Language itself is a container for misunderstanding. Many conflicts are blamed on “not speaking the same language,” but more often than not, what we overlook is that we’re standing in different positions.

I’m from the South. Where I grew up, people rarely use the honorific “nin” (您). Unless someone is putting on a show, tail up, ready to flatter. In daily life, the moment I hear that word, I tense up.

In the North, however, people casually replace “you” with “nin.” For them, it’s ordinary politeness. The sense of distance embedded in language is strangely subtle. When I was younger, I didn’t know that Northern people often call someone “jie” (older sister) as a friendly gesture. I misunderstood it as a hint that I looked older. I pulled away. I probably killed a few potential romances myself.

The same word can be used by one person to draw closer and heard by another as a jab. Honorifics are not meant to be weapons, yet they often become tools of distance. Even trickier are words with double meanings, homophones, same characters with different intentions. One small misread, and you step into a social landmine.

Language is not just vocabulary. It’s a compressed cultural file. If you unzip it differently, you get a completely different outcome.

Now we live in a world flooded with internet slang. New terms pop up overnight. If you don’t get them, you’re out. If you do, you instantly belong. They’re not honorifics, but they can be even more ruthless. Honorifics define distance. Internet slang defines tribes. One pushes away. The other filters.

Language has never been just about communication. It decides who’s inside and who’s outside. Sometimes I look at AI and almost want to give it a hug. Homophones, same characters with different meanings, and then translating all that into foreign slang? That’s brutal. And beyond the literal meaning, it still has to read the unspoken context behind the words.

But maybe it’s precisely because it’s so difficult that language feels so mysterious and fascinating.



—— XC Scribbles · 壹佰肆拾捌 CXLVIII 💬