My Literacy in Chinese

神: God
魔: Devil
剑: Sword
妖: Demon
仙: Immortal
啊: Ah
呢: Ne
爱: Love
恨: Hate
救: Rescue
杀: Kill
死: Die
错: Wrong
情: Feeling
恩: Gratitude
坐: Sit
战: War
心: Heart
说话: Speak
打: Hit
修练: Practise

I have achieved some degree of literacy in Chinese. It is not bad considering that I was entirely illiterate before. The Husband is most tickled because my vocabulary is entirely limited to 仙侠 words. One of the first words I learnt was 神. Along the way, I discovered that Chinese is a little like playing with Lego. Many words are a composition of parts. There is a 边 for speech words and a 边 for words depicting use of the hands like in 打.

I was thrilled to learn the word 心 because it is a stylised depiction of the actual human heart with the aorta, the pulmonary vein and the pulmonary artery. Clearly, whoever invented Chinese writing, had had some experience with hacking up a human. The word for "sit" is also super cute. It's actually 2 people sitting next to each other. Clearly, sitting is a social thing. One does not sit down alone. One sits with another human. In contrast, the word 杀 has no social aspect to its appearance, even though logically, there should be at least 2 people involved: the killer and the killee.

Interesting language.

The Husband is a quiet man, given to few words. He can sit quietly, reading and thinking for hours. I have learnt to ask him, "你是不是在修练?" because that is apparently what highly evolved immortal beings do all day (cf, 九宸 of 宸汐缘 aka Love and Destiny).

I am not saying that The Husband is a highly evolved immortal being. I am just saying that he spends the better part of his day at home reading and thinking deep thoughts, projecting all the strong, silent hero vibes of a 仙侠 hero. Haven't you noticed that all the 仙侠 heroes are quiet, introverted, expressionless, with no sense of humour... until a special woman comes along whom said hero feels greatly for, whereupon said hero braves dangers of all sorts and even dies (then comes back to life) all to keep said special woman safe?

Whilst I hope I am The Husband's special woman, I am most grateful that we have never had to go through death defying experiences. Then again, still musing, if The Husband has never defied death for me, how do I know that he truly loves me?

Hmmmm....