Nostalgia Over The Old Names

Arts & Sciences Culture & History
21

Daasgirl, my apologies. I really thought you were someone else.
The thing is this: history is important. If a place keeps changing its name, public memory is disjointed. I really LIKE the name Hsin-Tien and it has so much rich history behind it. I hope they don’t have to change their name. Taipei didn’t.// In fact, I wrote a little song for Hsin-Tien:

I hate living in Japan
And I’m moving back to Hsin-Tien
I miss that Cho-Tofu
And Taiwan-style yaketori, too

I miss living in Hsin-Tien
I lived on a mist-shrouded mountain
Movies were just 200 quai
And there were lots of dykey nuns
In that temple behind my house…hm hm hm…

22

I agree with you Kickstand. I also prefer the Wade Giles or whatever romanzation Hsintien is. I hate Xindian about as much as I hate XiZhi, even though I love Hanyu Pinyin for helping me with Chinese, I hate it to replace the places names in Taiwan. First the place names, next people’s names?! Yikes, stop the madness.

23

Most of this isn’t a question of naming. Hsin-tien = Xindian = Sindian. Such is a matter merely of romanization/spelling. The name remains the same.

Taibei could, however, be said to have an “English name”: Taipei (with the p pronunciation).

24

There is a place in Donegal called Muff. It’s quite popular with divers. I am not making this up. Check it out.

25

That’s right…most people in Taiwan- if not all- have a Wade-Giles romanization of their name. Tsang. Hsiu. Are we going to change those, too?

26

They’re changing the name of Xindian? Nobody told me, dammit, and I live there!

27

I think they should call Xindian “New Shop”. That would sort it out once and for all.