|output>[]
{|prose>[
(set: $dissolve to (transition: "dissolve"))
(set: $count to 0)
(live: 0.5s)[
(set: $count to it + 1)
(if: $count is 1)[
(append: ?output)[
]
]
(else-if: $count is 2)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:01 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[R u awake?]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 6)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
<br>
The message pops up in the middle of your social media scrolling. You blink at your phone, still bleary-eyed from sleeping in.
<br>
<br>
Of course the first text you’ve gotten today is from your mother.
<br>
<br>
- [[Reply|2]]
]
]
]
]
]}|output>[]
{|prose>[
(set: $count to 0)
(live: 0.5s)[
(set: $count to it + 1)
(if: $count is 1)[
(append: ?output)[
]
]
(set: $dissolve to (transition: "dissolve"))
(else-if: $count is 2)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:04 AM]
|name>[YOU:]
|chat>[I’m awake.]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 7)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:04 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[R u home?]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 9)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:04 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[Have u eat?]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 12)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:04 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[I will take u to lunch]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 15)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:05 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[Where u want to go?]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 18)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:05 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[I know a good restaurant, have |chinese>[手拉面]]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 25)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
<br>
...What does that mean?!
<br>
<br>
It wouldn’t hurt to ask your mother for clarification, but you want to figure it out yourself, at least this one time.
<br>
<br>
She must be tired of constantly translating for you.
<br>
<br>
- [[Translate|3]]
]
]
]
]
]}|output>[]
{|prose>[
(set: $dissolve to (transition: "dissolve"))
(set: $count to 0)
(live: 0.5s)[
(set: $count to it + 1)
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(append: ?output)[
]
]
(else-if: $count is 2)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:07 AM]
|name>[YOU:]
|chat>[Alright, sounds good. Send me the address.]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 7)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:07 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[OK]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 9)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
|timestamp>[11:07 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[See u there]
]
]
]
(else-if: $count is 16)[
(append: ?output)[$dissolve[
<br>
<br>
- [[Meet up|6]]
]
]
]
]
]}For a Saturday morning, the drive to the restaurant is relatively painless, though you’re concerned about the large group of people milling around the entrance. You check the time — 11:37 AM. Makes sense. Hopefully the queue to get in is shorter than it appears.
A small woman standing apart from the crowd catches your eye. Despite the visor and sunglasses that obscure her face, you recognize her.
- [[Call out to her|7]](click-replace: "最近怎么样")[|english>[How have you been]]\
(click-replace: "你的短头发太难看")[|english>[Your short hair doesn’t look good at all]]\
“Mom!” you exclaim, greeting her with a wave. But you don’t hug her; that’s something reserved for your friends and younger, Westernized relatives. The older people in your family never were the touchy sort.
She turns at the sound of your voice. Her face, usually so stern and rigid, breaks into a small, controlled smile.
“|chinese>[最近怎么样]?” she asks.
“I’ve been good.”
Without missing a beat, your mother wrinkles her nose.
“|chinese>[你的短头发太难看].”
You roll your eyes. By Western standards, she’s being completely rude. By Chinese standards of familial closeness, she’s in the right. At this point, you’ve learned to let go of her constant blunt remarks. “Whatever,” you say, momentarily regressing to your middle-school self.
The conversation goes on like this for a while; she talks to you in Chinese, while you reply in English. Sometimes you have to ask for a translation of a certain phrase or word. Listening to Chinese is easier, but not by much.
Before long, your mother’s name is called, and a waiter leads you to your table.
- [[Take your seat|8]](click-replace: "不错")[|english>[Not bad]]\
A ceramic teapot already sits on the table, waiting. You politely pour a cup for your mother first.
She takes a cautious sip. Upon tasting the tea, her expression changes from one of severity to one of surprised approval. “|chinese>[不错].”
You take her word for it.
- [[Look at the menu|9]]<div align=center><font size="+4">|chinese>[差异] // Disconnect</font>
By Kelly Weng
<img src="https://www.dropbox.com/s/x9vvn1p84usk3na/game%20image.png?raw=1" width="40%" height="40%">
[[START|1]]</div>(click-replace: "我想选择...呢个...原汁牛尾面")[|english>[I think...I’m going to get the oxtail noodle soup]]\
(click-replace: "你要什么")[|english>[What do you want]]\
(click-replace: "牛肉手拉面汤")[|english>[Niúròu shǒu lāmiàn tāng]]\
Flipping through the laminated pages, you scan each of the sections. The menu lists entries first in Chinese, then their rough English translations. You attempt to pick out characters you recognize, but to no avail.
Why do you keep doing this to yourself?
Defeated, you return to English, to the familiarity of the language you’ve grown to accept. To the words and letters and sounds that had sounded so harsh to you back when your world had been limited to just your family, back when you had only known Chinese. But these translations are nothing but pale imitations of the true words, unwieldy and approximate.
“|chinese>[我想选择...呢个...原汁牛尾面],” your mother mutters, half to herself. She looks up from the menu. “|chinese>[你要什么]?” she asks.
You know exactly what you want. Hand-pulled noodles in beef soup. But saying that out loud in English — to your own mother — would feel weird.
You point to the dish on the menu. “How do you say this?”
“|chinese>[牛肉手拉面汤].”
“Niúròu shǒu lāmiàn tāng,” you echo. The pronunciation is easy enough, but the accents worry you.
- [[Flag down a waitress|10]](click-replace: "你好, 点好了马")[|english>[Hi, are you finished deciding]]\
(click-replace: "我要原汁牛尾面")[|english>[I would like the oxtail noodle soup]]\
(click-replace: "还有呢")[|english>[What else]]\
As you try to catch the attention of one of the waitresses, you mentally rehearse what you need to say. <i>Wǒ yào niúròu shǒu lāmiàn tāng.</i> You silently mouth the words, testing the shape of each character.
Thankfully, one of waitresses notices your half-hearted waving. With her notepad and pen at the ready, she briskly makes her way over.
“|chinese>[你好, 点好了马]?” she asks.
Your mother nods. “|chinese>[我要原汁牛尾面].”
“|chinese>[还有呢]?”
- [[Reply|11]]“Wo yao niurou -- ” The sounds that emerge can barely be counted as Chinese. You attempt to force the rest of the accents out, but they stay rooted in your throat, refusing to surface. Warmth creeps over the back of your neck, reaching the tips of your ears.
- [[Try again]]
- [[Give up]](click-replace: "怎么了")[|english>[What’s wrong]]\
What’s the point? Are you trying to regain some sense of pride? Belonging? Caught between cultures, you remain a perpetual foreigner in your home and a stranger to your homeland. When have you ever belonged to either place?
This won’t prove anything to yourself, or anyone else for that matter.
You abandon all efforts to pronounce the Chinese correctly and instead, point to the menu. “I’d like this dish, please.”
“Is that all?” the waitress asks, switching to English.
Something inside your gut twists unpleasantly. Evidently, she’s dealt with her fair share of barely-fluent customers before. Even then, you can’t help but feel ashamed, avoiding eye contact with the waitress as she confirms the order with your mother and then walks away.
Your mother eyes you curiously. “|chinese>[怎么了]?”
- [[Shake your head|12]](click-replace: "牛肉手拉面汤")[|english>[Niúròu shǒu lāmiàn tāng]]\
(click-replace: "怎么了")[|english>[What’s wrong]]\
(click-replace: "对")[|english>[Correct]]\
You review the pinying over again in your head. <i>Wǒ yào niúròu shǒu lāmiàn tāng.</i> How hard can it be?
“Wo yao. Niurou — ”
Each syllable comes out agonizingly slow, in halting, butchered sections. Frustration boils in your chest, rising to your throat in a palpable, red-hot lump. You swallow hard.
“ — Shoulamiantang,” you blurt out, as fast as you can. Like ripping duct tape off of your skin.
The waitress raises an eyebrow.
“|chinese>[牛肉手拉面汤]?” she asks, with perfect pronunciation.
Before you can embarrass yourself further, your mother cuts in. “|chinese>[对],” she says.
The waitress jots down the order, unfazed. Evidently, she’s dealt with her fair share of barely-fluent customers before. Even then, you can’t help but feel ashamed, avoiding eye contact with the waitress as she confirms the order with your mother and then walks away.
Your mother eyes you curiously. “|chinese>[怎么了]?”
- [[Shake your head|12]]You opt to continuously sip tea so your mother doesn’t ask any further questions. How do you communicate a divide that spans a generation and a nation? Will you ever apologize for the years that have passed, measured by nothing but broken conversations?
There’s no use explaining it to her; there never is. She’d just feel vindication after all those years of trying to force you to go to Chinese school.
She drops the subject, moving onto random gossip about people you barely know or remember.
- [[Pretend you understand|13]]The words reach your ears, but you don’t quite process everything she says. Instead, you focus on the melodic sounds of Chinese, the fluidity that exists between each character.
There is something about Chinese that feels like home to you. It’s in your blood, on the tip of your tongue. But every time you reach out to chase that feeling, you grasp onto nothing. An inevitable static silence.
Stuck with a language that doesn’t belong to you, you do your best to listen to your mother’s ramblings, wondering how much you’ve lost in translation.
<div align=center>[[END|Start]]</div>(set: $dissolve to (transition: "dissolve"))\
(set: _link1 to false)\
(click-replace: "手拉面")[|english-chat>[hand-drawn face]{
(set: _link1 to true)
(if: _link1)[
(show: ?more)
]
}]
Writing and reading Chinese had always been the worst part about those Sunday morning classes you took as a kid. Fortunately, you retain some elementary-level Chinese knowledge and recognize the first character.
Google Translate never seems to be reliable for any Asian language, but maybe, just this once...?
You glance at the text again.
{|timestamp>[11:05 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[I know a good restaurant, have |chinese>[手拉面]]}
|more)[$dissolve[That...that can’t be right.
- [[Just Google it|4]]
]](set: $dissolve to (transition: "dissolve"))\
(set: _link1 to false)\
(click-replace: "手拉面")[|english-chat>[hand-pulled noodles]{
(set: _link1 to true)
(if: _link1)[
(show: ?more)
]
}]
{|timestamp>[11:05 AM]
|othername>[MOM:]
|otherchat>[I know a good restaurant, have |chinese>[手拉面]]}
|more)[$dissolve[Well, why not? The last time you saw your mother was a month ago and catching up would be nice.
Without warning, your stomach rumbles at the image of hand-pulled noodles, coupled with slices of beef and simmering in a warm broth.
...Maybe you’re also just hungry.
- [[Reply|5]]
]]
↶↷差异 // DisconnectBy Kelly Weng
START