Niubi! The Real Chinese You Were Never Taught in School

ZF

Short for 政府 zhèngfǔ (jung foo), which means “government.” ZF is often used in place of the Chinese characters so as not to attract the attention of the government censoring mechanism, which can be triggered by sensitive keywords.

JC

Stands for 警察 jǐngchá (jeeng cha), which means “police” or “police officer.”

FB

Stands for 腐败 fǔbaì (foo buy). Means “corruption” in Chinese, and since corrupt officials are often wined and dined, people now ironically say fǔbaì to refer to going out to a fancy restaurant, going on vacation, or otherwise treating oneself to something nice.

FZL or 非主流 fēizhǔliú (fay joo lew-liú rhymes with “pew”)

An “alternative” or “counterculture” person, usually rebellious and young with some sort of extreme style-elaborate hairstyle, piercings, unusual and edgy clothes, etc.-probably involving a great deal of influence from Japanese pop culture.

FQ or 愤青 fènqīng (fen cheeng)

Angry youth, patriotic youth. Coined in Hong Kong during the 1970s to refer to young people agitating for reform in Chinese society, but now used on the Internet to refer to extremely patriotic (or depending on your view of them, nationalistic) Chinese with aggressive stances on a number of political issues. Very broadly speaking, fènqīng tend to be virulently anti-Japanese and militantly opposed to Taiwanese and Tibetan independence. The issues at stake are complicated, and fènqīng attitudes can seem contradictory to anyone not familiar with their nuances. They often seem to unconditionally defend anything the Chinese government does but are simultaneously highly critical of that government for what they feel is too soft a stance on the core issues mentioned above. And they may exhibit intense xenophobia and call westernized Chinese “race traitors” while also believing that China should eventually democratize. Critics of fènqīng derogatorily call them 粪青 fènqīng (fen cheeng), a play on words that is pronounced the same as fènqīng but means “shit youth,” or just 粪 fènfèn (fen fen): “shit.”

人肉搜索 rén ròu sōusuǒ (ren roe so swuh)

Literally “human flesh search engine.” Refers to the phenomenon of Internet users hunting down people in real life.

草根网民 cǎogēn wǎngmín (tsow gehn wahng meeng)

Self-described ordinary citizens (in mainland China) who generally don’t have much of a voice, but who are slowly discovering the power of the Internet in helping to bring about social change (mainly in less sensitive areas like environmental protection, animal rights, labor rights, property rights, and rights for the disabled. Certain areas, however, cannot be touched without suffering consequences, such as attempting to organize politically). Literally “grassroots netizens” (a translation from the English).

晒黑族 shaìhēi zú (shy hay dzoo)

Literally “those who expose injustice.” It refers to people on the Chinese mainland who use the Internet to help expose or publicize injustice: for example by mass blogging about an incident on many different Web servers in order to overcome possible online censorship. Every Web host seems to have different censoring criteria, and thus something that gets blocked or deleted on one host server may not get censored on another.

别太 CNN bié tài CNN (byih tie CNN)

Literally “don’t be too CNN,” meaning don’t lie or distort the truth. When antigovernment rioting broke out in Lhasa in 2008, a perceived pro-Tibet, anti-China bias in Western media coverage provoked a rising tide of nationalism and anger among many Chinese. Someone started a Web site called Anti-CNN.com, with the slogan “Don’t be too CNN!” and dedicated to showing examples of truth distortion in the Western media’s China reporting. For example, one of the most hotly disputed photos, taken from the CNN Web site, portrayed two Tibetan men running away from Chinese military trucks rumbling ominously into town, but Anti-CNN posted the uncropped version of the photo that showed a group of Tibetan rioters throwing stones at the vehicles. Anger about media bias centers on CNN in particular because not long after the riots the CNN commentator Jack Cafferty outraged the public by referring to the Chinese as “a bunch of goons and thugs” during an on-air discussion about Chinese imports to the United States. Several (extremely dirty, profanity-filled) Chinese rap songs about the evils of “being too CNN” are also circulating on the Internet.

树洞贴 shù dòng tiē (shoo dohng tyih)

Literally “tree-hole post.” The Wong Kar Wai movie In the Mood for Love closes with the protagonist traveling to the remains of an ancient temple in Cambodia, finding a small hole among the ruins, and whispering into it. The scene is based on a (perhaps made-up) saying that in the past, people would find a small hole in a tree, hide a secret in it, and then seal the hole with mud, to be kept hidden forever. In online parlance, shù dòng tiē refers to a popular trend of posting secrets anonymously on the Internet-anything ranging from one’s salary to marital problems and beyond. People who do this are called 晒密族 shaìmì zú (shy me dzoo), literally “secret revealers,” or 晒客族 shaìkè zú, literally “information exhibitionists.”

我出来打酱油的 wǒ chūlaí dǎ jiàngyóu de (wuh choo lie dah jyung yo duh)

Literally, “I’m just out buying soy sauce.” This phrase, along with “soy sauce guy,” swept the Chinese Internet by storm thanks to a widely viewed Guangzhou TV news clip of a reporter asking an average man on the street his opinion of the latest celebrity scandal. The man famously replied “关我屌事, 我出来打酱油的” “Guān wǒ diǎo shì, wǒ chūlai dǎ jiàngyóu de” (gwun wuh dyow shih, wuh choo lie dah jyung yo duh)-“I don’t give a shit, I’m just out buying soy sauce.” Internet users have taken up the phrase “buying soy sauce” as a cynical euphemism for “It’s none of my business” or “Who gives a fuck?” On the Chinese version of Facebook and other popular sites, one now commonly finds, among the possible answers to online polls, “I’m just buying soy sauce.”

酱油男 jiàngyóu nán (jahng yo nahn)

Soy sauce guy. Indicating someone who ignores stupid shit.

很黄,很暴力 hěn huáng, hěn bàolì (hun hwahng, hun baow lee)

Literally “very yellow [pornographic], very violent.” This phrase became all the rage because of a news broadcast on CCTV (China Central Television, which is state owned and thus considered a government tool) about government regulation of the Internet. A thirteen-year-old girl being interviewed about her impression of the Internet used the phrase to describe what she had ostensibly seen online. Chinese Internet users have mockingly taken up the phrase and now use it in all sorts of different contexts, or simply use the same sentence structure and substitute different adjectives besides “yellow” and “violent” to fit whatever they are talking about.

别太 CCTV bié tài CCTV (byih tie CCTV)

Don’t be too CCTV. Meaning don’t bullshit or be a tool or espouse propaganda. Came about after the 很黄,很暴力 hěn huáng, hěn bàolì incident (previous entry) on China ’s state-owned TV station.

很傻,很天真 hěn shǎ, hěn tiānzhēn (hun shah, hun tyinn jen)

Literally “very foolish, very naive.” This phrase became popular after Hong Kong pop star Gillian Chung said it during a news conference. She was apologizing after pictures of her having sex with another celebrity, Edison Chen, were exposed on the Internet. Chinese Internet users were amused because it of its similarity to 很黄,很暴力 hěn huáng, hěn bàolì (page 163).