This article will describe my reasons for writing articles in Simplified Chinese.I have had two turning points in my life, and I feel that these experiences have made me who I am today.

Why Chinese?

English is probably the most familiar foreign language to Japanese people.

In Japan, students begin to study English at junior high school in my time and now at elementary school.Currently, each elementary school has a class of native English speakers, and the main focus is on conversation.

I studied English when I was a student, and I still find English to be the more readable of the foreign languages when it comes to computer-related reading.

Normally, English would be more familiar to you.

My relationship with China dates back to my childhood.

The first encounter was with the Westward Journey

My childhood was a time when color TV was in widespread use, and cartoons and dramas were aired.One of my favorite dramas was called Saiyuki.

I was not aware that it was a Chinese story at the time, and I still remember enjoying watching the slapstick of Sun Wukong, Tang Sanzang, Sha Wujing and Zhu Bajie.I enjoyed the atmosphere more than the realism.

Later, a comic book called Dragon Ball, inspired by Saiyuki, became popular.I was a comic book fan and read it to completion, and this one is also strong in my old memory.

The next encounter is with the Sanguozhi

My next encounter was a game in high school.

Among PC simulation games, “Sanguozhi” was popular among my friends, along with “Nobunaga’s Ambition” .It was a game based on the conflicts among the three kingdoms of Wei, Wu, and Shu. I was absorbed in the game without knowing the story of Cao Cao, Liu Bang, Sun Quan, Guan Yu, Zhang Fei, Zhuge Liang, and others in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms.

After that, a novel

From late high school through college, I read a great deal of comics and novels, along with computer-related magazines and books.

My novels were mostly science fiction and fantasy, and among them, I enjoyed reading Yoshiki Tanaka’s novels.

He also wrote a novel set in China, which I bought and read, although it was a hardcover book at the time.

It is one of those novels that I would like to read again when I have some spare time.

Assigned to China

After I started working, I could no longer afford to read novels and my relationship with China began to fade.I was so occupied with just living day to day that I had little opportunity to take the time to get to know anything computer-related.

Then, as if by force of habit, I was ordered to go to China.Twice.

First time living in China (turning point 1)

I spent a year in a city near Shanghai.

I had no prior language study, no prerequisite knowledge, and my boss at the time just told me to go for now.I was thrown in with no knowledge of the purpose of the work, not even a single word of Chinese, nor any knowledge of Chinese life.

With the support of expatriates, I was able to establish a good foundation for my daily life and gradually learn daily Chinese conversation and simplified Chinese characters from local interpreters, and managed to learn enough Chinese to live a daily life.

Even so, it was far from a level that could be used for work, and the number of interpreters was insufficient, so we communicated using one language + handwritten text + manga drawings.

As a result, what I found out was the reality that it is impossible to understand Chinese without the basics.

In the opposite sense of the word, I was able to reopen my mind and say, “I can manage to live even if I don’t understand the language”.

Even though Chinese is spoken in Chinese, the dialect is very strong, and I could not understand at all when Shanghainese or the local language was spoken.

Living in China for the second time (turning point 2)

I spent two years in a provincial city in Guangdong province.

The number of words I had learned during my last stay in China had decreased considerably, but since I was not starting from zero, I was able to recall them after a short time.I think it was especially significant that my ears could hear the words.

Nevertheless, I was equally troubled by the difficulty of the dialect.Cantonese is not a four-voice language, but has more types of inflections, and some of the sounds are made from the throat, making them completely inaudible.

By the second time, I was on many business trips within China, and every day I was astonished at how little of my Chinese vocabulary I had.

Nevertheless, I was able to borrow a lighter at the smoking area at the airport, buy cigarettes at a store, and buy beer and snacks at a store near the company housing where I was traveling on business, interacting only a little in my daily life, and by the latter half of the year, I was able to understand about 40% of standard daily conversation.The speaking is not good at all.I could not communicate because my four voices were not proper.

I was inwardly excited when the Chinese bullet train passed near “Red Cliff”.

No major contacts at present

Since returning to Japan after spending a total of three years in China, I have lived a life far removed from China.

I live in the Kanto area, so there are many foreigners, many of them Chinese, but I do not have much contact with them.I frequently hear Chinese in my daily commute.But I have only been asked for directions in Chinese once.

Even at work, there are few opportunities to come in contact with Chinese people.There are Chinese people in the company, but since business is conducted in Japanese, there are no opportunities to speak with them in Chinese.

English and the only other option on the multilingual site is Simplified Chinese

When we decided to create a multilingual site with the Bogo plugin on this site, we chose Simplified Chinese as the other language besides English.

My three years in China were a major turning point in my life, and although I had a lot of hardships at the time, they have been sublimated and now leave me with nothing but pleasant memories.The difficult experience has become a fertilizer deep in my heart.

Compared to other languages, Simplified Chinese is a little more understandable.I can notice when the intent of a translated text is very different.

I chose to return to Simplified Chinese, which I realize has had a significant impact on my life.

Musubi

In making this site multilingual, we wrote an article about why we chose Simplified Chinese for English and one other language.

Although it was only for a short period of three years, living in China has greatly influenced my current way of thinking.That is how stimulating my life in China was every day.

I’m hoping to get Chinese people to read my articles if possible, but the mainstream search in China is Baidu, not Google, and although Yoast SEO has a way to connect to Baidu Webmaster tools, it seems like there are many hurdles to overcome.

I will do some more research and see if I can find an article about it.