Meaning Of Different Chinese Zodiac Symbols
A Zodiac symbol says a lot about a person’s personality, clues to his/her potential flaws and keys to his/her success. The Twelve Chinese Zodiac animals represent each year of a twelve year cycle. Depending on the year a person is born, he/she can learn about themselves through comprehending the meaning behind the Chinese Zodiac symbol.

The Twelve Chinese Zodiac Symbols

Rat: rats, in China, represent prosperity. Some of their positive traits include problem solving skills and leadership skills. They also possess negative traits such as a hunger for power and selfishness.

Ox: Ox is second in the Chinese Zodiac. Meticulous and hard working, the Ox is known to be very patient and rational. However, it does have the tendency to be possessive, gullible and intolerant; the Ox needs a lot of balance to be successful in life.

Tiger: Tigers are known to be influential and respected. Since they possess traits such as bravery, and confidence Tigers can also be self-centered, conceited and reckless.

Rabbit: Rabbits are known to be caring and loving with an artistic inclination. However, people born under this sign can also be slothful, self-indulgent, and even aloof if they let those traits to surface.

Dragon: Dragons are the most powerful animal sign. They represent self-righteousness, generosity, and straightforwardness. However, if they aren’t watchful, Dragons can become demanding, tyrannical, or even violent.

Snake: The Snake represents grace, wisdom, and imagination. People born under this sign have an added depth to them. However, they are very possessive and have a hard time trusting people.

Horse: Horses are the most liked of all the signs. Agility, intelligence, and insightfulness are USP of a Horse. However they do have certain negative traits as well such as rudeness, nervousness, and inflexibility.

Ram: Rams are sincere, creative, sympathetic and often shy. However, they tend to worry a lot and can be very pessimistic.

Monkey: Monkey represents the 9th Zodiac symbol. It is quick-witted, innovation, clever and competitive. However, at the same time it is also self absorbed, selfish and even irresponsible.

Rooster: Roosters are known to be responsible and practical, with an old-fashioned personality. Their negative traits are that they can be very critical, abrasive and egotistical.

Dog: Dogs are known to be extremely fair and never indulge in unfair practices. However, while affectionate and sociable, dogs can get quarrelsome, stubborn, and lazy.

Pig: Pigs are honest, thoughtful and loyal. However they can also be naïve, decadent and gullible.

It is through the Lunar Calendar that you can find out about the Zodiac Animal you fall under. Reading and researching about your sign can help you understand yourself and the people around you. This information helps you make better decisions related to your innate personality, career options, love life, etc.

How To Learn Chinese

The opening up of the Chinese economy for trade has made it necessary for many people to learn the Chinese language for maintaining a better business relationship. Companies from the west which do business with Chinese companies might require some of their key employees to learn Chinese so that they can interact with their Chinese counterparts more effectively.

The ability to speak the language of one¡¯s business partners is extremely vital to the success of a business relationship. If you happen to deal with Chinese businessmen in the course of your business, you had better learn to speak Chinese mandarin as it is one of the most widely spoken dialects of the language.

Chinese is more than just a language.

The language is intricately knit with the culture of the region. Therefore, you need to learn the language from the local Chinese people. There could be many non-Chinese instructors who teach the language in your region. But unless you learn it from a real Chinese national who lives or has lived in China for a considerable amount of time, you will not be able to really capture the essence of the language in all its forms.

Although people assume that Chinese is a difficult language to learn, especially for westerners, it¡¯s sentence structure and grammar are very similar to English. In fact, other European languages have very dissimilar grammatical structures than English when compared to Chinese. Like in English, Chinese nouns have no gender, which makes it much simpler and less complicated to learn.

The easiest way to learn Chinese is to listen to people talk the language.

If you think about it, that is how we learnt our mother tongue too. We can pick up a language more effectively by listening to it being spoken rather than by any other method. In fact, you will pick up Chinese more accidentally by listening to it than you will ever do by consciously devoting time and effort to learning the language. You can also watch Chinese movies and news telecasts or listen to Chinese radio programs to pick up the nuances of the sounds and the pronunciation of different words.

If you really need to learn the Chinese language quickly, you can attend classes which are taught by real Chinese tutors from China. If you learn through an online coaching program, you can even learn from Chinese tutors who actually live in China. Nothing can be more effective than learning the language directly from local tutors living in their own country.

About Chinese Character Tattoo – Why Danzi is the Best Choice For New Tattoo Lovers

With the popularity of Chinese character tattoo, more people tend to select Hanzi (Chinese characters) as a unique way to express their individuality in the form of skin art. Indeed, this mysterious language is gaining increasing attention among tattoo lovers, especially those in search of a design as their first tattoo. In fact, for these groups of people, single Chinese character (or Danzi) would be the most recommended choice that leads to a unique and smart tattoo.

1.Danzi is convenient for tattooing

For those getting their first tattoo, it’s often recommended by professional tattoo artists that they start with something small, easy for ink, just to warm things up, since the pain and extra attention for the tattoo to be permanent on the skin would be bearable, yet unpleasant and sometimes demanding. For this reason, starting with a huge size of tattoo design is not quite a wise choice.

Danzi, by all means, qualifies as the No.1 choice for anyone seeking a Chinese character tattoo.

Its strokes are clear, easy for inking, and it doesn’t take much space on your skin, often times a 2 inch square space would be fairly comfortable for a normal single character to live in, even a slightly complex one.

2.Danzi is simple & smart

This is another reason why Danzi is tattoo-friendly, and it’s a major one. As Danzi is just one single character, meaning what it means, it’s actually considered concise, neat, and of course, smart in Chinese language, as long as the character in question is the right one. For example, both Li (Danzi) and Li Liang (two characters, a word) mean exactly “strength”, yet Li appears to be much smarter, more thought-provoking, and suitable for ink, as Li Liang looks formal, rigid, and serious, totally lack of “style”.

Can you get it? It’s the combining simplicity and meaningfulness of Danzi that leads to a smart result, which, without question, merits your first Chinese tattoo attempt.

3.Danzi can be much more meaningful

This one would be the ultimate reason why Danzi rocks for tattooing.

In reality, one can just ink a little dot on his or her arm, which would also be simple, convenient for ink, and may be smart to some people, but as it most probably would turn out to be, few will appreciate such a tattoo design, simple because it means virtually nothing, at least not what most people perceive as valuable. For tattoos done in the form of characters, its quality ultimately depends on its meaning, despite how fancy it’s designed or any other minor factors.

Fortunately, due to its long history and deep culture, Chinese language has arguably the richest meaning in its characters of all other existing languages. For this reason, one single Chinese character can reflect a big variety of meanings, depending on different contexts. With some work and maybe a little luck, you may manage to find one character that totally and completely fits your style and personality. If that’s the case, chances are you may find all other tattoo designs unnecessary, because you’ve already demonstrated your attitudes to the world, fully and in a unique way, with that one single Chinese character tattoo.

Learn Chinese & Japanese Tip – Always Keep Your Dictionary Ready

One of the best things you can do for yourself when learning a new language is to always have a dictionary ready. Don’t let yourself get stopped in the middle of reading something to go find your paper dictionary or to flip through your bookmarks to find your online one. At least when you’re at home or at the office, keep your dictionary ready at all times. I recommend consistently keeping an online dictionary open.

Find a good online dictionary and use that as your primary source for looking up words. This is the quickest and most effortless way to look up words. Instead of fumbling through your paper one, which can take a long time to find a word, just type or copy-paste the words in. You can probably look up about ten times as many words with an online dictionary as you can in the time it takes to use a paper one.

I always have my Chinese and Japanese online dictionaries open in a Firefox tab, along with all my other resources.

I’m not sure if other browsers can do this or not, but Firefox let’s you just open as many browser windows as you want at once. So I open my dictionaries in one window and just keep that minimized until I need to use it. Another nice thing is, you can just shut down your computer and the next time it restarts with Firefox all your saved windows will appear as they were before. This eliminates a lot of extra down time. It might not seem like a big deal, but this kind of time adds up.

There’s another way I use this to help me learn new words. Whenever you look up a word in the online dictionary, find your word and just leave it on that page. Don’t go back to the main search page. This way, when you come back next time you will see that word again.

Repetition is one of the keys to learning anything. The more times you see a word, the better chance you will remember it.

Here are the two online dictionaries I use and keep open at all times.
Japanese: http://www.df.lth.se/cgi-bin/j-e/jis/dict
Chinese: http://hmarty.free.fr/hanzi/
They might not have every word in their database, but then you can always go to your paper dictionary for the missing words. I’m not against paper dictionaries. I have about four of them on my desk at all times, but if you want to learn a language quickly then you should learn to manage your time as efficiently as possible.

Chinese Martial Arts Weapons

Martial arts weapons come in all shapes and sizes. Their origins fall in cultures and regions spanning the globe; generally, where man exists so too do martial arts weapons. These weapons are the implements of man’s early wars, they come from a time before firearms were readily available for purchase at the local department store, and they come from a time before the department store.

When most think of the definition of martial arts weapon a few things are brought to mind. The first would be a martial artist. Usually one thinks of a Chinese Monk or Bruce Lee type character when thinking of the martial arts. After all, even though martial art forms come from a vast variety of cultures and backgrounds the term has taken on an Eastern root. It is believed that the Ancient Chinese were the first martial artists and this is why we think of them before anyone else when discussing martial arts weapons.

Chinese martial artists use a variety of weapon types but there are a few famous ones that stand out above the rest.

The Shaolin monks prefer using a variety of bladed weapons like the straight sword or single headed spear. They also were keen to use the nunchakus, two blunt short sticks attached in the middle by a strong rope or chain. The meteor hammer is one of the more exotic weapons of the Shaolin monks. It is a rope of chain with two heavy steel balls attached to either end that can be whipped at an opponent by controlling and manipulating momentum.

The cartoon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is a great example for Chinese martial arts weapons. The turtle characters each wield a different weapon and they are all from the ancient Chinese. There is the straight sword of Leonardo, though occasionally it can be called a Katana, the Bo staff of Donatello, the nunchakus of Michelangelo, and the Sai of Rafeal.

Their master splinter named the turtles after old European painters but trained them in the weapons of the ancient Chinese and Japanese.

Most of the weapons were originally farming implements. The Chinese and Japanese developed their martial arts forms in secret while working the fields for the tyrannical governments. The nunchakus were originally used to till crops and the Oar was used for paddling boats. These weapons could be played off as farming implements until it was time to attack and this was a helpful advantage in over throwing ancient governments.

English to Chinese Translation Of Names

English to Chinese Translation of names may sound hard especially for people who are somewhat alienated with the Chinese language.  However, for those who are familiar with the language, it is definitely just a piece of cake. For those who are non-Chinese, having their names in Chinese symbols can mean a lot. For some it even brought them a sense of pride. However for those who have no idea of the Chinese language they might also end up being caught in some embarrassing situation of some sort if they are not being careful enough with English to Chinese Translation of their names.  

Things to Ponder with English to Chinese Translation  

1. It is important to know that Chinese alphabet is pretty different from the English alphabet. Hence, it is important to be extra cautious in having your name translated into this language otherwise you might catch yourself in embarrassing situation.
2.

The way English to Chinese Translation is done also makes a lot of impact on the way and English name is translated into Chinese symbols.

 
Transliteration Affecting the Chinese Symbols

The process of which English to Chinese Translation is done which is called transliteration really has a great impact on the way an English name is translated into a Chinese symbol or character.  This is because in this process, the English word having the same sound is given the Chinese translation regardless of its meaning.  

Scrutinize the Details

It is therefore important that you scrutinize the details before having English to Chinese Translation of your name. You should always ask questions when you decide to have your name translated into Chinese characters. English to Chinese Translation of names may sound hard especially for people who are somewhat alienated with the Chinese language. or those who are non-Chinese, having their names in Chinese symbols can mean a lot.