Getting Nuts About Standard Chinese, By Learning About the Chinese Names of Nuts

-

Hanbridge Mandarin

In pursuing the need to teach Mandarin Chinese, it's important to deviate from the old-fashioned Chinese language education (read here). Instead, we need to get people interested in basic vocabulary. This would be a good exercise to learn from basic sentence making and conversations. 

Here's an example of what's called bon toi back in my day. Let's think of learning Chinese through nuts.

  • Question: 你想要巴西坚果、核桃、杏仁还是腰果? (Nǐ xiǎng yào bāxī jiānguǒ, hétáo, xìngrén háishì yāoguǒ)
    • Translation: Do you want brazil nuts, walnuts, almonds, or cashews?
  • Answer: 我想要杏仁，非常感谢. (Wǒ xiǎng yào xìngrén, fēicháng gǎnxiè.)
    • Translation: I want to have almonds, please, thank you very much.
However, there's a mistake in the chart because the coconut isn't a nut. Instead, it's a coconut fruit of the coconut tree, of the coconut palm family. The song was written by Filipino musician Ryan Cayabyab. 

Now, it's time to enjoy learning Chinese through learning about nuts! 

Popular posts from this blog

Indonesia's Barito Group's $5 Billion Offer to Buy EDC isn't an Trojan Horse for Invasion, It's an INVESTMENT

-
Image
Some time ago, I remember writing about Jollibee's acquisition of Shabu All Day  and Compose Coffee . It might be easy to scream to the top of one's lungs, "Pinoy pride! The Philippines is taking over the world ! However, when news like t he recent plan of the Barito Group from Indonesia to purchase the Energy Development Corporation of the Lopezes  for $5 Billion (which might be in USD) arrived, I'm getting comments like: "This should be blocked by the Philippine Competition Commission!" "Foreign ownership of such a big percentage of our electrical generating capacity might have national security implications." "What does this mean for the Philippines' energy future? Maybe a higher price increase? The Philippines is selling everything! "The Philippines has its own but keeps selling everything." I wonder if the same people who are writing their comments danced, thinking that the Philippines was "conquering the world" th...
Read more

A Tale of Two Economic Policies: Why Vietnam's Doi Moi BEATS the Filipino First Policy

-
Image
Updated on: July 18, 2026 Last July 7, 2026, I read an article from ABS-CBN called " A tale of two economies: Why the Philippines now lags Vietnam ". I found the art above on Facebook; perhaps it's AI art that shows the Philippines lagging behind Vietnam. The Philippines used ot be ahead, but what happened? Speaking of ABS-CBN, I'm still reminded of how the network has the tendency to be hostile to constitutional reform. Now, putting that aside, I'd like to share an excerpt from the article, for a start: The Philippine Department of Economy, Planning, and Development (DEPDev) admitted that the Philippines has been on a slow growth pace for the past decades. Secretary Arsenio Balisacan said many ASEAN neighbors have outgrown the country, including Vietnam. “If you’re asking why we are poor, the big part of the story is the country has not grown as fast as our neighbors,” Balisacan said. Comparing the Philippines to other ASEAN neighbors, Singapore’s GNI per capita ...
Read more

Real Talk: No MNCs In Their Right Mind, Would Ever AGREE to That Ridiculous 60-40 Proposal

-
Image
Here's another art I found on Facebook. Some time ago, I wrote about how the 60-40 policy may not prohibit, while still discouraging FDIs from entering . It's plain common sense, really, that nobody would want to rent a space if they had to part with 60% of their net profits to the lessor (read here ).  It annoys me to think that certain Netizens on Facebook are still blaming government corruption over the 60-40 policy. That can get annoying. I can link the 60-40 policy to government corruption . After all, corrupt officials want to perpetuate their stay in power through an ignorant and impoverished population. However, blaming corruption alone is really downright stupid. Some say investors are going to Communist Vietnam because the Communist Party of Vietnam-Vietnam People's Army is serious about cracking corruption. However, the reality is that, ironically, Communist Vietnam has more reasonable economic restrictions compared to the Philippines (read here ). Only a few sec...
Read more