A language review for resident aliens
住 Zhù meaning, to dwell, either long-term or temporary
examples:
In English, the verb we use indicates whether we are referring to a domicile or some other temporary living quarters. I don't usually confuse which meaning of 住 in use, because context provides clarity. Occasionally when I have been in some other city and asked, "你住在哪里?" I have answered, "北京," and then the person points out they were really asking about my hotel.
Where this can become a problem is when a Chinese person speaking English to me translates 住 as "live" but I can't gather from their context which meaning of 住 they intend.
Like Wednesday morning, when my landlord (whom we adore) called me unexpectedly and asked me, "How many people are living in your apartment?"
I wasn't sure what he meant, especially since he has a copy of the lease and has been here a dozen times to collect rent since we signed that lease. So I quickly answered, "Four, like always. The two adults and two children."
My landlord explained his question, "I received a call from the police, and they said that you have only three people living there, and there is some question......" He paused, and then I thought I understood. 住
"If you mean right now, today, then the answer is three. My husband had to take a quick business trip to America. He left Monday morning and he will be back Thursday night. Usually there are four living here, but, again, if you mean at this moment, the answer is three."
"Ok," he said. "Maybe the police got some bad information from Entry/Exit Bureau. I'll tell them."
Immediately I started sending texts to Randy in America, and to one of his coworkers who could track down his HR people to try to talk to the police before he returned. By that afternoon, I came to understand it was Randy's 住 status in question, and he would have to sort that out Friday morning after he returned.
In the meantime, I tried to play out in my head what could possibly have gone wrong. When we first moved up to Beijing from Shenzhen, we had to visit the police station every time we exited and re-entered China and be re-issued new residence permits. This lasted a few years and then one day they said it was no longer necessary to do this. I think this was around the time that system upgrades allowed us to have residence permits using our full foreign names instead of our Chinese pseudonyms. However, if I had misunderstood this, we would have been entering and exiting illegally for years. No; something this week had to have happened to cause alarm with our local police.
As part of our Easter celebration, we decided to stay in a hotel after brunch Sunday and continuing until Tuesday. Randy didn't want to drive or take the subway for two hours after that fabulous meal, and I wanted to stay an extra day beyond that. After I had made the reservation, though, Randy's presence was requested at one of his customers' sites in the US for meetings the Tuesday after Easter. He left for the airport on Monday morning, and I went to the hotel desk to remove his name from the room. The man assisting me appreciated my honesty, though he noted the the local police usually ignore the comings-and-goings of people with legal residency in China. I said something about if Randy were just going back to our apartment I probably would not have done anything. I just didn't want the hotel to get into trouble when the Entry/Exit would have Randy leaving the country but the hotel still had him on their guest list. Since the phone call with my landlord, I wondered if this action prompted the mix-up.
Randy returned to Beijing Thursday afternoon. He was processed through the normal immigration channel at the airport. He thought it may have taken a few more minutes than usual, but they didn't ask him any questions or stop him. The agent stamped his passport and let him continue.
The next morning, Randy went to the police station with a coworker to try to sort this out. I remained at home, wondering how it might develop. Not too long after he got there, he called me wanting to know what the apartment number on our lease was. This had always been a matter of confusion, stemming mostly from the Chinese reluctance to use the word for "four" (四 sì) because it is a homophone for "death," 死 sì.
We live on a fourth floor, and our flat number is sometimes written as starting with a 4 and sometimes starting with a 3B. Our lease is for 3BXXX, though the post office uses 4XXX. The program the police in Changping use cannot enter letters in any of the apartment number fields. Usually they have used 4XXX on our residence permits, but this year someone entered it as 3XXX. I texted Randy a picture of our lease, showing the 3BXXX, then asked him if this had been the problem. It wasn't, he replied. It was just something they realized was not quite right.
Soon after our exchange of messages about apartment 3BXXX/4XXX, Randy walked in the door. The matter had been resolved.
What had happened, he said, was that the system upgrade from a few years ago was supposed to alert our police station automatically our movements in and out of China. That was why for a few years now we didn't need to report to the station every time we left or returned to China. Any overseas guests we host still have to do this, but our family does not.
Randy had gone to the US for a week back in March. His passport bore all the correct entry-and-exit stamps from that trip, but somehow his re-entry into China had not been properly recorded at the airport. The system in Changping still showed him as being outside of China. This week his leaving again from Beijing was automatically sent to our police station, but this time it was flagged. With no register of his previous re-entry, it looked like he had come into the country illegally sometime between March and this week. This would have been a very serious problem, but Randy's stamps were all in order. No fine, no confession.
This, however, was not the end of our interactions with the police this day. Randy hadn't been home very long when someone rang our doorbell. We answered, finding five or six policemen gathered there. One of them carried a clipboard. He asked the usual questions, like who and how many people lived here. I fetched our lease and all of the passports and residence permits (which I hadn't had time to put away yet). I noticed the top sheet on the clipboard had been filled in to about half-way down, and he added a new entry to copy names and numbers from our passports and lease. Thanking me, they turned to leave until one police officer exclaimed a word or two in a tone that seemed he had almost forgotten something. I couldn't make out what he exclaimed, which was then repeated by two or three of the others. One policeman who had this whole time been silent and hung in the rear of the group fiddled with a giant clear plastic bag. I hadn't noticed it before, and it looked to me like it had a comforter or pillow stuffed in it. He ripped through the plastic and pulled out a tea towel. I was not sure what was going on, but I still managed a happy thanks. Once inside the apartment, I looked more closely at what I had just been given.
Embroidered in red across the towel were the words "邻里守望 共创平安." Neighborhood Watch. Create Peace.
I can't even say this was the last thing I expected. On the list of outcomes I thought could result from the day's dealings with the police, receiving a gift didn't even make it.
To be sure that was truly the last we would see of the police today, and to investigate if maybe our problem sparked some sort of larger security action in Changping, Randy sent a text to his coworker. He told her we had just received a visit from Changping's finest, and when they left they gave us a towel. The coworker was confused by that last part especially. What did he mean by "gave us a towel?" Was this some expression that meant something else? So Randy sent her a picture.
Once again, Randy's HR contacted the police station to see why the police still came around our flat if everything had been resolved earlier that morning. There had been nothing to fear, was the assurance. The interview at our door was part of the regular household checks on residents foreign and Chinese.
Later in the afternoon I saw many policemen in our apartment complex, some with clipboards, going in and out of the buildings. They really were going door-to-door, trying to determine who was honest about where they 住, and rewarding the compliant with a tea towel.
examples:
我们在蔚蓝海岸花园住
Wǒmen zài wèilán hǎi'àn huāyuán zhù
We live at the Cote d'Azur Apartment Garden. (sometimes I still miss that place in Shenzhen)
我们在凯宾斯基酒店住
Wǒmen zài kǎi bīn sī jī jiǔdiàn zhù.
We are staying at the Kempinski Hotel.
In English, the verb we use indicates whether we are referring to a domicile or some other temporary living quarters. I don't usually confuse which meaning of 住 in use, because context provides clarity. Occasionally when I have been in some other city and asked, "你住在哪里?" I have answered, "北京," and then the person points out they were really asking about my hotel.
Where this can become a problem is when a Chinese person speaking English to me translates 住 as "live" but I can't gather from their context which meaning of 住 they intend.
Like Wednesday morning, when my landlord (whom we adore) called me unexpectedly and asked me, "How many people are living in your apartment?"
I wasn't sure what he meant, especially since he has a copy of the lease and has been here a dozen times to collect rent since we signed that lease. So I quickly answered, "Four, like always. The two adults and two children."
My landlord explained his question, "I received a call from the police, and they said that you have only three people living there, and there is some question......" He paused, and then I thought I understood. 住
"If you mean right now, today, then the answer is three. My husband had to take a quick business trip to America. He left Monday morning and he will be back Thursday night. Usually there are four living here, but, again, if you mean at this moment, the answer is three."
"Ok," he said. "Maybe the police got some bad information from Entry/Exit Bureau. I'll tell them."
Immediately I started sending texts to Randy in America, and to one of his coworkers who could track down his HR people to try to talk to the police before he returned. By that afternoon, I came to understand it was Randy's 住 status in question, and he would have to sort that out Friday morning after he returned.
In the meantime, I tried to play out in my head what could possibly have gone wrong. When we first moved up to Beijing from Shenzhen, we had to visit the police station every time we exited and re-entered China and be re-issued new residence permits. This lasted a few years and then one day they said it was no longer necessary to do this. I think this was around the time that system upgrades allowed us to have residence permits using our full foreign names instead of our Chinese pseudonyms. However, if I had misunderstood this, we would have been entering and exiting illegally for years. No; something this week had to have happened to cause alarm with our local police.
As part of our Easter celebration, we decided to stay in a hotel after brunch Sunday and continuing until Tuesday. Randy didn't want to drive or take the subway for two hours after that fabulous meal, and I wanted to stay an extra day beyond that. After I had made the reservation, though, Randy's presence was requested at one of his customers' sites in the US for meetings the Tuesday after Easter. He left for the airport on Monday morning, and I went to the hotel desk to remove his name from the room. The man assisting me appreciated my honesty, though he noted the the local police usually ignore the comings-and-goings of people with legal residency in China. I said something about if Randy were just going back to our apartment I probably would not have done anything. I just didn't want the hotel to get into trouble when the Entry/Exit would have Randy leaving the country but the hotel still had him on their guest list. Since the phone call with my landlord, I wondered if this action prompted the mix-up.
Randy returned to Beijing Thursday afternoon. He was processed through the normal immigration channel at the airport. He thought it may have taken a few more minutes than usual, but they didn't ask him any questions or stop him. The agent stamped his passport and let him continue.
The next morning, Randy went to the police station with a coworker to try to sort this out. I remained at home, wondering how it might develop. Not too long after he got there, he called me wanting to know what the apartment number on our lease was. This had always been a matter of confusion, stemming mostly from the Chinese reluctance to use the word for "four" (四 sì) because it is a homophone for "death," 死 sì.
We live on a fourth floor, and our flat number is sometimes written as starting with a 4 and sometimes starting with a 3B. Our lease is for 3BXXX, though the post office uses 4XXX. The program the police in Changping use cannot enter letters in any of the apartment number fields. Usually they have used 4XXX on our residence permits, but this year someone entered it as 3XXX. I texted Randy a picture of our lease, showing the 3BXXX, then asked him if this had been the problem. It wasn't, he replied. It was just something they realized was not quite right.
Soon after our exchange of messages about apartment 3BXXX/4XXX, Randy walked in the door. The matter had been resolved.
What had happened, he said, was that the system upgrade from a few years ago was supposed to alert our police station automatically our movements in and out of China. That was why for a few years now we didn't need to report to the station every time we left or returned to China. Any overseas guests we host still have to do this, but our family does not.
Randy had gone to the US for a week back in March. His passport bore all the correct entry-and-exit stamps from that trip, but somehow his re-entry into China had not been properly recorded at the airport. The system in Changping still showed him as being outside of China. This week his leaving again from Beijing was automatically sent to our police station, but this time it was flagged. With no register of his previous re-entry, it looked like he had come into the country illegally sometime between March and this week. This would have been a very serious problem, but Randy's stamps were all in order. No fine, no confession.
This, however, was not the end of our interactions with the police this day. Randy hadn't been home very long when someone rang our doorbell. We answered, finding five or six policemen gathered there. One of them carried a clipboard. He asked the usual questions, like who and how many people lived here. I fetched our lease and all of the passports and residence permits (which I hadn't had time to put away yet). I noticed the top sheet on the clipboard had been filled in to about half-way down, and he added a new entry to copy names and numbers from our passports and lease. Thanking me, they turned to leave until one police officer exclaimed a word or two in a tone that seemed he had almost forgotten something. I couldn't make out what he exclaimed, which was then repeated by two or three of the others. One policeman who had this whole time been silent and hung in the rear of the group fiddled with a giant clear plastic bag. I hadn't noticed it before, and it looked to me like it had a comforter or pillow stuffed in it. He ripped through the plastic and pulled out a tea towel. I was not sure what was going on, but I still managed a happy thanks. Once inside the apartment, I looked more closely at what I had just been given.
Embroidered in red across the towel were the words "邻里守望 共创平安." Neighborhood Watch. Create Peace.
I can't even say this was the last thing I expected. On the list of outcomes I thought could result from the day's dealings with the police, receiving a gift didn't even make it.
To be sure that was truly the last we would see of the police today, and to investigate if maybe our problem sparked some sort of larger security action in Changping, Randy sent a text to his coworker. He told her we had just received a visit from Changping's finest, and when they left they gave us a towel. The coworker was confused by that last part especially. What did he mean by "gave us a towel?" Was this some expression that meant something else? So Randy sent her a picture.
Once again, Randy's HR contacted the police station to see why the police still came around our flat if everything had been resolved earlier that morning. There had been nothing to fear, was the assurance. The interview at our door was part of the regular household checks on residents foreign and Chinese.
Later in the afternoon I saw many policemen in our apartment complex, some with clipboards, going in and out of the buildings. They really were going door-to-door, trying to determine who was honest about where they 住, and rewarding the compliant with a tea towel.
Comments