Tien bu do! Tien bu do! Wa bu ming bai! Leave me alone!

I'm sure that all the people that talk at us mean well, but they don't seem to understand our two phrases for "I don't understand!" Well, they do, but then they start talking to us again. I wondered if maybe when we say "I don't understand" they switch from Lonevalleyhua to Putonghua (i.e. the local Lone Valley dialect to the standard Mandarin), but Mum said no.

Embarrasing situation last night. A mother comes over with her baby--toddler--and sits down. The toddler starts patting Susie's knee--no, whapping Susie's knee--and the mother comes up with the catch phrase. "Dje-dje, dje-dje!" That means "big sister, big sister". You say the first dje kind of normal, and then you rise the tone almost like a question and not quite for the otehr dje. But I don't think you'll need that any time soon. Well, the woman keeps saying things to Susie and she keeps saying (after a little help from me) "Tien bu do! Tien bu do!" and then there's this other phrase, "Wa bu ming bai!" Niether one works perfectly--but we forgot to use the "wa bu ming bai" at this time. So the woman finally gives up and walks away, but not before the toddler hugged Dje-dje.

I've been called Dje-dje twice. Once there was a foreigner who was talking to a little Chinese kid, and I was one of the Dje-djes. Mum was A-yi, which is aunt. Then another time we were also sitting around and this woman and toddler comes up and says, "Dje-dje! Dje-dje!" (pointing to Susie) and then she turns to me and goes, "A-yi! A-yi!" Oops. You might not be able to tell from my profile picture, but I'm--um--oh, what is the word--precocious in body and that causes a lot of people to think I'm older than I really am. When Mum was training at this college to go overseas, I had to patiently explain to some fellow train-ee that I was her daughter and Susie was not my daughter. She finally got it. And I have to explain to Kitty that I am not a teacher at the college or anywhere, I am simply the age of a middle school student. Well, Kitty is always trying to say something to me in Chinese and I keep telling her I don't speak it. Perhaps she's the sort of person you must speak to about sixteen times before they finally get it. Kitty's pretty nice, though.

The second time I was called Dje-dje was when Uncle Charles (who just came down and brought us yummy yummy cornflakes) wanted me to take Neal to the bathroom in Thailand. He said, "Well, Neal, I guess you're going to have to go with dje-dje and she'll find the bathroom for you." Then he turns to me, holds out Neal's hand and goes, "Dje-dje?"

Oh, well, I like the way you just call everybody here by a word of famlial relationships. For example, if you knew a lot of Chinese to carry on suitable conversation with a little old grandmother running a shop, you would probably addresss her as "grandmother" or if she were younger, "aunt". That's fine with me, I just hope that the little toddlers go around catching the stomach bug that Susie got. Don't worry, it was just a quick little thing and she's almost better now.
Saro