How to say 'sorry' in China? Well, that depends...
 |
|
||||||||||||||||||||
HAIKOU, China - At the center of the impasse between China and the United States over the collision of a Navy spy plane and a Chinese fighter jet is the issue of an apology, an issue made trickier by the complexities of the Chinese language.
Within hours of the collision, the Chinese demanded "daoqian" - an apology.
Three days later, Secretary of State Colin Powell expressed "regret" over the collision and the loss of a Chinese plane and its pilot, Wang Wei. In Chinese, "regret" is usually translated as "yihan," a far cry from Chinese notions of daoqian.
Within hours of Powell's statement, the Chinese foreign-ministry spokesman parried with a demand for "zhengshi daoqian," a formal apology.
On Thursday, Chinese President Jiang Zemin introduced a twist to the linguistic fencing match when he told reporters on his visit to Chile that "I have visited many countries and I see that when people have an accident, the two groups involved, the two parts always say 'excuse me,' " - or in Chinese, "duibuqi."
Fainter even than duibuqi is the all-purpose "buhaoyisi," literally "I'm embarrassed," but conveying more the meaning of the quick "sorry" that an English speaker would offer after stepping accidentally on someone's polished shoe.
Ironically, despite the many levels at which apologies are employed in the Chinese language, it is rare in daily interactions for Chinese ever to say "excuse me" or "sorry" when they bump into someone, spill tea on someone or, despite Jiang's assertion, have an auto accident.
The Chinese language works at many levels of nuance, and Chinese linguists tease meaning from each of the phrases.
The English idea of being sorry is usually rendered in Chinese as "baoqian," an expression that, for important apologies, "is not serious," said Lu Jianming, a professor of linguistics at the Department of Chinese Language and Literature at Peking University. "One can say 'baoqian' when one is late. It is only to be sorry in general."
On the other hand, Lu explained, " 'daoqian' is when one has done something wrong and brought damage to another. One feels he is not right because he has harmed the other so seriously. Under such circumstances, he has to daoqian."
The "regret," as expressed by Washington, D.C., is somewhat removed from the thrust of either of these expressions.
" 'Yihan' indicates that something might (or might not) be one's fault," Lu said. "Something happens that does not accord with one's wishes. For example, one is yihan ... if one cannot attend a meeting because he is sick."
Another Chinese linguist also suggested that "yihan" is "a very abstract word and its meaning is very vague." The linguist asked that his name not be used because of what he said is the current sensitivity of discussions about the vocabulary of apologia.
"Yihan" indicates "that somebody is unwilling to make himself understood clearly and that he himself does not want to make the issue clear either," the linguist said. "For instance, one is supposed to say he is yihan when he interrupts another person at work or uses other's room, or brings inconvenience to others. It is a very flexible word. It may have the meaning of 'daoqian,' or it may not have that meaning at all."
He added, "In diplomacy, 'yihan' cannot be considered as serious."
According to Lu, only a zhengshi daoqian is appropriate in this case. "Zhengshi daoqian - a formal or official apology - can be a solemn oral statement or a daoqian in a written form," he said. "It is that one in which one openly and seriously apologizes to another."