Chinese joke about homonymous meaning of English name "Alexander"

Chinese joke about homonymous meaning of English name "Alexander"

BEIJING, Jan. 27 (Xinhua) -- When a Chinese person gives himselfthe English name "Alexander," other Chinese laugh.

"Alexander" is read "Yalishanda" in Chinese, which is homonymouswith another phrase that means under the pressure of a largemountain.

"I really do feel pressure now because I have to take care of myparents and child while I work," Li Xiao told a Guangzhou newspaperrecently.

Other people call themselves "Yalishanda" when they are underpressure to buy a house or find a spouse.

There is an "Yalishanda" entry on hudong.com, which tracks thehot topics on the Chinese Internet. Some 132,758 netizens haveviewed the entry.

It was selected as one of the top ten topics of the month,according to a hudong.com report Wednesday.

The other hot topics were:

- The Hu-Obama meeting held during Chinese President Hu Jintao'sstate visit to the United States. Hu reached an important consensuswith U.S. President Barack Obama.

- China's J-20 stealth fighter jet, which took its first testflight earlier this month.P - Forced housing demolition, which wasended in cities without due process and fair compensation, with theState Council publishing a regulation on expropriation andcompensation for houses on state-owned land last week.

- China's tobacco control work, which was criticized for failingto honor World Health Organization (WHO) commitments.

- Spring Festival, which may see a record 2.85 billion passengertrips taken as Chinese return home for family reunions.