What is this site about?

We look at words that, when directly translated, have strange or nonsensical meanings. It's a way for all students of Chinese to help understand and learn new vocabulary. But really, this site is an investigation into why the Chinese language kicks ass.

Who made it?

This site was made by me, Chris West! I'm British and I have lived in Fuzhou, Fujian Province for 3 years now, studying Mandarin Chinese, working as an English teacher and taking photographs. If you'd like to see some of my pictures, head over to www.westiseast.co.uk - if you'd like to drop me a line, send an email to mail@thosecrazychinese.com

What language are you using?

The language referred to on this site is Mandarin Chinese. The pinyin system used is the official pinyin system of the Chinese government, now widely taught in favour of previous Western interpretations. The characters shown in pictures are simplified mainland characters, not the same as the ones you'd see in Hong Kong or Taiwan. The definitions and literal intepretations of words are my own. My apologies for any mistakes.

How was this site built?

The website is built using the Open Source Django framework. It's hosted on an Ubuntu machine provided by Fry-IT, the London based web development company I work for. You should browse it using Firefox, IE7+, Safari or Google Chrome - if you don't have any of these, please download a modern browser...it's free.

A small warning!

Sometimes we may look at words that are rude or offensive to some people. I apologise in advance. The website is made for normal people, who want to learn everyday Chinese - this sometimes includes swearwords or sexually-explicit phrases. If you're not comfortable with it, don't come to the site.