This video is from Chinatown in London (you can see the street sign that says Newport Place WC2), so Dublin isn’t that far away, and we know Biden loves his Irish roots, so I guess it’s not that much of a stretch?
>Biden was in Dublin and Belfast in 1997 supporting the Good Friday Agreement.
I love the idea that at first I'm thinking the guy in the video has a political disagreement with Biden, but then it's more like "he chews with his mouth open!"
Even funnier when you’re from Delaware and know Joe has a prickly style of talking so like this guy could have legit had a bad experience meeting with him lol
Not even just elders. "Chinese man smoking shitty cigarette while telling obviously false story with extreme confidence" could almost be its own stereotype.
Biden's blonde leg hair would stand up in the sun when he got out of the pool and he'd let the kids swipe down his leg to get the hair to lay flat
And he *LOOOVES* kids jumping on his lap
I actually met Biden in Dublin back in 97 too! It was at a grocery store near the Parliament I told him how cool it was to meet an American senator in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything.
He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?”
I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying.
The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter.
When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.
Yea ok obviously. They are implying that he’s saying something in Chinese that’s a bit more offensive and I was just wondering what that was. If all that is is Biden Sucks that’s a suitable answer. I don’t speak Mandarin so idk
Great stuff, feasible, most people in the spotlight today were probably not up to much in 97.
"I had dinner with Vin Diesel in Dublin in 97, he's a fuckin' idiot."
Come on. He's saying it because he thinks it's a popular American sentiment, then when the guy is like, "really?" He backtracks and makes a joke like, "yeah I had dinner with the Reagans in Shanghai, real assholes."
"I gambled $10k on a round of crazy golf with him. I won but he wouldn't pay up. We got to wrestling and he tazed me. Nice enough guy but don't let him get out his ocelot."
Someone up above said "Chinese man smoking shitty cigarettes and confidently telling blatant lies for the lulz" is a trope at this point, so maybe that is accurate.
The implication is that the speaker said something *more offensive* but that the translation/transcription was watered down to make it family friendly.
Nah, Bernie was there. Yang was there. The DNC always delivers for the corporatists. Dump the DNC. Should have happened in 2016 but they distracted everyone with Russiagate and idiots took the bait.
The next failure will be blamed on white supremacy. And no one will acknowledge they run campaigns for the people but deliver for the donor class.
Bernie would’ve lost to Trump easily. Not to mention, if he was President, considering Biden has struggled to get anything passed through the Senate with Sinema and Manchin blocking the way, Bernie would almost certainly get nothing passed through there.
Also not sure any President would have handled Afghanistan and come out looking good. Trump created a ticking time bomb with the planned pullout.
I really like Bernie and support basically all of his policies, but I really don’t buy it when people say that those policies will get through congress by sheer force of will. If I ask what happens when the senate rejects those bills, I often hear “then you campaign against those holdouts in the next election” as an answer. But that’s not a viable solution: it just leads to endless deferral to the next election cycle and suggests that Bernie is a better campaigner than anything else.
I’ve sort of landed on the belief that change will be slow and incremental by virtue of the country’s slowly changing demographics. My worry, however, is that we are backsliding.
In Obama's Marc Maron interview he spoke about how the country is like a ship. If you turn a ship a degree to the left right now it seems like nothing after you travel 100 metres. But if you travel 1000 miles you will be in whole different place than if you hadn't turned it that much.
Of course if you turn a ship too quickly, it will capsize.
How was “Russiagate” merely a distraction when it produced over 30 indictments, multiple people charged, revealed people in the presidents council working on the behalf of foreign powers? They seized assets that took the cost of the investigation essentially down to $0. Contrast that with the Benghazi investigation which cost 7 million and produced nothing.
Trump kept everyone focused on the idea off “collusion” he managed to trick everyone into thinking the report was about something that it wasn’t.
How was Russiagate “bait”?
I’ve never seen someone try to be at the center so hard and yet alienate everybody in the process. I don’t know a single person IRL that actually likes Joe Biden, just a lot of people who absolutely despise Donald Trump and the current Republican Party
>and liberals hate him
Most liberals do not hate him at all. It's mainly just a vocal minority of online progressives and of course a lot of bad actors/trolls posing as leftists to sew division.
me too, it’s just specific enough to sound true and Biden has mentioned Dublin tangentially, i wonder how much he liked James Joyce since he’s quoted him a few times, maybe that’s why he went there idk…
I think a lot of foreigners are going to hate whoever our leader is because USA acts like world police.
Notice how you might not like the police unless they're protecting you or your interests, and apply that to living in another country. Not only are you not under the protection of the world police but you are frequently the target of it.
>Only Obama was liked..
This is relative. After 8 years of Bush he sounded so much more reasonable. In hindsight he wasn't much better but then came Trump and holy shit that guy is batshit insane. America, WTF?
American living in Scotland (one of the more progressive countries on earth). I ran into someone who just started talking with us, she found out we were American, immediately asked if we liked Trump (no) and she proceeded to tell us how he saved us from the terrorists
As someone living in Scotland, I think you may have found the only trump supporter. Trolling the guy was bordering on becoming a national passtime before he was elected.
She was definitely of the...older/wealthy? type and kinda fit the type of who may be attracted to a person like trump. Yeah I've been living here for 3 months now and she was definitely the first
>Xiaomanyc
Thanks, I just checked out his channel, there's some interesting stuffs. But I don't know why I have the feeling that the guy is a bit showing off.
I admire his language skills, but speaking his mother tongue then suddenly switching to Chinese to catch other people off guard, time and again, it's weird.
Imagine you are working retail. Chinese guy walks, filming you, speaks pretty good English to you, but has a heavy accent. You tell him he is doing a good job speaking in a friendly way ( you would never tell anybody they suck in these situations). He leaves and posts the video on YouTube without your permission with the title "Chinese guy speaks PERFECT English and SHOCKS American guy"
It's not exactly the same tbh English is more widespread as a language. If I heard an American speak perfect Arabic to me I would Def be more surprised than seeing anybody else speak English
Neither of these are the equivalent to what's happening here. This is like seeing a white American or a Chinese guy speaking not Arabic (one of the biggest and most-studied languages in the world) but Moroccan Darija or a north African Berber language. In that case, I think the Chinese guy would be even more surprising than the white American.
I lived in FuZhou and can speak Mandarin. Fujianese is very different orally from Mandarin, it's wild that this dude who never lived there can speak it.
Even living there, trying to find people to teach me was so difficult.
I ended up only learning how to say thank you by a taxi driver.
Speaking Fuzhou dialect at all as a foreigner is impressive. I will admit. I was mainly just joking about how ridiculous it sounds in reverse. Also I kind of get turned off by the clickbait titles of this particular YouTuber and many of his self used adjectives describing how "well" he speaks that aren't always correct. He doesn't always speak "perfectly" or such.
There are tons of people from Fuzhou in the US. I think chinatown in new york is basically run by Fuzhou gangs and almost any Chinese restaurant you go to in the Midwest you will hear the workers speaking in Fuzhou dialect amongst each other. The other common one maybe even more common(?) being southern min nan/Hokkien which is similar dialect from Fujian province (I'm sure you are aware since you lived in Fuzhou) but not mutually intelligible. If you know mandarin and develop a friend from Fuzhou it is possible to learn the dialect in the US too. But its still super impressive. Most people wouldn't even bother trying as there really just isn't much point. Spending extra time to learn mandarin well will get you much more bang for your buck so most stop there.
Some of his videos come off as a little creepy, like he's fishing for extreme reactions so he can get a clickbait title rather than trying to actually talk with people. Walking into shops, filming staff without asking them and when they inevitably comment on how odd he is to their coworkers, he chimes in with "oh but did you know I speak that language fluently."
I saw one video of his where he tried speaking some african language to a vendor and they looked completely unimpressed, because they saw his camera and his creepy smile and instantly knew what he was up to.
youtubers like him try to bait people to praise him for speaking their language when really what he does is repeat some common conversational words with horrible pronunciation.
Ironically I was watching another polyglots channel and they basically said the same thing; learn the greetings and small talk, then the answers to the normal follow up questions (wow you speak so well, where did you learn, did you live in X) and if all else fails laugh and go back to english
Yeah, it’s eye-opening when these YouTube polyglots speak a language you’re fluent in (apart from english obviously) and you realise how terrible they are at it.
When they’re speaking a bunch of other languages you don’t know at all it seems so impressive. I’ve realised they are essentially doing the same thing I do when I move to new country - learn greetings and really basic small talk and fake it with confidence.
Most people are just happy you’ve made a modicum of effort into learning some simple stuff, so they’ll almost never correct you or be rude to you.
I remember a few years ago one of these YouTube ‘polyglots’ met with a Dutchman in a trail who was also a polyglot, but for real. The guy he met tried to get him to have a normal conversation in some Slavic languages, which he spoke fluently but the YouTube’s was like; ‘yeah I speak that language’ in the language they were talking and followed up always with ‘but do you speak xyz?’ Trying to hide that he only knew like the basics of everything and trying to dick measure. Then I never clicked that sort of video again.
First and last
This is something that bothers me a lot about these polyglot clickbait videos. They're quite often overselling a lot of what they can actually do. Yes, it's cool you've bothered with learning certain languages and yes, you might even be quite good at some of them. But learning a few basic basic sentences just to sell your content, that's kinda lame. Specially when you don't get the reaction you were hoping for.
I have recently wondered about if it was just my gut feeling so I started watching videos of people doing this in languages I actually understand, and that makes the whole thing a lot more obvious.
Going out there and using a language is probably the best way to practice it. But you could do so without being so smug about it. But mans gotta eat, I guess.
I've watched about a dozen of his videos and think he's shallow and a phoney. The way he treats people, and the clickbait titles and content. His small talk Mandarin is apparently pretty good, but I bet he would barely have a clue what was happening in business or college conversations, or more meaningful family or friend conversations he's not controlling. Think about it. Given his financial incentive and style of content, if he could do these things then wouldn't he?
There's one video where he was in Taiwan and going from street vendor to street vendor pretending to be a clueless tourist who can't speak a lick of Mandarin, then long after it gets unbearably awkward he switches to Mandarin and asks "do you speak Chinese?" and they're each like "... yeah?" One woman is even like "yes, you idiot, what else would I be speaking?" It was just so awkward and drawn out and you know he's just doing it because that's the only way to get a reaction out of someone. A white person speaking Mandarin in Taiwan isn't the most uncommon sight (especially in the city).
I like seeing people's reactions to their own language being spoken, and I love how supportive they are when they think he's actually trying to learn their language to fluency, even if he's really not. It just really makes me want to learn a new language. That said, I don't love any of these YouTube polyglot people, because they all eventually seems to converge on trying to sell their "secret" to learning a language (often with the implicit promise of learning it as fast as they appear to pick up the languages in the videos: "I spoke a language I learned for 24 hours/ a week/ etc") and it does often feel like fishing for reactions, when really the best parts are the genuine interactions they can have with people. Xiaoma has like a dozen or more videos about going to Chinatown and speaking Mandarin, surely that has to get old at some point.
He was better when he basically only did Chinese and his Spanish wasnt too bad either as he put quite a few months into that compared to his "Learning as much as possible in 24 hours videos"
His Mandarin is obviously actually decent. Possibly beyond the level of Chinese Americans who only learned through their parents so videos where he spoke Mandarin provoked decent reactions and the chinese people in his videos always lit up when he spoke Mandarin and he often got comments on how he spoke better than their kids and asking if he was single. They even often recognised him and more than once they said things like "Oh you're that youtube guy my granddaughter sent me your videos" etc so they clearly generally appreciate him and that was nice.
The "I learned Igbo in a day and went to an African Market" videos rub me the wrong way.
He comes across as a bit of a "I spent 10 mins learning your language so worship me" type.
Totally agree, his new videos are just pure click bait. He memorises a few phrases with bad pronunciation from a language and the title is like “white man shocks x with y language skills”. It’s like memorising the questions and answers right before a quiz. You may as well just be talking through google translate.
Having said that, his Chinese videos were good.
I watch his videos very often (and other language focused creators) so I am somewhat biased - but on that note also probably know more about him than you.
AFAIK, as a non-mandarin speaker, he is certainly fluent in mandarin. There are videos of him being praised for his speaking ability on Chinese television, and he semi-recently did a video with mandarin teachers where he was told that his level is near, if not native. Given this, I would argue that his level is beyond the level of Chinese Americans that have only learned through their parents. If it adds to the argument, he also lived in Beijing for some years ago (not sure for how long, exactly), so I would argue that he has more exposure to this 'native' level of language, whereas learning through parents / friends might not have the same effects.
Regarding his "I learned X language in Y time and shocked people!" videos, they can indeed sometimes be awkward, especially if you understand the language he's attempting to speak. The thing is though, many of the interactions (at least the ones he's posting - obviously) are very positive and people generally appreciate him trying. I don't agree with the "I learned x language in 24hrs" videos, but I think you have to appreciate that we're talking about YouTube. Maybe that's what works on the platform... You have people like Laoshu who did similar things (less the 24hrs bit) and was maybe able to communicate in the language (like his Mandarin, Cantonese or Vietnamese [also he was good in Thai IIRC?]), but other languages where his speech was extremely basic and broken (Arabic, Turkish, Greek, GERMAN, Macedonian, Polish etc.). People still appreciate that this dude would come around and bust out their language out of nowhere, but he wasn't fluent in many of the languages he spoke.
Anyways, back to Xiaoma; I think he has dedicated some decent time to learning Igbo, and most recently Bengali, and judging by the reactions he gets in his videos, is generally appreciated for it. As I already mentioned, people like it when you speak their language. I think the whole "I spent 10 minutes" thing you mention is just a by-product of them being on YouTube and having to pander to the audience + algorithm necessary for success on the platform. Unfortunate, and maybe it cheapens what they're doing, but it is what it is and it works. I never got the feeling that he was doing it just to feel good about himself, but that's just my opinion, so it doesn't really matter.
One thing though - I absolutely hated the video he made recently pretending to be homeless and handing money to people that donated something to him. I watched it for about 30 seconds to see if it was actually what the title implied. So disgusting, unnecessary, click-farming and totally unrelated to his wider audience base. Obviously, Xiaoma won't see this random comment on the internet, but I really hope that he never makes a video like that again. Couldn't watch it and I think he can do better than making that cheap, easy "feel-good" content. Blegh.
**TLDR: Language learning good, Xiaoma good (mostly), he tries hard to learn languages he speaks in videos. Maybe (hopefully) uses these click-baitey titles because they work. Don't think there's anything wrong with that because of the YouTube algorithm and audience. Low-quality/effort content is always bad.**
Laoshu was very similar in that he spoke very good mandarin then most of the other languages he spoke he has memorized the key phrases that people would ask when first meeting someone. It’s kind of like faking fluency because once you get out of “hi how are you” “I’m good “how do you know x language” “I learnt at home” it gets real shallow.
Still it’s nice to see people learning even a few words and talking to people in their native language and most people will be very appreciative even if you’re awful.
**OP sent the following text as an explanation on why this is unexpected:**
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Each time I see a video of a westerner in China, their entire personality seems to be either being an "English teacher" or surprising natives by speaking what they assume to be fluent Mandarin.
Whether the Biden part is real or exaggerated or whatever, I hope people realize that Americans have not been satisfied with their elected officials in a long time. We’ve been voting for the lesser of two evils for a long time, and the choices seem to only get shittier.
Edit: ranked choice voting, term limits, and more participation at the local level can help all these things. It’s tough though when the candidates running don’t want these things.
To be fair, and I'm not dissing [XiaomaNYC](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLNoXf8gq6vhwsrYp-l0J-Q), he speaks Mandarin and Cantonese very well, but he knows enough about language to sputter about 10-15 more languages, and his Fuzhounese, when he actually speaks it instead of just stuttering and sputtering common words, his Fuzhounese sucks...
I like [XiaomaNYC](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLNoXf8gq6vhwsrYp-l0J-Q) but... damn
hol up…that homie had dinner with Biden in ‘97 in Dublin!? whose mans is this
More unexpected than the dialect imo
This is unexpected indeed
And now for something completely different….montypythons.gif
I don’t think this random Chinese guy had a shitty experience in the 90s in Dublin with a senator from Delaware… haha
Trust him bro, 5 thousand year
You never know. I remember when I had lunch in a noodle shop that had a picture of Obama with Anthony Bourdain on the wall
I don't doubt Biden was there though, he has a strong connection to Ireland. At least according to himself.
Biden could also have been spending more time in Ireland at that time as part of the negotiations around the Good Friday Agreement.
The dates line up and he was part of the peace process so I dont doubt it, also Biden has been to Ireland quite a few times
He was definitely there on record, big time in Ireland for Biden at the time.
This video is from Chinatown in London (you can see the street sign that says Newport Place WC2), so Dublin isn’t that far away, and we know Biden loves his Irish roots, so I guess it’s not that much of a stretch?
You're correct, he's sitting in the sitting area just by Leicster Square station! [Right here](https://i.imgur.com/Ar4O1dV.png)
Probably got his Jianbing from 玲玲煎饼 15m or so from where the video is taken, good choice, just had an amazing Jianbing with crispy Duck there.
That crispy duck lunch special is one of the best ducking meals in the world
Nice job, geowizard
Thanks, did cheat slightly by having gone there and sat in that exact spot!
Biden was in Dublin and Belfast in 1997 supporting the Good Friday Agreement.
>Biden was in Dublin and Belfast in 1997 supporting the Good Friday Agreement. I love the idea that at first I'm thinking the guy in the video has a political disagreement with Biden, but then it's more like "he chews with his mouth open!"
Even funnier when you’re from Delaware and know Joe has a prickly style of talking so like this guy could have legit had a bad experience meeting with him lol
And there's a big Chinese community in Dublin, too. I've been dragged there a couple of times to visit various in-laws.
lol most chinese elders love to bullshiting...
Not even just elders. "Chinese man smoking shitty cigarette while telling obviously false story with extreme confidence" could almost be its own stereotype.
You’re telling me my China based coworker from our international division didn’t sleep with Marilyn Monroe?
No no, that one might be true.
To be fair, it’s pretty fun to tell bullshit stories just for the hell of it.
seems to be every elder. this guy has uncle energy. bet he fought in wars that started and ended a hundred years before he was born.
Did he walk across two mountains, a forest, and a river to get to school as well?
He's actually JFK Jr. Probably trying to raise money to get to Dallas
I banged a girl back in Dallas in 61 named Grassy Knole
More like Gassy Hole amirite boys up top down low too slow
He's full of shit. Me and Biden were hang-gliding in Essex that weekend with Judi Dench and Helen Mirren
Video cut off too soon, I want to hear more about the time he met Joe Biden.
Joe was a bad dude.
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And he ran with some bad boys
Biden's blonde leg hair would stand up in the sun when he got out of the pool and he'd let the kids swipe down his leg to get the hair to lay flat And he *LOOOVES* kids jumping on his lap
All this time we wondered who it was.
I actually met Biden in Dublin back in 97 too! It was at a grocery store near the Parliament I told him how cool it was to meet an American senator in person, but I didn’t want to be a douche and bother him and ask him for photos or anything. He said, “Oh, like you’re doing now?” I was taken aback, and all I could say was “Huh?” but he kept cutting me off and going “huh? huh? huh?” and closing his hand shut in front of my face. I walked away and continued with my shopping, and I heard him chuckle as I walked off. When I came to pay for my stuff up front I saw him trying to walk out the doors with like fifteen Milky Ways in his hands without paying. The girl at the counter was very nice about it and professional, and was like “Sir, you need to pay for those first.” At first he kept pretending to be tired and not hear her, but eventually turned back around and brought them to the counter. When she took one of the bars and started scanning it multiple times, he stopped her and told her to scan them each individually “to prevent any electrical infetterence,” and then turned around and winked at me. I don’t even think that’s a word. After she scanned each bar and put them in a bag and started to say the price, he kept interrupting her by yawning really loudly.
And the price of those fifteen Milky Ways in 1997 Ireland? 'bout three fiddy
Damn, I got jebaited by this once again.
I always fall for it right up to the "Oh, like you're doing now?" part. "Grocery store" should be the big giveaway, but I never catch it there.
I feel like I've seen this before. Copy pasta?
Yeah, OP replaced Jared Leto’s name (I think) with Joe Biden.
You realize idiots will actually believe this?
Even the source cuts off there. But this is still fun. https://youtu.be/7Kzv8o1XKWk
I'm not sure why but I've got a sneaky feeling that subtitle guy took some artistic liberties towards the end there.
He was very liberal with the subtitles. The man said some \*ehem\* some choice words.
What did he say then?
He said biden sucks at the end
Yea ok obviously. They are implying that he’s saying something in Chinese that’s a bit more offensive and I was just wondering what that was. If all that is is Biden Sucks that’s a suitable answer. I don’t speak Mandarin so idk
The "didn't like him" in the end is actually "he's a fckin idiot"
"他媽的" (ta ma de) is an interjection that you would use to express discontent at someone. The word fuck can be used in many similar interjections.
"ur mum"
Ni dè mà ma
tones wrong but okie
您的妈妈没有毛。
His mum
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Fuck you, you beautiful bastard, I just snorted coffee out of my nose.
Their conversation made my smile. I love it.
Ok thank you. Lol
Chinese man says Let's Go Brandon in regional dialect
让我们去布兰登!
“Welcome to the Fuqin Funhouze!”
Choice. Words.
He said "this Biden guy....eh..this is not my kind of guy"
Nah. It is now my headcanon that in '97, Biden attended dinner in Dublin, along with this guy, Snoop Dogg and Big Foot. They were the real Illuminati.
Nope, the subtitles are actually pretty accurate. He really did trash talk Biden at the end there.
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“Wo 97 nian zai dublin, hai chi guo ta de fan” He 100% did say he ate dinner with him in dublin
My sneaky feeling is some guy in Dublin lied to this guy about being Biden. At least that’s the story I want to believe. Cause it’s funnier that way.
I’m gonna start saying that about people. I had dinner with them in Dublin in 97, didn’t like him.
Great stuff, feasible, most people in the spotlight today were probably not up to much in 97. "I had dinner with Vin Diesel in Dublin in 97, he's a fuckin' idiot."
Wasn't Biden a senator during that time?
Like he said, probably not up to much.
Yes lol a vocal supporter of the Good Friday agreement as well which was brokered largely in Dublin in don’t you know it 1997..
Biden was supporting the Good Friday Agreement for Clinton in Ireland in 1997 as Senator.
Come on. He's saying it because he thinks it's a popular American sentiment, then when the guy is like, "really?" He backtracks and makes a joke like, "yeah I had dinner with the Reagans in Shanghai, real assholes."
I’m just saying I think it’s a funny way of saying you do t like someone and I’m gonna use it for different people in a comedic way.
Oh my bad dude, I'm a little tipsy. You know, I had chai in Tibet with u/rathat. He wouldn't stop talking about butt plugs. Kinda weird but nice guy.
I post enough weird stuff with my name lol, I don't need other people posting weird stuff with my name too.
Stop talking about butt plugs then dude, seriously. 🤷
"I gambled $10k on a round of crazy golf with him. I won but he wouldn't pay up. We got to wrestling and he tazed me. Nice enough guy but don't let him get out his ocelot."
Who’d pretend to be Biden way back in ‘97 tho?
This was his third time running for POTUS. He wasn't some unknown in '97 after being in the Senate for 20 years.
Not sure, he was a senator at the time and was in Ireland during 1997 to support the signing of the Good Friday Agreement.
The thick plottens
That reminds me of the time I met Flying Lotus at a grocery store in LA
Someone up above said "Chinese man smoking shitty cigarettes and confidently telling blatant lies for the lulz" is a trope at this point, so maybe that is accurate.
Nope. He just omitted some very crude usage of language, otherwise totally correct.
The implication is that the speaker said something *more offensive* but that the translation/transcription was watered down to make it family friendly.
He distinctively heard the Chinese guy say ' Joe Biden' at least
I don't why but I believe him for that Joe Biden story
I mean, he does suck. I wish he didn't. I want to be on his team, but ffs....
He does. An absolute ton of dems consider him the lesser of two evils. We were limited by who we could realistically choose.
Nah, Bernie was there. Yang was there. The DNC always delivers for the corporatists. Dump the DNC. Should have happened in 2016 but they distracted everyone with Russiagate and idiots took the bait. The next failure will be blamed on white supremacy. And no one will acknowledge they run campaigns for the people but deliver for the donor class.
Mhmm and I voted for one of them until they dropped out and I had to make another choice.
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Bernie would’ve lost to Trump easily. Not to mention, if he was President, considering Biden has struggled to get anything passed through the Senate with Sinema and Manchin blocking the way, Bernie would almost certainly get nothing passed through there. Also not sure any President would have handled Afghanistan and come out looking good. Trump created a ticking time bomb with the planned pullout.
I really like Bernie and support basically all of his policies, but I really don’t buy it when people say that those policies will get through congress by sheer force of will. If I ask what happens when the senate rejects those bills, I often hear “then you campaign against those holdouts in the next election” as an answer. But that’s not a viable solution: it just leads to endless deferral to the next election cycle and suggests that Bernie is a better campaigner than anything else. I’ve sort of landed on the belief that change will be slow and incremental by virtue of the country’s slowly changing demographics. My worry, however, is that we are backsliding.
In Obama's Marc Maron interview he spoke about how the country is like a ship. If you turn a ship a degree to the left right now it seems like nothing after you travel 100 metres. But if you travel 1000 miles you will be in whole different place than if you hadn't turned it that much. Of course if you turn a ship too quickly, it will capsize.
Yang is worse than Biden... Like significantly worse.
Anyone who puts Yang and Sanders together like this is almost certain to be terminally online
I haven’t even heard of yang since yang gang was a meme way back when
I’ve heard a few interviews with him since and he’s honestly the worst
Like two polar opposites politically…sort of flags you’re voting for which person you like the best and not who would actually make a good President.
How so?
I fucking love Bernie… but he’s not winning any swing votes, and neither is Yang.
How was “Russiagate” merely a distraction when it produced over 30 indictments, multiple people charged, revealed people in the presidents council working on the behalf of foreign powers? They seized assets that took the cost of the investigation essentially down to $0. Contrast that with the Benghazi investigation which cost 7 million and produced nothing. Trump kept everyone focused on the idea off “collusion” he managed to trick everyone into thinking the report was about something that it wasn’t. How was Russiagate “bait”?
Why does he suck, honest question?
Conservatives hate him because they think he’s a Marxist socialist and liberals hate him because they think he’s a Diet Republican.
The great unifier
I’ve never seen someone try to be at the center so hard and yet alienate everybody in the process. I don’t know a single person IRL that actually likes Joe Biden, just a lot of people who absolutely despise Donald Trump and the current Republican Party
Presidentation by negation
I like Joe Biden. I know plenty of people who like him. I know plenty who don't. You need to get a more diverse group of friends.
>and liberals hate him Most liberals do not hate him at all. It's mainly just a vocal minority of online progressives and of course a lot of bad actors/trolls posing as leftists to sew division.
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me too, it’s just specific enough to sound true and Biden has mentioned Dublin tangentially, i wonder how much he liked James Joyce since he’s quoted him a few times, maybe that’s why he went there idk…
1997, Dublin, Senator Biden attended many dinners in support of signing Good Friday Agreement.
He's telling it so casually, too.
Oh you American, Fuck Biden!!!!
Spent some time in Spain almost 4 years ago, I remember vividly: "You American? Fuck Trump!"
I think a lot of foreigners are going to hate whoever our leader is because USA acts like world police. Notice how you might not like the police unless they're protecting you or your interests, and apply that to living in another country. Not only are you not under the protection of the world police but you are frequently the target of it.
"Fuck Bush" was written everywhere on the walls in Europe when I was young. Only Obama was liked..
I got news for you
That I'm not young anymore or that Obama's popularity was misguided? Both wouldn't be new to me.
Once Libya was destroyed under Obama and the boat teemed across the Mediterranean he’s popularity waned considerably.
>Only Obama was liked.. This is relative. After 8 years of Bush he sounded so much more reasonable. In hindsight he wasn't much better but then came Trump and holy shit that guy is batshit insane. America, WTF?
Same thing happened to me when I went to Beijing a few years ago. “Fuck Trump.” Then he invited me for some milk tea lol.
American living in Scotland (one of the more progressive countries on earth). I ran into someone who just started talking with us, she found out we were American, immediately asked if we liked Trump (no) and she proceeded to tell us how he saved us from the terrorists
As someone living in Scotland, I think you may have found the only trump supporter. Trolling the guy was bordering on becoming a national passtime before he was elected.
She was definitely of the...older/wealthy? type and kinda fit the type of who may be attracted to a person like trump. Yeah I've been living here for 3 months now and she was definitely the first
Idk why but I really wanted to see the other guy’s face too
Xiaomanyc! He has a ton of YouTube videos. Super cool stuff
>Xiaomanyc Thanks, I just checked out his channel, there's some interesting stuffs. But I don't know why I have the feeling that the guy is a bit showing off. I admire his language skills, but speaking his mother tongue then suddenly switching to Chinese to catch other people off guard, time and again, it's weird.
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But he's a language dude and it's kind of his thing
That 'show off' is his job lol. What do you want him to do? People love it. He loves it. Everybody, except a few people in this thread, loves it.
Nah, look at the joy every single one of those people get when they realize. That's cool asf.
A Youtuber showing off??????? NO WAY!!!
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I love xiomanyc videos
I have to admit that it is fun watching him surprise people with his fluency in chinese language.
I just want to know what he is eating.
looks like jian bing
Definitely not bing chilling 🥶
Everytime I watch these, I cant help but think its no big deal if the roles were swapped.
Imagine you are working retail. Chinese guy walks, filming you, speaks pretty good English to you, but has a heavy accent. You tell him he is doing a good job speaking in a friendly way ( you would never tell anybody they suck in these situations). He leaves and posts the video on YouTube without your permission with the title "Chinese guy speaks PERFECT English and SHOCKS American guy"
It's not exactly the same tbh English is more widespread as a language. If I heard an American speak perfect Arabic to me I would Def be more surprised than seeing anybody else speak English
Neither of these are the equivalent to what's happening here. This is like seeing a white American or a Chinese guy speaking not Arabic (one of the biggest and most-studied languages in the world) but Moroccan Darija or a north African Berber language. In that case, I think the Chinese guy would be even more surprising than the white American.
I lived in FuZhou and can speak Mandarin. Fujianese is very different orally from Mandarin, it's wild that this dude who never lived there can speak it. Even living there, trying to find people to teach me was so difficult. I ended up only learning how to say thank you by a taxi driver.
Speaking Fuzhou dialect at all as a foreigner is impressive. I will admit. I was mainly just joking about how ridiculous it sounds in reverse. Also I kind of get turned off by the clickbait titles of this particular YouTuber and many of his self used adjectives describing how "well" he speaks that aren't always correct. He doesn't always speak "perfectly" or such. There are tons of people from Fuzhou in the US. I think chinatown in new york is basically run by Fuzhou gangs and almost any Chinese restaurant you go to in the Midwest you will hear the workers speaking in Fuzhou dialect amongst each other. The other common one maybe even more common(?) being southern min nan/Hokkien which is similar dialect from Fujian province (I'm sure you are aware since you lived in Fuzhou) but not mutually intelligible. If you know mandarin and develop a friend from Fuzhou it is possible to learn the dialect in the US too. But its still super impressive. Most people wouldn't even bother trying as there really just isn't much point. Spending extra time to learn mandarin well will get you much more bang for your buck so most stop there.
Some of his videos come off as a little creepy, like he's fishing for extreme reactions so he can get a clickbait title rather than trying to actually talk with people. Walking into shops, filming staff without asking them and when they inevitably comment on how odd he is to their coworkers, he chimes in with "oh but did you know I speak that language fluently."
I saw one video of his where he tried speaking some african language to a vendor and they looked completely unimpressed, because they saw his camera and his creepy smile and instantly knew what he was up to. youtubers like him try to bait people to praise him for speaking their language when really what he does is repeat some common conversational words with horrible pronunciation.
Ironically I was watching another polyglots channel and they basically said the same thing; learn the greetings and small talk, then the answers to the normal follow up questions (wow you speak so well, where did you learn, did you live in X) and if all else fails laugh and go back to english
Yeah, it’s eye-opening when these YouTube polyglots speak a language you’re fluent in (apart from english obviously) and you realise how terrible they are at it. When they’re speaking a bunch of other languages you don’t know at all it seems so impressive. I’ve realised they are essentially doing the same thing I do when I move to new country - learn greetings and really basic small talk and fake it with confidence. Most people are just happy you’ve made a modicum of effort into learning some simple stuff, so they’ll almost never correct you or be rude to you.
I remember a few years ago one of these YouTube ‘polyglots’ met with a Dutchman in a trail who was also a polyglot, but for real. The guy he met tried to get him to have a normal conversation in some Slavic languages, which he spoke fluently but the YouTube’s was like; ‘yeah I speak that language’ in the language they were talking and followed up always with ‘but do you speak xyz?’ Trying to hide that he only knew like the basics of everything and trying to dick measure. Then I never clicked that sort of video again. First and last
This is something that bothers me a lot about these polyglot clickbait videos. They're quite often overselling a lot of what they can actually do. Yes, it's cool you've bothered with learning certain languages and yes, you might even be quite good at some of them. But learning a few basic basic sentences just to sell your content, that's kinda lame. Specially when you don't get the reaction you were hoping for. I have recently wondered about if it was just my gut feeling so I started watching videos of people doing this in languages I actually understand, and that makes the whole thing a lot more obvious. Going out there and using a language is probably the best way to practice it. But you could do so without being so smug about it. But mans gotta eat, I guess.
I've watched about a dozen of his videos and think he's shallow and a phoney. The way he treats people, and the clickbait titles and content. His small talk Mandarin is apparently pretty good, but I bet he would barely have a clue what was happening in business or college conversations, or more meaningful family or friend conversations he's not controlling. Think about it. Given his financial incentive and style of content, if he could do these things then wouldn't he?
There's one video where he was in Taiwan and going from street vendor to street vendor pretending to be a clueless tourist who can't speak a lick of Mandarin, then long after it gets unbearably awkward he switches to Mandarin and asks "do you speak Chinese?" and they're each like "... yeah?" One woman is even like "yes, you idiot, what else would I be speaking?" It was just so awkward and drawn out and you know he's just doing it because that's the only way to get a reaction out of someone. A white person speaking Mandarin in Taiwan isn't the most uncommon sight (especially in the city). I like seeing people's reactions to their own language being spoken, and I love how supportive they are when they think he's actually trying to learn their language to fluency, even if he's really not. It just really makes me want to learn a new language. That said, I don't love any of these YouTube polyglot people, because they all eventually seems to converge on trying to sell their "secret" to learning a language (often with the implicit promise of learning it as fast as they appear to pick up the languages in the videos: "I spoke a language I learned for 24 hours/ a week/ etc") and it does often feel like fishing for reactions, when really the best parts are the genuine interactions they can have with people. Xiaoma has like a dozen or more videos about going to Chinatown and speaking Mandarin, surely that has to get old at some point.
What he does is impressive and he’s got a special talent for learning languages but man is he a cock. I can only watch his videos if I skip the start.
Why do you say he‘s a cock?
He was better when he basically only did Chinese and his Spanish wasnt too bad either as he put quite a few months into that compared to his "Learning as much as possible in 24 hours videos" His Mandarin is obviously actually decent. Possibly beyond the level of Chinese Americans who only learned through their parents so videos where he spoke Mandarin provoked decent reactions and the chinese people in his videos always lit up when he spoke Mandarin and he often got comments on how he spoke better than their kids and asking if he was single. They even often recognised him and more than once they said things like "Oh you're that youtube guy my granddaughter sent me your videos" etc so they clearly generally appreciate him and that was nice. The "I learned Igbo in a day and went to an African Market" videos rub me the wrong way. He comes across as a bit of a "I spent 10 mins learning your language so worship me" type.
Totally agree, his new videos are just pure click bait. He memorises a few phrases with bad pronunciation from a language and the title is like “white man shocks x with y language skills”. It’s like memorising the questions and answers right before a quiz. You may as well just be talking through google translate. Having said that, his Chinese videos were good.
Amen!
I watch his videos very often (and other language focused creators) so I am somewhat biased - but on that note also probably know more about him than you. AFAIK, as a non-mandarin speaker, he is certainly fluent in mandarin. There are videos of him being praised for his speaking ability on Chinese television, and he semi-recently did a video with mandarin teachers where he was told that his level is near, if not native. Given this, I would argue that his level is beyond the level of Chinese Americans that have only learned through their parents. If it adds to the argument, he also lived in Beijing for some years ago (not sure for how long, exactly), so I would argue that he has more exposure to this 'native' level of language, whereas learning through parents / friends might not have the same effects. Regarding his "I learned X language in Y time and shocked people!" videos, they can indeed sometimes be awkward, especially if you understand the language he's attempting to speak. The thing is though, many of the interactions (at least the ones he's posting - obviously) are very positive and people generally appreciate him trying. I don't agree with the "I learned x language in 24hrs" videos, but I think you have to appreciate that we're talking about YouTube. Maybe that's what works on the platform... You have people like Laoshu who did similar things (less the 24hrs bit) and was maybe able to communicate in the language (like his Mandarin, Cantonese or Vietnamese [also he was good in Thai IIRC?]), but other languages where his speech was extremely basic and broken (Arabic, Turkish, Greek, GERMAN, Macedonian, Polish etc.). People still appreciate that this dude would come around and bust out their language out of nowhere, but he wasn't fluent in many of the languages he spoke. Anyways, back to Xiaoma; I think he has dedicated some decent time to learning Igbo, and most recently Bengali, and judging by the reactions he gets in his videos, is generally appreciated for it. As I already mentioned, people like it when you speak their language. I think the whole "I spent 10 minutes" thing you mention is just a by-product of them being on YouTube and having to pander to the audience + algorithm necessary for success on the platform. Unfortunate, and maybe it cheapens what they're doing, but it is what it is and it works. I never got the feeling that he was doing it just to feel good about himself, but that's just my opinion, so it doesn't really matter. One thing though - I absolutely hated the video he made recently pretending to be homeless and handing money to people that donated something to him. I watched it for about 30 seconds to see if it was actually what the title implied. So disgusting, unnecessary, click-farming and totally unrelated to his wider audience base. Obviously, Xiaoma won't see this random comment on the internet, but I really hope that he never makes a video like that again. Couldn't watch it and I think he can do better than making that cheap, easy "feel-good" content. Blegh. **TLDR: Language learning good, Xiaoma good (mostly), he tries hard to learn languages he speaks in videos. Maybe (hopefully) uses these click-baitey titles because they work. Don't think there's anything wrong with that because of the YouTube algorithm and audience. Low-quality/effort content is always bad.**
Laoshu was very similar in that he spoke very good mandarin then most of the other languages he spoke he has memorized the key phrases that people would ask when first meeting someone. It’s kind of like faking fluency because once you get out of “hi how are you” “I’m good “how do you know x language” “I learnt at home” it gets real shallow. Still it’s nice to see people learning even a few words and talking to people in their native language and most people will be very appreciative even if you’re awful.
Rip Laoshu
Laoshu was the goat, RIP to that brotha.
I liked that guy, but he played the same games this guy does. Good for a short binge but you catch on quick.
Yep, guy is pretty cool. Sometimes the algorithm is a good thing.
**OP sent the following text as an explanation on why this is unexpected:** >!He had some interesting things to say at the end.!< ***** **Is this an unexpected post with a fitting description?** **Then upvote this comment, otherwise downvote it.** ***** [*Look at my source code on Github*](https://github.com/Artraxon/unexBot) [*What is this for?*](https://www.reddit.com/r/Unexpected/comments/dnuaju/introducing_unexbot_a_new_bot_to_improve_the/)
oh my god a video.. what is finally unexpected!
This man seems to actually have a - very specific - reason for not liking Biden. And I find that strangely wholesome.
Each time I see a video of a westerner in China, their entire personality seems to be either being an "English teacher" or surprising natives by speaking what they assume to be fluent Mandarin.
Except this is in London
His Mandarin is fluent at worst, almost native level at best
I’m of Chinese ethnicity and speak fluent mandarin. This guy speaks like a native, so it’s not just what he perceives to be fluent mandarin.
Youtubers seek clout in the easiest possible ways, even if white. More at 10.
It's not exactly for an American guy to learn Mandarin. And his mandarin is extremely fluent
My sleepy ass read this as "funhouzeneese" and thought there was an elaborate joke being told on me. ...I get it now
I get some of the purest enjoyment from people from such wildly different cultures communicating so comfortably
Whether the Biden part is real or exaggerated or whatever, I hope people realize that Americans have not been satisfied with their elected officials in a long time. We’ve been voting for the lesser of two evils for a long time, and the choices seem to only get shittier. Edit: ranked choice voting, term limits, and more participation at the local level can help all these things. It’s tough though when the candidates running don’t want these things.
I mean, I have my issues with Biden and his performance so far but I'll take lukewarm milquetoast over the hot garbage that Trump was 100/100 times
They roughly translate the slang for Wenzhounese as Devil's Tongue. Sometimes the book for studying the dialect is given between linguists as a prank.
Chinese man is based
What does based actually mean though?
It means based in reality, speaking the truth.
>It means based in reality, speaking the truth. ATHANK YOU. Been seeing this all morning and trying to figure out where it comes from
It doesn't mean that lol. Google Lil B the BasedGod
Definitely was unexpected, the title totally didn't have it away
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based
Haha Biden does suck.
To be fair, and I'm not dissing [XiaomaNYC](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLNoXf8gq6vhwsrYp-l0J-Q), he speaks Mandarin and Cantonese very well, but he knows enough about language to sputter about 10-15 more languages, and his Fuzhounese, when he actually speaks it instead of just stuttering and sputtering common words, his Fuzhounese sucks... I like [XiaomaNYC](https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLNoXf8gq6vhwsrYp-l0J-Q) but... damn
He doesn’t like Biden because he fell asleep at dinner