Niubi! The Real Chinese You Were Never Taught in School

Fuck-related profanity

肏 cào, more commonly written 操 cāo (both pronounced tsow)

Fuck. The character 肏 is visually quite graphic, as it is composed of 入 rù (roo), meaning “enter,” and 肉 ròu (row), meaning “meat.” 肏 is technically the correct character for “fuck,” but because it is not included in most computer or phone-character input systems, and because it’s just so uncomfortably dirty looking, most people write the homophonous 操 (which actually means “hold”). Thus I have written 操 for the rest of the terms in this chapter that use the word. But remember, technically, it should be 肏. (For those of you who pay attention to pinyin tones, I also render the syllable as fourth tone every time even though 操 is first tone, since that’s pretty much how it always comes out sounding. In general, though, with colloquial expressions like these you shouldn’t get too hung up on which tone is technically accurate since it’s not always fixed.)

我操 wŏ cào (wuh tsow)

Fuck! An extremely common exclamation for all occasions-when you’re pissed off, impressed, amazed, or whatever. Literally, “I fuck.” (As a side note, many Chinese are amused when they hear English speakers say “what’s up?” or “wassup?” because it sounds to them like wŏ cào.) When saying “fuck” alone, it’s much more usual to say wŏ cào than to say just 操 cào (tsow); northern Chinese, however, do often use cào alone as an interjection, especially between clauses. For example: “I had a really bad morning, fuck, had a car accident on my way to work.”

操你妈 cào nǐ mā (tsow nee ma)

Fuck you! Literally, “Fuck your mother!” An extremely common obscenity.

操你大爷 cào nǐ dàye (tsow nee dah yeh)

Fuck you! Literally, “Fuck your grandfather!” Northern and southern Chinese use different words for grandparents, so this one is used in northern China only. This is marginally less strong than cào nǐ mā (above) because it’s generally considered more offensive to curse someone’s female relatives than their male relatives. You can insert any relative into this construction; for example northern Chinese might say 操你奶奶 cào nǐ nǎinai (tsow nee nigh nigh): literally, “Fuck your grandmother.” See the entries after 日 rì (page 39) for the southern versions.

操你妈的屄 cào nǐ mā de bī (tsow nee ma duh bee)

Fuck you! Literally, “Fuck your mother’s cunt,” and stronger than the two expressions above since you’re adding another obscene word, bī, or “pussy,” on top of cào.

操屄 càobī (tsow bee)

Fuck. Can be exclaimed alone or used as an intensifier. Literally, “fuck pussy.”

操蛋 càodàn (tsow dahn)

Literally “fuck egg.” (See the previous chapter for why eggs are used in insults.) Can be exclaimed alone, like “Fuck!” or “Oh fuck!” and can also be used as an adjective to mean that someone is bad or inept, as in 你真肏蛋 nǐ zhēn càodàn (nee jen tsow dahn), which means “You’re a real stupid fuck.”

操行 càoxing (tsow sheeng)

A dirty and insulting way to refer to someone’s appearance or behavior. Literally “fucking behavior” or something like “the behavior of a shitty person.” For example, 你看他那操行, 真受不了 nǐ kàn tā nà càoxíng, zhēn shòubùliao (nee kahn tah tsow sheeng, jen show boo liao) means “Look at his shit behavior, it’s totally unacceptable.” The term can also be an adjective meaning “shameful” or “disgusting,” as in 你真操行 nǐ zhēn càoxíng (nee jen tsow sheeng), or “You’re really fucking disgusting.”

操你八辈子祖宗! Cào nǐ bā bèizi zǔzōng! (wuh tsow nee bah bay dz dzoo dzohng)

Fuck eight generations of your ancestors! An extremely strong insult: stronger than cào nǐ mā (above). It’s always specifically eight or eighteen generations that are cursed in this insult. The number eight, 八 bā (bah), is considered lucky in Chinese culture. Thus it is especially significant for misfortune to befall what should be a lucky number of generations.

操你祖宗十八代! Cào nǐ zǔzōng shíbā dài! (tsow nee dzoo dzohng shih bah die)

Fuck eighteen generations of your ancestors! An extremely strong insult. All multiples of nine are significant in Chinese culture because nine, 九 jiǔ (joe), is pronounced the same as the word for “long-lasting,” written 久. Eighteen, 十八 shíbā (shih bah), is itself significant because it sounds like 要发 yào fā (yow fah), which means “one will prosper.”

日 rì (rih)

Southern Chinese slang for “fuck” (and also used a bit in some northern provinces like Shanxi and Shandong.) Its origins most likely come from it sounding like 入 rù (roo), which means “enter” and in ancient China was itself a less dirty way of saying “fuck” (like saying “freaking” instead of “fucking”). Rù is also a component radical for another word for “fuck,” 肏 cào (see page 36). Rì is used the same way as cào-combined with “I” into an exclamation like 我日! Wŏ rì! (wuh rih), meaning “Fuck!” or directed at someone’s mother or relatives or ancestors to mean “Fuck you!” as in 日你妈! Rì nǐ mā! (rih nee ma), literally, “Fuck your mother!”

日你外公 rì nǐ wàigōng (rih nee why gohng)

Fuck you. Literally, “Fuck your grandfather!” Used in southern China.

日你外婆 rì nǐ wàipó (rih nee why pwuh)

Fuck you. Literally, “Fuck your grandmother!” Used in southern China.

干 gān (gahn)

Fuck. In reality, gān is slightly less offensive than cào (see above), partly because it isn’t visually graphic (like 肏). It’s closer in strength to “shit,” but most dictionaries translate it as “fuck.” It can refer to having sex, and the way it’s used grammatically is also closer to “fuck”-it can be yelled alone when you’re pissed off, as in 干! Gān! (gahn) or 干了! Gānle! (gahn luh), or like cào it can followed by a subject (usually someone’s mother). See the next entry for more on this. Also see chapter 5 for how to use gān in the context of describing sex. The character 干 also means “dry,” which has made for more than a few comical mistranslations on Chinese restaurant menus and supermarket signs. Now you’ll know what happened next time you come across “sliced fuck tofu” on a Chinese menu. 干 Gān is also used a lot in fighting contexts because it can also mean “to kill.”

干你娘 gān nĭ niáng (gahn nee nyahng)

Fuck you! Literally, “Fuck your mother!” Used in southern China only (a northerner would always say cào nǐ mā). 娘

Niáng means “mother,” same as 妈 mā (ma), but 干你妈 gān nǐ mā sounds funny in Chinese so niáng is always used instead.

靠 kào (cow)

Damn! A common exclamation to express surprise or anger. 靠 Kào means “to depend upon” in Mandarin, but in the southern Fujianese dialect that the expression originates from (spoken in both Fujian and Taiwan) it’s actually 哭 kū (coo), meaning “to cry.” Kao bei, “cry over your father’s death,” kao bu, “cry over your mother’s death,” and kao yao, “cry from hunger,” are extremely common expressions (implying something like “What’s wrong with you? Did your mother/father just die?” or “Are you dying of starvation?”) and are nasty ways, in this dialect, to tell someone to shut up. However, in its popularization beyond Fujian and Taiwan the meaning has changed to an exclamation equivalent to “Damn!”