so of course I'm not at the bottom of the curve. But they didn't teach us mending.

It is very rewarding. But it does take time and knowhow. It's a shame it's such a lost skill.

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

And apparently, experienced needleworkers all sew in a way that's easy to unpick. If stitches were smaller, a seam ripper would have a hard time getting into them. If they were bigger, there'd be gaps in your clothes.

Reminds me of the way experienced coders write documentation that will make sense to their future selves.

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

“With sadness and shame I inform you that 11,000 tons of clothes in the textile dump were burned.”

The world's leading clothing brands have been dumping unsold clothes in Chile's Atacama Desert. And then it got burned down when someone tried to bring it to the attention of the law. It's a heck of a story.

https://www.wired.com/story/fashion-disposal-environment/

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

Your Eco-Friendly Lifestyle Is a Big Lie

Eating organic and switching to low-energy light bulbs feels like the green thing to do, but are people missing the bigger opportunities right in front of them?

https://www.wired.com/story/eco-friendly-myth/?bxid=63c18bbf8e40ad38790ccbe6

jonny, to random
@jonny@neuromatch.social avatar

in the same way that we have thermometers and display temperature, given covid we should have the cubic feet per second of ventilation and CO2 meters as basic measurements of the habitability of a room.

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@jonny may I suggest air changes per hour (ACH) instead of cubic feet per second? https://smartairfilters.com/en/blog/what-is-air-changes-per-hour-ach-how-to-calculate/

I believe the CDC currently recommends at least 5 air changes per hour in occupied spaces. https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/community/ventilation.html

Minimus, to random
@Minimus@archaeo.social avatar

fabula murina (mouse story) XXV
"olim, Minimus surgit e lecto laneo. (One day, Minimus gets up from his woolly bed.) culina vacua est. (The kitchen is empty.) nemo domi adest. (Nobody is at home). omnia silent. (Everything is quiet)."
#fabulamurina

yingtai,
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

@Minimus what a great drawing! I love Minimus's nervous expression!

yingtai, to random
@yingtai@zirk.us avatar

Worrying essay on nationalism and misogyny in Chinese interpretations of the Three-Body series. https://madeinchinajournal.com/2023/12/11/the-three-body-problem-the-imperative-of-survival-and-the-misogyny-of-reactionary-rhetoric/

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