Posted on by eazychinese.com

These Boots were made for Walkin\’!

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(My nice, new pair of Converse I got on my last birthday)

Okay, so not exactly boots. But they were made for walking, so I got that part right at least. Moving on. In my last post I mentioned the significance of the number eight to Taiwanese people. Today I want to introduce my readers to an interesting Chinese superstition,
míxìn(迷信) in Mandarin. In Chinese culture, it is considered taboo, or jìnjì(禁忌) to give your significant other shoes as a gift. The reason being, as I already mentioned, shoes were meant for walking, and if you give your lover a nice pair of sneakers they will use them to walk out of your life. So if you ever give your boyfriend/girlfriend a pair of Converse for his/her birthday, make sure they pay at least a small portion of the price-tag, 100Nt should suffice. That way they aren't a "gift" or lǐwù(禮物).

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Chinese phrases of the day:

míxìn(迷信)= superstition

jìnjì(禁忌)= taboo

lǐwù(禮物)= gift

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4 Replies to “These Boots were made for Walkin\’!”

  1. I have heard about that one before. But there is also one about giving clocks and watches to people. I remember I gave one of my good Taiwanese friends a watch and in return, she gave me NT$1. I can’t remember the exact reasoning behind the superstition but it is something else you shouldn’t give as a present in Taiwan!

    1. I’ll address this and a few more superstitions in my next post! You are absolutely correct, clocks are taboo as well because the way it sounds in Mandarin is like they are seeing you for the last time before you are buried. Kind of morbid, right? Thanks for sharing your experience and please check out my follow up post!

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