Category: Chinese Words&Phrases

促狭(cō kē) (Shanghainese phrase)
Tricky, mean, sinister, vicious, hard to deal with
Many say this is another pidgin English term widely used by Shanghai locals. This term, 促狭(co ke), sounds very similar to the English word "trick" and shares some meanings of the word "tricky."
The Shanghainese phrase is now almost always used with a derogatory connotation. It may be used to describe a person who is mean and tricky. It may also be used to depict a move made by your opponent which makes it very difficult for you to respond or counteract, such as in play of chess. So, you may say he or she has made a 促狭(co ke) move.
When 促狭(co ke) is used to describe remarks and texts, it means they are malicious or have a double meaning.
However, occasionally, the phrase can be used among close friends in a playful and lighthearted manner. For instance, if your friend pulls your leg in a mischievous manner, you may say: "You are so 促狭."

腻心(nǐ xīn)(Shanghainese phrase)
Dirty, filthy, nauseating, disgusting, revolting
When a native Shanghainese sees something thatís filthy or disgusting, he would call it 腻心(ni xin). The first character in the Shanghai dialectic phrase means literally "oily," "icky" or "fed up." The second character means the "heart." So, if you feel that something is "icky" or "fed up" in your heart, it must be disgusting in one way or the other.
However, this phrase may also be used to describe a person if he or she is wearing very dirty clothes or clothes of disgusting taste, or acting in an unpleasant and revolting manner. In such cases, one may say, "He's such a 腻心person."

3Q战争(sān Q zhàn zhēng)
360-QQ Battle
The term refers to a battle over alleged unfair business practices between Tencent, operator of the popular instant-messaging software QQ, and Qihoo 360, China's biggest antivirus service provider. The battle escalated as Tencent stopped service to QQ users whose computers were detected to have installed Qihoo 360's software. It ended following mediation by China's government.

豆腐渣婚姻(dòu fu zhā hūn yīn)
jerry-built marriage
Some people have described the marriage of a rising number of young couples born in the 1980s as a building constructed with poor materials: hastily made and readily collapsible, on the grounds that these young couples meet by speed dating, get a hurried marriage and then break up shortly after.

恐归族 （kǒng guī zú）
home-going phobia clan
The term refers to people who plan to return home for the annual family reunion during the Spring Festival but are put off by the high travel costs and crowded transportation. Most of these people are migrant workers, who have to stay in the area where they work to spend the festival holidays as train tickets are sold out and they can’t afford planes.

火锅婚姻(huǒ guō hūn yīn)
hotpot marriage
Chinese netizens have compared marriage to the hotpot, where the romantic love before marriage represents the base of the broth and assorted difficulties faced in everyday life are the seasonings. It turns out that some couples make perfect hotpot, while others spoil it.

电视棒(diàn shì bàng)
TV USB drive
USB drives believed to be capable of picking up overseas TV channels once inserted into a computer with Internet access have been hawked illegally at some electronics markets in China, which bans unauthorized viewing of foreign channels.

萝卜招聘(luó bo zhāo pìn)
hand-picked employment
Some local governments in China are reported to have held job fairs that are apparently open to everyone but in fact vacancies have been reserved for the offspring of local heavyweights. The expression literally means “radish employment,” as a Chinese saying goes that each radish fits a single hole, meaning exclusiveness.

隔代结婚（ge2 dai4 jie2 hun1）
intergenerational marriage
The term refers to the marriage of two people with a distinct generation/age gap between them. It spread widely online after an official suggested that women born in the 1980s should marry men born in the 1960s or 1950s, who are older but have accumulated strong economic basis for a family life, during the annual two sessions — Chinese People’s Congress and Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference. The official said young people frustrated by high housing prices and unable to find a spouse their own age could consider marrying those of an older generation.

森林碳汇（sēn lín tàn huì）
forest carbon sinks
The term refers to a kind of economical environmental protection method of building more forests to accumulate carbon-containing chemical compounds for an indefinite period. The approach gained popularity after it was mentioned by some during the annual two sessions.