口水 kou shui (mouth water)

Yesterday I learned another Chinese word...it's great to be in a place where they speak the language you're trying to learn. It really helps.

Yesterday's word that I learned is slightly interesting, and very appropriate for my everyday life. To repeat the title above, the word is 'kou shui', which literally means 'mouth water.' I get a kick out of how literal Chinese can be sometimes, and while sometimes humorous for the learner, I'm sure Chinese people rarely think about the words they use in the same way a foreigner learning the language would. I'll let you all (Americans and non-Chinese) think about what the meaning of what 'mouth water' might be for a bit before revealing the answer at the bottom of this post.

What's a good word combination set that we use in English...? How about house shoes... or butterfly maybe? This sort of combination occurs much more frequently in Chinese, where one character will be used in conjuction with another character to produce a combined meaning from both of the characters. The word for train, for example...火车 (huo che) literally means 'fire vehicle.' Or consider the characters for 'milk mouth,' (奶嘴) which are used in combination to mean pacifier or the nipple on a bottle. Incidentally, we're approaching the same category of every day use that I have for 'mouth water'...

While 'butterfly' might not be humorous to us as native speakers of English, someone learning the language might seriously wonder why we would call such a beautiful creature a margarine mosquito, for example. Thus is the source of my delight in words such as 'kou shui.'

Now that I've bantered about on one of the finer points of learning Chinese....let me appropriately tell you at this time that we have signed contracts to go to Zhejiang Normal University in Jinhua next year. We're excited, as it seems God is leading us there. We may have mentioned before that the situation to work there next year more or less developed on it's own with very little work on our part...and in many ways it seems that it will be a much more ideal situation. Whether it turns out to be that way or not, we are excited to be following His will, although we aren't sure why we are favored enough to rest in it. His grace and mercy are truly amazing.

Now, to turn back to the appropriateness of our aforementioned topic. The meaning of 'kou shui?' It is drool. A very useful word when you're the parent of a three month old.