You can't always tell the difference between white people either. My girlfriend's ancestors were german and dutch she was halfway between blonde and brunette could have been from anywhere in europe. My ancestors were english and a little native but you'd have a hard time guessing that too.
I love how you guys show the REAL thing with no BS or fake. I'm tired of all the travel shows that show everything being all grand and wonderful. You show how it really is. Stay Awesome and carry on.
I'm going to start a channel called "The Real INSERT FOREIGN COUNTRY" My first episode is a close-up of shit in a public bathroom or the equivalent. You are invited to be my first subscriber. I also will describe the smell in detail, by the way! Bet you're as excited as a quarreling squirrel on crack. The second episode will be piss.
Love the channel guys, and I'm loving this Vietnam series. That said, (and please take these pointers with the aforementioned love :) to C-Milk's question about misconceptions surrounding Asian cultures, I felt some of those misconceptions were promulgated in this very video. Winston's analogy of UK and US is misleading for a simple reason. The US has its very genesis in the British empire. It can be directly traced to the expansion of the British empire and could be said to be its offshoot - like Australia, New Zealand etc. However, the relationship between China and Vietnam is more akin to the relationship between the UK and India. Yes, the latter inherited many cultural and linguistic aspects from the former, but it already existed as a separate culture with a separate history and language and an independent origin at the time when the two came into contact. Chinese is part of the Sino-Tibetan languages. Vietnamese belongs to the Austroasiatic family. Vietnam's later adoption of Chinese characters is owed to China's cultural dominance at the time, and also to the absence of a native Vietnamese script. The same is true of Korean and Japanese. Both languages belong to distinct language families but, lacking a script, adopted Chinese characters at a time when they were the only game in town. The English adopting the Latin alphabet despite speaking a Germanic language is a similar case. As for the culture, well, let's just say that memes are older than the internet. The Chinese lunar calendar and Chinese zodiac being adopted by Japan, Korea and Vietnam do not point to a common origin any more than the Greek Zodiac or Gregorian calendar point to a common origin between Glaswegians, Greeks and Romans. Cultures can and do routinely adopt and borrow things from other cultures, so the existence of cultural similarities between neighbours doesn't mean those neighbours have a common origin. That said, I hope you took this in good spirits. Keep the videos coming! Xx
@Panda Bear While I agree to what you said, you may not know that southern Chinese are genetically related to Vietnamese and other southeast Asians, and Koreans are genetically related to northern Chinese from Shandong and Northeast China, the ancestors of many Koreans were originally from Shandong province in China and migrated to Korea 800 years ago, some were the government officials who were posted to Korea by Chinese government and never returned. The former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is one of them. Unlike Japanese or Koreans, 'Han Chinese' is not a homogeneous race but a mixture or collection of different tribes and cultures across China, it was the first emperor who unified the writing system that unified Chinese in China. That is why northern Chinese are much taller and fairer, southern Chinese are shorter and darker. And Chinese from Sichuan province in the Southwest look different from Chinese grow up in eastern provinces near Shanghai. The reason these countries adopted Chinese language and culture is because China was more advanced than them 2000 years ago, they sent students to China and had learned a lot from China. Northern Vietnam was ruled by China for a few hundreds of years until one of the Chinese businessman established his own dynasty in Northern Vietnam and there are a lot of Chinese descendants there and you can still see strong Chinese influence 1000 years later. BTW, the country name of 'Vietnam' was given by Chinese emperor, Vietnamese proposed 'Nam Viet' as their name, the Chinese emperor rejected and gave them 'Vietnam' instead. Vietnam was a vassal state of China during that time.
While we are pointing out inaccuracies, that wasn't the outskirts of Hanoi; it started in Hoan Kiem district, which is inner Hanoi. It may have been the outskirts decades ago, but especially now with the broader size classification of Hanoi, it is inner-inner Hanoi.
You‘re correct in everything you said @@icebaby6714. Great post. I would only clarify than when I wrote about separate origins, I was referring to the origins of cultures and/or nations. You're right to point out that these groups are genetically closely related, but it's worth bearing in mind that memes (culture, language, etc.) evolve much, much faster than genes. As such, it is entirely possible to have groups that share a close genetic kinship with each other, but which have become culturally, linguistically and historically distinct after having split for centuries or millennia. With enough time, these genetically close groups can give rise to separate and independent cultural identities. By the time these identities became established, the only knowledge of their past would have come from a oral tradition, and later through the written word. By then, the creation myths and origin stories which provided people and nations with the sense of a shared identity did not reflect the kinship you alluded to, as it would have been all but unknown to them at the time. It is this distinction that I meant to make, since Winston and C-Milk implied that the cultural similarities between these countries is due to a common (presumably "cultural") origin, which is not the case. .
I think we never shared the same language, Vietnamese language actually belongs to a totally different family. When China conquered Vietnam, they brought in their writing system, and the Vietnamese adapted that writing system for the Vietnamese spoken language. Do note that, however, we only borrowed the kanji to represent the sounds. So the Vietnamese writing system (chu Nom) is unique in such way that it's borrowed from Kanji but then adapted in shape to represent the sound. The real spoken and written Chinese, only a few elite Vietnamese knew. Of course I'm talking about the official Chinese language here, China is a big country that absorbed and conquered many other small countries in the past, so if you list all the languages of China there will be way too many.
'kanji' is japanese and 'hanzi' is chinese with pronunciation and some meaning being different...i noticed the two boys do not know the difference either!
The only thing I know is "quay" in Thai is much different than "quay" in Laos and that is about all I know of Asia for me. Hint a Thai woman taught me most of the bad words.
China once promoted itself as "Land of a Million languages!" but now everyone must act Han Chinese & preferably speak Mandarin. It's a shame, really. China could benefit from its own diversity.
Kind of like all the local Chinese dialects. Written, they still use the simplified character set, but they just have different sounds to go with each character. So the character for dog is always the same, but how you say the character changes depending on which language you use. My wife is from Guangdong and Cantonese sounds a lot more like Vietnamese to me than Mandarin.
The most relevant thing you will learn is, in Asia you will always get that "You do not understand our culture" sentence, regardless where you are, regardless how long you were there, if your wife is from there, if you worked there for 25 years, if you travelled all over Asia, if you studied that culture, if your friends and family lives there, or whatever you do. The presumption is there, written like an invisible law over your head, visible to Asians before you even open the mouth, and it can almost never be changed.
you guys really are the definition of best friends :p it just reminds us ( in this day and age ) that you don't have to agree with each other about everything... as long as you keep an open mind , listen , and try to learn a thing or 2 ..... keep them uploads coming , and most of all ...............stay awesome !!!
I do subscribe; I love your channels and yes I am watching in my warm computer room drinking coffee. I know I won't get to travel to all these countries but your videos are the next best thing. Thanks guys
Same here! :) Stuck in south Jersey, usa, too old to travel, but seeing tons of places I'll never go, thru my old pc. Thanks so much for sharing your journeys! :)
not sure how long you have been in Vietnam, C-Milk, but I'm kind of surprised that you have noticed the effort of Vietnamese to be (considered) different from Chinese. It would be great to hear more from you about this, how you think about it, related things that you find interesting or worth mentioning...
Thank you so much for showing us a very unique view of Vietnam. I had such a biased view of Vietnam growing up with Vietnamese friends. I thought the country was very backward, but like you did with the China videos your really opening my eyes to Vietnam. Thank you so much for your videos can't wait to see the next one. Thank you for all your hard work and dedication to your fans.
Not going to lie, my true journey to discovering the different cultures in East Asia started with anime about 7 years ago. I have since learned a little bit about every country whether it's through music or through literature and obviously channels like ADVChina. Thanks for another great video filled with great information.
Being from Eastern Europe, living in Ireland, I had a ton of misconceptions about Asia, didn't really think about it too much, just a continent, not exactly a place I had any interest in.. But then one of my best mates started dating a girl from Hong Kong, and invited me to go with him to visit Hong Kong, at the time, I had one big thing to do on my bucketlist, which was to travel outside Europe, see something completely different, and Hong Kong did not dissapoint, actually, I found your channels around the time when I was travelling there, and already had a few pleasant trips to Asia (tho I usually try to avoid tourist places, as I'm not really into that scene as I found out in Thailand..)
I don't think the Vietnamese language and Chinese language as as close as you think. Chinese is in the Sino-Tibetan language family whereas Vietnamese is an Austroasiatic language. That's the same language family as Cambodian. Although Vietnam did borrow a bunch of words from Chinese, it's still in a separate language family (similar to how English is Germanic, yet it incorporated a bunch of Latin based words).
Laos is basically Thailand with much more candy people (they are absolutely lovely over there!), beautiful atypical landscapes, a powerful military junta but no King!
@@ManiSRao-bt3xw Not exactly, like in Thailand, they will use the word pathed (which means country): ປະເທດລາວ - pathed lao Officials, politicians and the military junta probably could tell you: Sathalanalat Passathipatai Passasson lao - ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ - Lao People's Democratic Republic
I get your point C-milk. And you are absolutely right. It goes both ways, they don't expect you to know where they come from, but if you do, they are shocked and sometimes blown away with things you know about them. Great video 👍
Sometimes I like to play a game with salesclerks, like at Walmart, if their face is asian. I'll try and guess where they're from. It's usually the Philippines, so that makes it easier, and when I'm right, we both smile! :)
If you really want to surprise/shock an Asian... say something-answer in their language!!! s);oD Kind of a hobby of mine. (They'll [usually] stop talking $h!t about the gaijin-loawai customers until you leave too!) *
In response to conversation @10:40 If I were in New York and came across some Chinese tourists and they asked me where I was from and I told them Bozeman Montana, I would be shocked if they knew where that was. And I wouldn't be angry. So yeah... I get it.
ya, i have been there before but i can not remember which part of montana, 'bozeman' is located in... china is so old that the cities have been renamed sometimes more than once!
I absolutely appreciate the cultural differences of all the locales you visit! That is one of the main reasons I love exploring, travelling and visiting new places.
o 44 I’m South Korean and I can say that this is correct. Learning Japanese take us only a few weeks or months in general, to reach fluency, since all we have to do is just to exchange between the words and all the grammatical particles that only exists in Korea and Japan, not caring about grammatical errors. I’m not sure why you call this bs, but I assume the reason is Japanese people’s romanized names and Korean people’s romanized names sound totally different to you as a English speaker - you may think the Korean is similar to Chinese because of our syllables in names looks the same as the Chinese since Koreans still uses sino-Korean when we name our kids. (If you’re Korean or Korean ethnicity who hates Japan and Japanese people because of the recent history between us, trust me I was one of the most hateful people when I was young and stupid enough to be fooled by the far lest teachers. The more I know about Japan and Japanese people, the more I find the similarities and I also think that we can learn a lot from them. - Most importantly, I found that Japanese people generally have less ego when it comes to their craft, while we Koreans tend to be all about our ego and pride that these can hurt our products or out performance. Look at the North Korea for example. They never kneel down to nobody to keep their ideology and dignity so as a result they don’t get any outside resources while all they have is the small population and bald headed mountains with cold dry weather. You can say that it’s just the regime not the people, but many North Korean experts say that these are partly the result of their culture. You can see Japanese people as sneaky and dishonest but at the same time, they for sure know how to take step back and admit their fault and losses honorably, not trying to win every battles, only focusing on the war. Our culture is certainly premature in this important aspect of our life.)
@@deleted836 sure, right you are! I learned Japanese since early youth and when I listened first time to Korean, it made me think of Japanese -- diction, mannerisms, pronunciation, etc. but definitely not of Mandarin Chinese.
Hey guys! I'm heading to China in a few weeks, Fuzhou in particular. Enjoy watching your vids on multiple channels, reminds me of how much I enjoy China while I'm back home on Canada's west coast. Stay Awesome!
Just the video quality is enough for me to thoroughly enjoy your adventures in Asia. Except for that moment I realized I was looking at a butchered dog :( I love that your conversations are informative (especially for those like me who may never have the chance to go there), and you keep off the regular tourist traps. We get to see what it really looks like. A breath of fresh air.
i have to say. i REALLY love ADVChina because ur not just a blogger channel. I love hearing ur thoughts of the good and bad stuff of China. The truth. I wish there was a foreigner in VN that did the same. Talked about the good and bad. But people in Nam just talk about their great life in VN without ACTUALLY knowing anything about VN. they may speak the language but have no clue about the culture, the history and I wish they talked about the bad things in VN not just about their life and how great it is. Thank you ADVChina
Always always enjoy your videos but the banter between the two of you in this one makes this one of my top favorites. Also, I used to think Hong Kong was a part of Japan . 🤦♂️. To be fair I was a lot younger than I am currently when I thought that. I am staying awesome.👍
The story behind Korean (Hangul) is very interesting. An Emporer said to a scribe that he wanted a writing system "A smart person could learn in a day, and a dumb person could learn in 10 days." The script is incredibly intuitive. I've learned Hangul, and some Sanskrit (devanagari) and it's so much easier for Hangul.
Because they switched entirely to Hangul, Koreans cannot read old literature. This means they cannot study or understand their own history. So, Koreans live on fantasy history they have created with wishful dreams.
Wow! How neat, all the little alleyways! Impressive facts & history. I always wondered about. Little Korea, Japan, China, Vietnam. . I enjoy learning all this!!
I recently found your channel and am very much enjoying it. The modern Korean alphabet is actually not based on the Chinese script. It's a phonetic alphabet based on the shape of the mouth and the direction of the exhaled breath when making that sound. For instance, ㄴ is "n" because the tip of the tongue is touching the top of the mouth while ㄱ is "g" because the back of the tongue is at the top of the mouth. It's absolutely true that they celebrate the same holidays, though! When Vietnam celebrates Tet, Korea celebrates Seolnal 설날! My Korean wife absolutely learned the Chinese script in school and it was fun driving around in Chinatown in Seattle, where she was reading the street signs, written in Chinese, just reading them in Korean. 고맙숩니다! 안녕!
I circled the Pacific while in the US Navy in the late 1970's, and I was always surprised when my shipmates "couldn't tell the difference" between the many ports we visited. The food is the first thing I noticed. Then the ways of doing business (negotiating over a sale was most fun in Taiwan). Next was the friendliness of the locals. In South Korea a cab driver took me to his home to taste his wife's kimchi (yes, it was that good). But Hong Kong may have been the best combination of it all: I had a small vendor close his shop and take me on a tour of other vendors, just because he didn't have what I was looking for. By far the best was simply being invited into people's homes The best in this respect was Taiwan, which was under military dictatorship at the time, so the most important parts of life happened indoors. In the Philippines, dirt-poor villages were eager to share their meals, not because they thought I would pay, but because I was white and curious. They probably had seen far too many "ugly American" tourists. I love each and every one of my Asia memories. Watching this channel reinforces them and brings them up to date. Talk about living vicariously...
When someone asks where I am from and I reply New York they assume I live in NYC. I spent 90% of my life growing up on a farm an hour from Buffalo. Now I live in Rochester, NY and it takes only 20 minutes before you're in the country. It's hard for many foreigners to realize that NY state is a big state and that it takes me 7 hours driving legally to get to NYC.
I don't get mad, but sometimes I do get annoyed when they don't know where I am from. This is de reason why: In primary school I had to learn all capitals of South America, North America (and several important states/cities), Europe and Oceania. In Asia and Africa I had to learn all countries and several cities as well. Of course I don't remember all of them, but I also learned some new ones. If I visit a country I look at the map beforehand, so I generally know where I am going. People visit my country (mostly, but not only Americans) and the only know Amsterdam - most of the time they don't even know what country they are in. Not to even speak of the bigger cities. Those same people act like I am stupid if I don't know the state they are from. (Since I am not in the states, I sometimes have to ask questions like 'that's the one next to Virginia right?')
The US typically uses a map projection for the world which distorts it to an absurd degree, where Greenland is the size of Africa for crying out loud, so the US cares not for geography.
Rob Vespa': same happened to me in a Taiwanese temple - a guy addressed me in Japanese -- and as a German I definitely don't look Asian -- but I guess Japanese is the only foreign language they've learnt in their youth. I told that once to a local Chinese and made her upset: exclaiming: "you talked to the wrong people!" -- maybe U should not have told her -- politically incorrect!? (Haha...)
As a Vietnamese, I'm very interested in learning about the Sinosphere (China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam) culture. I think recently our government has also been promoting the Sinosphere culture a lot. Thank you for such informative and accurate video. Seeing you guys riding and having a conversation at the same time is surprisingly relaxing. Cảm ơn! - 感恩 !
I want to thank you for giving so much info on Asia. I know I could read about these countries but seeing all the different communities and villages from the videos makes me feel as though I am going with you to these places and when I talk to other people about what I have learned from your videos, they are usually amazed at how much I know. PS: I also have an affinity for the snake (serpent) Winston. It has extremely powerful symbolism and people who know of its wisdom understand that it is not evil. The wave it creates as it moves has so many meanings throughout various cultures.
Korean script was formed by looking at the cross section of the human head and how the tongue etc would be positioned when pronouncing Korean syllables. The story behind it is a little more complicated than just „screwing Chinese characters“. The transition from using a combination of Chinese and Korean script to a „pure“ Korean system happened not too long ago (in South Korea). People in S. Korea nowadays cannot read Chinese (unless they specifically learn it). Most of them can only read a few characters (if at all) and write their names in Chinese (they oftentimes struggle, though). I personally would like to see Chinese script being reintroduced in Korea as it would make understanding what I read easier. Probably not gonna happen...
Seeing the difference between a Korean and Japanese is like looking for the visual differences between a Dutchman and a German if your not familiar with Germanic people. It's their demeanour/attitude and sometimes the clothes and hair styles that helps, but otherwise, almost impossible to do. Seeing the differences between an Indonesian, Malaysian, Singaporian, Timorese or Philippino is again, near impossible without the other clues, it's like looking to see the difference between a Russian, Ukrainian, Romanian, Georgian, Serbian or Polish person on visuals alone. With Chinese,...some are very closely related to Mongolian's, others look very much like Thai, Cambodian, Birmese or Vietnamese depending on the location in China they came from. And other Chinese look very much like Koreans and Japanese, while others look very Afghan or Turkish. You need to be able to know the differences between languages and cultures to know outright in most cases,otherwise you need to obsever the demeanour/attitude, clothes and hairstyles to guess it.
As an East Asian, I approve of this. It seems you know quite well about the genetic distribution/groupings of the peoples in East Asia quite well! The Han Chinese today is a weird mix of all peoples depending on which part of China like you said. They all call themselves "Han" but the fact is that genetically, there are probably no pure Han. Northern Han have some Manchurian/Mongolian/Korean while Southern Han have some Vietnamese/Thai.
Yea but there's a little grey area which starts somewhere in South China to North Vietnam because the Han Chinese from the North colonised South China a loooong time ago and assimilated the native women. South China used to be the land of the natives who weren't Han Chinese. These natives were similar to the Vietnamese/Thais of today genetically and also spoke a language from the same language family of modern Vietnamese and Thai. Most South Chinese today have ancestors who were Han Chinese men and native women. Ancient China even went further South and occupied North Vietnam for hundreds of years and did the same process of ethnic cleansing and assimilation in North Vietnam albeit to a less successful degree. That is why today there are some South Chinese who looks completely like Southeast Asians and some North Vietnamese that looks like South Chinese. You will find that most South Chinese today have about 10% - 30% of Vietnamese/Thai genes while North Vietnamese have a similar percentage of Han Chinese genes.
I agree but they don’t have enough knowledge about those countries because they just don’t care. So I decided to call all non-blonde-white-people as Arabs.
I have to say, the one thing that gained my interest in Asian history and culture in general is the patterns I started to notice between them. I knew there wasn't a coincidence, so I read deeply into Chinese and a plethora of Asian history, took many classes in it, then finally minored in Asian studies.
Lol, My Dad (admittedly old and not as sharp as he once was) and his younger self-centered wife still can't be bothered to remember where me and my Chinese wife go to see her family. When we come back, the first thing they ask is "How was Japan?" Drives me nuts....
...I actually CAN. Chinese have characteristic behavior and are typically LOUD. The challenge with telling korean and japanese (If they are not talking) is in their fashion (and again, subtle behavior differences) The main issue is telling the difference between phillipeno, malasian and vietnamese. (for me at least) Not enough experience with them to know. As for language (written) The easiest tell between japanese and chinese is hiragana and katakana. As for telling between thaiwanese and chinese, that would typically require knowledge in the difference between traditional and simplified characters. That's a challenge indeed. Experience makes all the difference.
@@iamnathank Sips hot coffee while watching screen in living room while reading about you sipping hot coffee while watching screen in living room while reading about you sipping hot coffee while watching screen in living room.
I spent two years in Thailand during the Vietnam War, and it was crowded in the major cities and the people there was nice and the country was nice. I also spent plenty of time in Japan, The Philippines, and South Korea and it was the same there also it is different there also than in countries like Vietnam, and China. I would like to go back to Japan, and then Thailand to see what those countries look like now.
Love your videos guys, they are a great way to live vicariously through your travels, especially on a bike, which I miss. I do have one maybe silly question, which may be worth covering in a video? I have been in discussions before arguing about the physical differences in typical facial features between the Chinese, Japanese, Korean, SE Asian, etc.. Is there an easy answer to explain it, or am I right to say it's complicated?
@@SpinningSpinor - I get that and understand. But is there some way you can define it better for people who aren't from China? For example, I have Korean friends who say they can identify most Chinese or Japanese people they see in Korea by sight. Are their any specific suggestions for westerners to more easily identify different Asians from different countries?
@@TheGoodwolfe It requires years of experience. I am from northwest. When I was young, I wan't able to identify the local Han Chinese and Hui muslim minority. I was always curious about how adults could distinguish them. They looked the same to me when I was a kid. It took me so many years to grasp the ability. It cannot be explained by languages.
Thanks for trying to educate the average citizen of all countries whose lack of knowledge about geography and world history is abysmal! Wish you would comment on the assimilation of Asian culture into Western societies. I.e. you will see ads in the US announcing Chinese New Year's Sales! Thoroughly enjoyable vlog today. Loved going on your ride through the back alleys of Vietnam. Brought back great memories of my 10 years in Asia!
I attribute that to the rise of Chinese tourism and their love for luxury products. Note that you see ads like this most in or near stores that sell luxury fashion brands.
You guys are awesome! Have you ever though of doing the same vlog in the Philippines? Philippines is more diverse than China. You will never be bored there since Philippines has more than 7,000 islands, it has almost 200 dialects (different language variations), However, almost everybody can speak English so it'll be easy for you to get lost and still find your way because of the Filipino hospitality (and just being helpful). A well known trait for Filipinos.
At a Chinese restaurant, I asked a Chinese waiter one time, from which city in China he originated. Despite asking several times, he would only tell me, "from the south." It took me a few minutes to catch on, he was in the US illegally and didn't want to tell me anything at all about himself. Duh! Silly me, eh?.
Many of them are from rural villages in the South and too ashamed to admit...even if he told you where he came from, you will never know where the place is.
@@icebaby6714 It would be easy to mention the next bigger city then. If someone asks me, I am always saying near by Collogne. Many people in Asia do not even know which is the nearest big city. Don't believe it, up to you, then that's ok with me. My experience, and it is not only China, it is everywhere in Asia. For example go to Bangkok and ask a person born in Bangkok how many people does Bangkok have? 90 % have no clue, not even losely.
Can't tell physical differences between people from Thai/Singapore/Cambodia/Vietnam/Laos Also Kazakh/Tibetian. But I have a good ear for languages. That's the only way I would know tbh.
In Cambodia there are quite distinct races. The Kmai (Khmer) are dark but then you have the people who look like Thais (and probably are), who are light skinned and most resemble the northern Mongoloids, and then you have the other race that looks like Vietnamese (and probably are). And then you have me, a Spaniard from Honduras, the only one here! :-) Even English teachers think I'm exotic! One time a hot woman turned around on her bike to stare at me. And when I had a beard, Indians payed more attention to me. Today blacks looked at me funny, like "This guy ain't like the rest." I love being exotic.
In Singapore and Malaysia (1900s -), we have Chinese ethnic as well. The Chinese ethnic speak Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien and other dialects originated from Mainland China. Most common dialects you will hear in Malaysia are Cantonese and Hokkien. The Hokkien speaking is very similar to Taiwanese. Cantonese speaking is same as in Guangzhou and Hong Kong, however, there is slightly slightly different, just like UK vs US English.
Winston, do you have CCTV in my apartment? You were spot on with your description. I usually watch in my living room with snacks in my face and a nice cold beer.
Andy w Well usually the UK ones look quite different when they’re at home wearing their black suits.. still not very good manners when they’re abroad.. Americans are easy since they only talk about America and can’t seem to process the fact that there are other things to talk about.. Kiwis and Australians like beer.. can’t think of anything bad to say about them other than they seem to be everywhere.
In my experience, East Asia is just as diverse as Europe, and it is only at the most superficial level you could lump all East Asian countries together. Yes they shared some things, such as writing systems and festivals, but so does Europe. It does not take long for someone to realise that they are in Japan, not China, just as it does not take long for one to see that Germany is different to France despite them sharing the Latin script and Christmas. On C-Milk’s point, generally speaking, I have found in some parts of East Asia, their expectations of one’s knowledge are so low, they often feel affirmed if one does not know something, but on the flip side, when one does know something, that is when some people get frustrated as I have found with some people a curious need to ‘know more than the foreigner’ and so you end up in this situation when they will start aggressively trying to prove your knowledge is limited and that you could never truly understand their culture. This is with some people at least.
I get the feeling that the guy taking the lead has to be a very understanding and patient person to deal with the other guy. The second guy seems abrasive sometimes and easy to get off the subject at hand. I LOVE your vids, keep them coming!
korean language system(structural consonants+vowels like english)and chinese language system(quasi hieroglyphics) is completely different. it's not based on chinese.
@@Sayu277 which countries? If you mean china korea and japan then no, not at all. There is a possible link between japanese and korean but chinese is a totally different language family
@@yes8515 i know that. It's whynthe japanese developed the kana. but they were talking about china japan korea and vietnam and then said they used to share the same language or written language. I would like to note that written language is not just the script.
Funny video. By way of background, I've lived in Vietnam for years, my wife is Viet. So I'm a white guy but I am surely better than most picking out Asians. Some are easier, like Cambodians have a distinct look. Between Vietnamese and Chinese, it's hard but you can pick it out by the mannerisms. Koreans and Japanese have a distinct look too, many Japanese have "moon faces" as my Korean friend derisively points out. Koreans sometimes have really distinct -- and attractive -- look with really angular features. But the loveliest women, of course, are from Vietnam :D And if you're a real pro, you''ll notice that northern Viets like my wife look more Chinese. Southern Viets look more like Thai.
@@ZeldaZiplock - Funny, you're joking back with me. Lol. Anyhow, for those who do not know what a Minuteman is, they were members of American volunteered militiamen ready to fight the Redcoat at a minute notice. The American Revolution is my favorite piece of history. 1776 was a historical year indeed.
My fiancé is Thai Naturalized US Citizen and I’ve done biz in Asia so this is interesting-her 90 yr old Mama says she’d get you REAL THAI FOOD YOU’D like! Love seeing different cultural areas usually there are a couple of things I didn’t know though I’ve spent time with the cultures! Be in Thailand soon
I spent 6 months in Vietnam and 2 months in Cambodia. What he said about learning a language with a Roman alphabet being a lot easier is definitely true especially for the casual learner. I didn't even try to learn Vietnamese but I learned a lot just by seeing certain things everyday. I learned virtually no Cambodian because I never bothered to learn the alphabet and so could never tell what anything was saying.
Chinese people will probably like this video, as do I, but if you say anything bad about China they don't like it. But at the end of the day all you guys ever do is tell the truth...that's what real news and real information is about.
Yes I can. Japan, Korean, Philippine, Vietnamese and Main Land, China have distinct cultures, languages and ethnic differences. They look different as well.
I haven't seen the video yet, but just responding to the title, I did live in Japan for nearly a decade (and in Singapore for a year), and I think I can tell Asians apart generally. Of course, it is far from 100%. But if you give me two countries and general people from each, I would likely be 70+% accurate. Difficult would be Japanese and Koreans, and maybe Southern Chinese and Vietnamese, which can kind of blend in with each other. Also, besides just natural appearance, fashion (including makeup, hairstyles, etc) play a major role. That is, I would assume that a Chinese person dressed in a very Japanese way would be Japanese due to the fashion displayed more than any physical characteristics. (This is why it is harder to tell Japanese Americans from Chinese Americans, as they often do not have the fashion giveaways.) And of course, if we are talking about those who do not look like the generalized types (that is, if they are "trick questions"), then that accuracy might go out the window, as it should with trick questions.
Although I do have a sick imagination wondering what "I Remember Yuri" crossover would sound like. (Probably just for the pun.) Or... Cardood feat. Yuri Wongtsmann - I Remember Jüri Woah, both dudes have pretty much the same name!
Oh yeah, I've had people ask me if I can speak Japanese living here in Hong Kong. You even have university professors who ask if Hong Kong is in Japan.
A clarifying point about hangul is that it’s based off of the spoken korean language more than the Chinese writing system. Hangul is designed to be very phonetic and operates in a unique way that you write based on syllable blocks and it uses a letter system instead of a pictogram or character system like Chinese
Japanese uses the traditional Chinese characters in some cases (馬) and in other cases uses the simplified characters (号)(医). In yet other cases Japanese uses their own version of simplified characters (広)(歯). Interesting video overall...謝謝！
I can distinguish between koreans, vietnamese, japanese, chinese, burmese, indonesians and malay with good accuracy. The less migration/immigration a country has the easier it is. Something about the facial structures really speak to me, and I memorize where I've seen it before. It's very hard with europeans, downright impossible in some cases.
I was surprised to see so many people wearing that wide conical rice farmer hat in day to day life. I figured that was just an outdated stereotype. Maybe that's part of the promotion of Vietnamese culture?
The Ehiji Soto Zen Buddhist monastery in Japan, chant the daily Sutra chants in Mandarin, (classical chinese?)because this is how they were chanted in the 12th century, when they first arrived there from mainland China. Tradition.
I am still struggling to see how Korean writing system or Hangul is “based” on Chinese logographs or Hanzi... I am sure either you don’t speak, or write to be more exact in this case, either Korean or Chinese, or even worse neither of the two languages. Plus, it’s not just North Koreans that said goodbye to Chinese characters or Hanja as it is called in Korean, average South Koreans do not comprehend Chinese script either. Unless of course they studied Chinese or Japanese, and that is exactly how I understand written Chinese, albeit the pronunciation will surely come off totally different from the Chinese way.
As another point of note, should anyone be interested [the argument that] the spread of Chinese culture to Japan occurred during the Tang Dynasty, was supposedly carried out by a Buddhist monk from Yangzhou. He was successful in carrying out this task on his seventh attempt, having failed on the previous six occasions of getting to Japan. You may visit the 'Da Ming Temple' [on the outskirts of the Slender West Lake] in Yangzhou City, Jiangsu Province to learn more.
The spread of Chinese culture isn't only a one-off event. Ancient China was dominant for a very long period of time. Many of its cultural practices and technologies were also indirectly passed on to Japan by first spreading to Korea and then from Korea to Japan.
@ Eric sure, you are correct. The Chinese just claim that this particular monk from Yangzhou, was the starting point of the spread of some aspects of Chinese culture to Japan.
Go to NordVPN.com/ADVCHINA and use the code ADVCHINA to to get 75% off a 3 year plan. Protect yourself online today!
I'm gonna give it a try. Deal seems too good. Fingers crossed. 😅
You can't always tell the difference between white people either. My girlfriend's ancestors were german and dutch she was halfway between blonde and brunette could have been from anywhere in europe. My ancestors were english and a little native but you'd have a hard time guessing that too.
Your affiliate link is broken. All I get is a blank page. I already have a VPN so it's possible my VPN is messing with your link.
@@Mr.Unacceptable worked for me. I signed up and all. No issues.
Your link doesn't work for me when using Chrome or Edge.
I love how you guys show the REAL thing with no BS or fake. I'm tired of all the travel shows that show everything being all grand and wonderful. You show how it really is. Stay Awesome and carry on.
Yes let's get some people more honest about western countries. It's not all sunshine and rainbows over here lol .
@@indovilletv8601 Yeah, like Logan airport in Boston, lol. Or all the insane potholes in DC, our nation's beautiful capital, lol
I'm going to start a channel called "The Real INSERT FOREIGN COUNTRY" My first episode is a close-up of shit in a public bathroom or the equivalent. You are invited to be my first subscriber. I also will describe the smell in detail, by the way! Bet you're as excited as a quarreling squirrel on crack. The second episode will be piss.
I always love the back alley ventures. Vietnam seems quite colorful and a bit homey. I worry about your mirrors.
Famous last words: "it's OK other people are going this way too" ⛔
"I feel like I'm going the wrong way on a one way road" - Winston
I feel like I'm going the wrong way on a two way road.
Said Winston when he met Matthew 👬
@islandbee - Poetically beautiful! 😆👍
Everyone else is doing it, it's fine. -All of Vietnam
Wrong way, on a one way stree-eet!
Love the channel guys, and I'm loving this Vietnam series. That said, (and please take these pointers with the aforementioned love :) to C-Milk's question about misconceptions surrounding Asian cultures, I felt some of those misconceptions were promulgated in this very video.
Winston's analogy of UK and US is misleading for a simple reason. The US has its very genesis in the British empire. It can be directly traced to the expansion of the British empire and could be said to be its offshoot - like Australia, New Zealand etc. However, the relationship between China and Vietnam is more akin to the relationship between the UK and India. Yes, the latter inherited many cultural and linguistic aspects from the former, but it already existed as a separate culture with a separate history and language and an independent origin at the time when the two came into contact.
Chinese is part of the Sino-Tibetan languages. Vietnamese belongs to the Austroasiatic family. Vietnam's later adoption of Chinese characters is owed to China's cultural dominance at the time, and also to the absence of a native Vietnamese script. The same is true of Korean and Japanese. Both languages belong to distinct language families but, lacking a script, adopted Chinese characters at a time when they were the only game in town. The English adopting the Latin alphabet despite speaking a Germanic language is a similar case.
As for the culture, well, let's just say that memes are older than the internet. The Chinese lunar calendar and Chinese zodiac being adopted by Japan, Korea and Vietnam do not point to a common origin any more than the Greek Zodiac or Gregorian calendar point to a common origin between Glaswegians, Greeks and Romans. Cultures can and do routinely adopt and borrow things from other cultures, so the existence of cultural similarities between neighbours doesn't mean those neighbours have a common origin.
That said, I hope you took this in good spirits. Keep the videos coming! Xx
Well done ..Thankyou..
Thank you for clarifying that.
@Panda Bear While I agree to what you said, you may not know that southern Chinese are genetically related to Vietnamese and other southeast Asians, and Koreans are genetically related to northern Chinese from Shandong and Northeast China, the ancestors of many Koreans were originally from Shandong province in China and migrated to Korea 800 years ago, some were the government officials who were posted to Korea by Chinese government and never returned. The former UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is one of them. Unlike Japanese or Koreans, 'Han Chinese' is not a homogeneous race but a mixture or collection of different tribes and cultures across China, it was the first emperor who unified the writing system that unified Chinese in China. That is why northern Chinese are much taller and fairer, southern Chinese are shorter and darker. And Chinese from Sichuan province in the Southwest look different from Chinese grow up in eastern provinces near Shanghai.
The reason these countries adopted Chinese language and culture is because China was more advanced than them 2000 years ago, they sent students to China and had learned a lot from China. Northern Vietnam was ruled by China for a few hundreds of years until one of the Chinese businessman established his own dynasty in Northern Vietnam and there are a lot of Chinese descendants there and you can still see strong Chinese influence 1000 years later. BTW, the country name of 'Vietnam' was given by Chinese emperor, Vietnamese proposed 'Nam Viet' as their name, the Chinese emperor rejected and gave them 'Vietnam' instead. Vietnam was a vassal state of China during that time.
While we are pointing out inaccuracies, that wasn't the outskirts of Hanoi; it started in Hoan Kiem district, which is inner Hanoi. It may have been the outskirts decades ago, but especially now with the broader size classification of Hanoi, it is inner-inner Hanoi.
You‘re correct in everything you said @@icebaby6714. Great post. I would only clarify than when I wrote about separate origins, I was referring to the origins of cultures and/or nations. You're right to point out that these groups are genetically closely related, but it's worth bearing in mind that memes (culture, language, etc.) evolve much, much faster than genes. As such, it is entirely possible to have groups that share a close genetic kinship with each other, but which have become culturally, linguistically and historically distinct after having split for centuries or millennia. With enough time, these genetically close groups can give rise to separate and independent cultural identities. By the time these identities became established, the only knowledge of their past would have come from a oral tradition, and later through the written word. By then, the creation myths and origin stories which provided people and nations with the sense of a shared identity did not reflect the kinship you alluded to, as it would have been all but unknown to them at the time. It is this distinction that I meant to make, since Winston and C-Milk implied that the cultural similarities between these countries is due to a common (presumably "cultural") origin, which is not the case.
.
I thought you were going to talk about the physical differences between asian ethnic groups
me too...i was ready to disagree
I think we never shared the same language, Vietnamese language actually belongs to a totally different family. When China conquered Vietnam, they brought in their writing system, and the Vietnamese adapted that writing system for the Vietnamese spoken language. Do note that, however, we only borrowed the kanji to represent the sounds. So the Vietnamese writing system (chu Nom) is unique in such way that it's borrowed from Kanji but then adapted in shape to represent the sound. The real spoken and written Chinese, only a few elite Vietnamese knew. Of course I'm talking about the official Chinese language here, China is a big country that absorbed and conquered many other small countries in the past, so if you list all the languages of China there will be way too many.
'kanji' is japanese and 'hanzi' is chinese with pronunciation and some meaning being different...i noticed the two boys do not know the difference either!
The only thing I know is "quay" in Thai is much different than "quay" in Laos and that is about all I know of Asia for me. Hint a Thai woman taught me most of the bad words.
@@daieast6305 same thing. Kanji is the old Chinese characters, borrowed from China long long ago. The word kanji means Han characters.
China once promoted itself as "Land of a Million languages!" but now everyone must act Han Chinese & preferably speak Mandarin. It's a shame, really. China could benefit from its own diversity.
Kind of like all the local Chinese dialects. Written, they still use the simplified character set, but they just have different sounds to go with each character. So the character for dog is always the same, but how you say the character changes depending on which language you use.
My wife is from Guangdong and Cantonese sounds a lot more like Vietnamese to me than Mandarin.
I'm going to start using that quote at work "you weren't there either, so shut up."
The most relevant thing you will learn is, in Asia you will always get that "You do not understand our culture" sentence, regardless where you are, regardless how long you were there, if your wife is from there, if you worked there for 25 years, if you travelled all over Asia, if you studied that culture, if your friends and family lives there, or whatever you do. The presumption is there, written like an invisible law over your head, visible to Asians before you even open the mouth, and it can almost never be changed.
@@krollpeter Totally true!
you guys really are the definition of best friends :p it just reminds us ( in this day and age ) that you don't have to agree with each other about everything... as long as you keep an open mind , listen , and try to learn a thing or 2 ..... keep them uploads coming , and most of all ...............stay awesome !!!
This is 100% selfish of me, but please don't stop making videos. I love watching them and vicariously going on adventures with you.
I do subscribe; I love your channels and yes I am watching in my warm computer room drinking coffee. I know I won't get to travel to all these countries but your videos are the next best thing.
Thanks guys
Same here! :) Stuck in south Jersey, usa, too old to travel, but seeing tons of places I'll never go, thru my old pc. Thanks so much for sharing your journeys! :)
not sure how long you have been in Vietnam, C-Milk, but I'm kind of surprised that you have noticed the effort of Vietnamese to be (considered) different from Chinese. It would be great to hear more from you about this, how you think about it, related things that you find interesting or worth mentioning...
Phú Nguyễn yea, it’s definitely been in conversations we’ve had with Vietnamese people here
Cool vid guys - a little like the old days of ADV Churchill etc. I love the old raw vids ;-) 👍
I thought the same, I prefer this type of video.
You CAN'T Tell the Difference Between CaucAsians, Can You?
@@commentfreely5443 wtf?
Thank you so much for showing us a very unique view of Vietnam. I had such a biased view of Vietnam growing up with Vietnamese friends. I thought the country was very backward, but like you did with the China videos your really opening my eyes to Vietnam. Thank you so much for your videos can't wait to see the next one. Thank you for all your hard work and dedication to your fans.
Not going to lie, my true journey to discovering the different cultures in East Asia started with anime about 7 years ago.
I have since learned a little bit about every country whether it's through music or through literature and obviously channels like ADVChina.
Thanks for another great video filled with great information.
Being from Eastern Europe, living in Ireland, I had a ton of misconceptions about Asia, didn't really think about it too much, just a continent, not exactly a place I had any interest in.. But then one of my best mates started dating a girl from Hong Kong, and invited me to go with him to visit Hong Kong, at the time, I had one big thing to do on my bucketlist, which was to travel outside Europe, see something completely different, and Hong Kong did not dissapoint, actually, I found your channels around the time when I was travelling there, and already had a few pleasant trips to Asia (tho I usually try to avoid tourist places, as I'm not really into that scene as I found out in Thailand..)
I don't think the Vietnamese language and Chinese language as as close as you think. Chinese is in the Sino-Tibetan language family whereas Vietnamese is an Austroasiatic language. That's the same language family as Cambodian. Although Vietnam did borrow a bunch of words from Chinese, it's still in a separate language family (similar to how English is Germanic, yet it incorporated a bunch of Latin based words).
No one goes to Burma(Myanmar) or Laos, go there
Are you calling them no ones? 😜
Laos is basically Thailand with much more candy people (they are absolutely lovely over there!), beautiful atypical landscapes, a powerful military junta but no King!
@@blackmennewstyle maybe you can answer a question for me: Is the country Laos actually called "Lao" by the people who live there? Thanks in advance
@@ManiSRao-bt3xw Not exactly, like in Thailand, they will use the word pathed (which means country): ປະເທດລາວ - pathed lao
Officials, politicians and the military junta probably could tell you:
Sathalanalat Passathipatai Passasson lao - ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ - Lao People's Democratic Republic
@@blackmennewstyle Thanks, I understand. Much appreciated.
I get your point C-milk. And you are absolutely right. It goes both ways, they don't expect you to know where they come from, but if you do, they are shocked and sometimes blown away with things you know about them. Great video 👍
Sometimes I like to play a game with salesclerks, like at Walmart, if their face is asian. I'll try and guess where they're from. It's usually the Philippines, so that makes it easier, and when I'm right, we both smile! :)
If you really want to surprise/shock an Asian... say something-answer in their language!!! s);oD
Kind of a hobby of mine.
(They'll [usually] stop talking $h!t about the gaijin-loawai customers until you leave too!) *
Again, thanks for letting many of us out here live vicariously through you guys!
In response to conversation @10:40
If I were in New York and came across some Chinese tourists and they asked me where I was from and I told them Bozeman Montana, I would be shocked if they knew where that was. And I wouldn't be angry. So yeah... I get it.
ya, i have been there before but i can not remember which part of montana, 'bozeman' is located in... china is so old that the cities have been renamed sometimes more than once!
I absolutely appreciate the cultural differences of all the locales you visit! That is one of the main reasons I love exploring, travelling and visiting new places.
I love that you guys explore these interesting alleyways or other areas while talking. It makes it really interesting.
that ad dub absolutely killed me! lmao. keep up the great work fellas, love the content! much love from finland!
kiitos!
Something to note with Japanese and Korean language. Although mutually unintelligible when written or spoken, they have virtually identical grammar.
Im gonna have to call bullshit on that one chief
o 44 I’m South Korean and I can say that this is correct. Learning Japanese take us only a few weeks or months in general, to reach fluency, since all we have to do is just to exchange between the words and all the grammatical particles that only exists in Korea and Japan, not caring about grammatical errors.
I’m not sure why you call this bs, but I assume the reason is Japanese people’s romanized names and Korean people’s romanized names sound totally different to you as a English speaker - you may think the Korean is similar to Chinese because of our syllables in names looks the same as the Chinese since Koreans still uses sino-Korean when we name our kids.
(If you’re Korean or Korean ethnicity who hates Japan and Japanese people because of the recent history between us, trust me I was one of the most hateful people when I was young and stupid enough to be fooled by the far lest teachers. The more I know about Japan and Japanese people, the more I find the similarities and I also think that we can learn a lot from them. - Most importantly, I found that Japanese people generally have less ego when it comes to their craft, while we Koreans tend to be all about our ego and pride that these can hurt our products or out performance. Look at the North Korea for example. They never kneel down to nobody to keep their ideology and dignity so as a result they don’t get any outside resources while all they have is the small population and bald headed mountains with cold dry weather. You can say that it’s just the regime not the people, but many North Korean experts say that these are partly the result of their culture. You can see Japanese people as sneaky and dishonest but at the same time, they for sure know how to take step back and admit their fault and losses honorably, not trying to win every battles, only focusing on the war. Our culture is certainly premature in this important aspect of our life.)
@@deleted836 sure, right you are! I learned Japanese since early youth and when I listened first time to Korean, it made me think of Japanese -- diction, mannerisms, pronunciation, etc. but definitely not of Mandarin Chinese.
Hey guys!
I'm heading to China in a few weeks, Fuzhou in particular. Enjoy watching your vids on multiple channels, reminds me of how much I enjoy China while I'm back home on Canada's west coast.
Stay Awesome!
Have fun!
@@laowhy86
Thanks C-milk!
Just the video quality is enough for me to thoroughly enjoy your adventures in Asia. Except for that moment I realized I was looking at a butchered dog :(
I love that your conversations are informative (especially for those like me who may never have the chance to go there), and you keep off the regular tourist traps. We get to see what it really looks like. A breath of fresh air.
i have to say. i REALLY love ADVChina because ur not just a blogger channel. I love hearing ur thoughts of the good and bad stuff of China. The truth. I wish there was a foreigner in VN that did the same. Talked about the good and bad. But people in Nam just talk about their great life in VN without ACTUALLY knowing anything about VN. they may speak the language but have no clue about the culture, the history and I wish they talked about the bad things in VN not just about their life and how great it is. Thank you ADVChina
Always always enjoy your videos but the banter between the two of you in this one makes this one of my top favorites.
Also, I used to think Hong Kong was a part of Japan . 🤦♂️. To be fair I was a lot younger than I am currently when I thought that. I am staying awesome.👍
60fps is sooo appreciated, guys, loving the smooth video, thanks!
The story behind Korean (Hangul) is very interesting. An Emporer said to a scribe that he wanted a writing system "A smart person could learn in a day, and a dumb person could learn in 10 days." The script is incredibly intuitive. I've learned Hangul, and some Sanskrit (devanagari) and it's so much easier for Hangul.
That's because Hangul is an alphabet, whereas Devanagari is an abugida.
Because they switched entirely to Hangul, Koreans cannot read old literature.
This means they cannot study or understand their own history. So, Koreans live on fantasy history they have created with wishful dreams.
Wow! How neat, all the little alleyways!
Impressive facts & history. I always wondered about. Little Korea, Japan, China, Vietnam. . I enjoy learning all this!!
The VPN ad... lol.
@@DestinationJapan95 patreon privileges
These videos have been very information and I love learning about all these different Asian Cultures! The Asian persuasion
This is my favorite of your Vietnam videos. ❤️
Thanks!
The best way to summarize it is: ancient China is to east Asia what ancient Rome and Greece are to the west.
I recently found your channel and am very much enjoying it. The modern Korean alphabet is actually not based on the Chinese script. It's a phonetic alphabet based on the shape of the mouth and the direction of the exhaled breath when making that sound. For instance, ㄴ is "n" because the tip of the tongue is touching the top of the mouth while ㄱ is "g" because the back of the tongue is at the top of the mouth. It's absolutely true that they celebrate the same holidays, though! When Vietnam celebrates Tet, Korea celebrates Seolnal 설날! My Korean wife absolutely learned the Chinese script in school and it was fun driving around in Chinatown in Seattle, where she was reading the street signs, written in Chinese, just reading them in Korean. 고맙숩니다! 안녕!
gomapsoobnida ANYANG! (I only know one of those words!) Anyanghaseyo!!
These videos are making me want to visit Vietnam!
I circled the Pacific while in the US Navy in the late 1970's, and I was always surprised when my shipmates "couldn't tell the difference" between the many ports we visited.
The food is the first thing I noticed. Then the ways of doing business (negotiating over a sale was most fun in Taiwan). Next was the friendliness of the locals. In South Korea a cab driver took me to his home to taste his wife's kimchi (yes, it was that good). But Hong Kong may have been the best combination of it all: I had a small vendor close his shop and take me on a tour of other vendors, just because he didn't have what I was looking for.
By far the best was simply being invited into people's homes The best in this respect was Taiwan, which was under military dictatorship at the time, so the most important parts of life happened indoors. In the Philippines, dirt-poor villages were eager to share their meals, not because they thought I would pay, but because I was white and curious. They probably had seen far too many "ugly American" tourists.
I love each and every one of my Asia memories. Watching this channel reinforces them and brings them up to date. Talk about living vicariously...
Thank you for your service.
From the heart.
When someone asks where I am from and I reply New York they assume I live in NYC. I spent 90% of my life growing up on a farm an hour from Buffalo. Now I live in Rochester, NY and it takes only 20 minutes before you're in the country. It's hard for many foreigners to realize that NY state is a big state and that it takes me 7 hours driving legally to get to NYC.
Then explain to them that the US isn't even half of America.
I love watching your videos and learning about these cultures. Please keep it up!
I remember Youuuuuuu
I don't get mad, but sometimes I do get annoyed when they don't know where I am from. This is de reason why:
In primary school I had to learn all capitals of South America, North America (and several important states/cities), Europe and Oceania. In Asia and Africa I had to learn all countries and several cities as well.
Of course I don't remember all of them, but I also learned some new ones. If I visit a country I look at the map beforehand, so I generally know where I am going.
People visit my country (mostly, but not only Americans) and the only know Amsterdam - most of the time they don't even know what country they are in. Not to even speak of the bigger cities.
Those same people act like I am stupid if I don't know the state they are from. (Since I am not in the states, I sometimes have to ask questions like 'that's the one next to Virginia right?')
The US typically uses a map projection for the world which distorts it to an absurd degree, where Greenland is the size of Africa for crying out loud, so the US cares not for geography.
Your videos help me get away and learn about a beautiful culture....
6:40 Did you see the dog butcher shop?
@@kencole4850 very refreshing
Very interesting. This reminds me of the older ADVChina videos that first introduced me to you both. Love it! Very nice. Thank you.
Rob Vespa': same happened to me in a Taiwanese temple - a guy addressed me in Japanese -- and as a German I definitely don't look Asian -- but I guess Japanese is the only foreign language they've learnt in their youth. I told that once to a local Chinese and made her upset: exclaiming: "you talked to the wrong people!" -- maybe U should not have told her -- politically incorrect!? (Haha...)
As a Vietnamese, I'm very interested in learning about the Sinosphere (China, Japan, Korea, Vietnam) culture.
I think recently our government has also been promoting the Sinosphere culture a lot.
Thank you for such informative and accurate video.
Seeing you guys riding and having a conversation at the same time is surprisingly relaxing.
Cảm ơn! - 感恩 !
I want to thank you for giving so much info on Asia. I know I could read about these countries but seeing all the different communities and villages from the videos makes me feel as though I am going with you to these places and when I talk to other people about what I have learned from your videos, they are usually amazed at how much I know.
PS: I also have an affinity for the snake (serpent) Winston. It has extremely powerful symbolism and people who know of its wisdom understand that it is not evil. The wave it creates as it moves has so many meanings throughout various cultures.
Korean script was formed by looking at the cross section of the human head and how the tongue etc would be positioned when pronouncing Korean syllables. The story behind it is a little more complicated than just „screwing Chinese characters“. The transition from using a combination of Chinese and Korean script to a „pure“ Korean system happened not too long ago (in South Korea). People in S. Korea nowadays cannot read Chinese (unless they specifically learn it). Most of them can only read a few characters (if at all) and write their names in Chinese (they oftentimes struggle, though). I personally would like to see Chinese script being reintroduced in Korea as it would make understanding what I read easier. Probably not gonna happen...
Seeing the difference between a Korean and Japanese is like looking for the visual differences between a Dutchman and a German if your not familiar with Germanic people.
It's their demeanour/attitude and sometimes the clothes and hair styles that helps, but otherwise, almost impossible to do.
Seeing the differences between an Indonesian, Malaysian, Singaporian, Timorese or Philippino is again, near impossible without the other clues, it's like looking to see the difference between a Russian, Ukrainian, Romanian, Georgian, Serbian or Polish person on visuals alone.
With Chinese,...some are very closely related to Mongolian's, others look very much like Thai, Cambodian, Birmese or Vietnamese depending on the location in China they came from.
And other Chinese look very much like Koreans and Japanese, while others look very Afghan or Turkish.
You need to be able to know the differences between languages and cultures to know outright in most cases,otherwise you need to obsever the demeanour/attitude, clothes and hairstyles to guess it.
As an East Asian, I approve of this. It seems you know quite well about the genetic distribution/groupings of the peoples in East Asia quite well! The Han Chinese today is a weird mix of all peoples depending on which part of China like you said. They all call themselves "Han" but the fact is that genetically, there are probably no pure Han. Northern Han have some Manchurian/Mongolian/Korean while Southern Han have some Vietnamese/Thai.
Thanks Winston and C-Milk!
I was looking for Vietnam videos from you guys and see the plalist was updated 5 days ago with 29 videos, dammmn =))
you can most certainly tell the difference between east asians (chinese, japanese, koreans) and south east asians (thai, filippino, indo, etc)
Yea but there's a little grey area which starts somewhere in South China to North Vietnam because the Han Chinese from the North colonised South China a loooong time ago and assimilated the native women. South China used to be the land of the natives who weren't Han Chinese. These natives were similar to the Vietnamese/Thais of today genetically and also spoke a language from the same language family of modern Vietnamese and Thai. Most South Chinese today have ancestors who were Han Chinese men and native women. Ancient China even went further South and occupied North Vietnam for hundreds of years and did the same process of ethnic cleansing and assimilation in North Vietnam albeit to a less successful degree. That is why today there are some South Chinese who looks completely like Southeast Asians and some North Vietnamese that looks like South Chinese. You will find that most South Chinese today have about 10% - 30% of Vietnamese/Thai genes while North Vietnamese have a similar percentage of Han Chinese genes.
I agree but they don’t have enough knowledge about those countries because they just don’t care.
So I decided to call all non-blonde-white-people as Arabs.
I have to say, the one thing that gained my interest in Asian history and culture in general is the patterns I started to notice between them. I knew there wasn't a coincidence, so I read deeply into Chinese and a plethora of Asian history, took many classes in it, then finally minored in Asian studies.
Lol, My Dad (admittedly old and not as sharp as he once was) and his younger self-centered wife still can't be bothered to remember where me and my Chinese wife go to see her family.
When we come back, the first thing they ask is "How was Japan?" Drives me nuts....
@@StevenT7146 Oh man, sorry dude. That sounds dreadful.
Same here. I moved to Japan for work and my old coworkers kept saying, "He's going to China." hahaha It's mainly the older folks, I guess.
@@StevenT7146 Lol, this doesn't surprise me. Makes me a little sad and frightened, but not surprised.
...I actually CAN. Chinese have characteristic behavior and are typically LOUD. The challenge with telling korean and japanese (If they are not talking) is in their fashion (and again, subtle behavior differences) The main issue is telling the difference between phillipeno, malasian and vietnamese. (for me at least) Not enough experience with them to know. As for language (written) The easiest tell between japanese and chinese is hiragana and katakana. As for telling between thaiwanese and chinese, that would typically require knowledge in the difference between traditional and simplified characters. That's a challenge indeed. Experience makes all the difference.
*sips hot coffee while watching screen in living room*
Morthalis Sips hot coffee while watching screen in living room while reading about you sipping hot coffee while watching screen in living room.
@@iamnathank Sips hot coffee while watching screen in living room while reading about you sipping hot coffee while watching screen in living room while reading about you sipping hot coffee while watching screen in living room.
Coffee Inception
KneeGrow ✓ 😂
I spent two years in Thailand during the Vietnam War, and it was crowded in the major cities and the people there was nice and the country was nice. I also spent plenty of time in Japan, The Philippines, and South Korea and it was the same there also it is different there also than in countries like Vietnam, and China. I would like to go back to Japan, and then Thailand to see what those countries look like now.
I just subscribed looking forward towards new videos
Love your videos guys, they are a great way to live vicariously through your travels, especially on a bike, which I miss. I do have one maybe silly question, which may be worth covering in a video? I have been in discussions before arguing about the physical differences in typical facial features between the Chinese, Japanese, Korean, SE Asian, etc.. Is there an easy answer to explain it, or am I right to say it's complicated?
There are a lot of facial feature difference between Chinese from northwest, northeast, southwest southeast and central.
@@SpinningSpinor - I get that and understand. But is there some way you can define it better for people who aren't from China? For example, I have Korean friends who say they can identify most Chinese or Japanese people they see in Korea by sight. Are their any specific suggestions for westerners to more easily identify different Asians from different countries?
@@TheGoodwolfe It requires years of experience. I am from northwest. When I was young, I wan't able to identify the local Han Chinese and Hui muslim minority. I was always curious about how adults could distinguish them. They looked the same to me when I was a kid. It took me so many years to grasp the ability. It cannot be explained by languages.
1:28 "...Milk chicken." It's a rooster C-Milk 😆😅😆😅😆
Thanks for trying to educate the average citizen of all countries whose lack of knowledge about geography and world history is abysmal! Wish you would comment on the assimilation of Asian culture into Western societies. I.e. you will see ads in the US announcing Chinese New Year's Sales! Thoroughly enjoyable vlog today. Loved going on your ride through the back alleys of Vietnam. Brought back great memories of my 10 years in Asia!
I attribute that to the rise of Chinese tourism and their love for luxury products. Note that you see ads like this most in or near stores that sell luxury fashion brands.
You played I Remember U again! Good call
Yep. Finally.
You guys are awesome! Have you ever though of doing the same vlog in the Philippines? Philippines is more diverse than China. You will never be bored there since Philippines has more than 7,000 islands, it has almost 200 dialects (different language variations), However, almost everybody can speak English so it'll be easy for you to get lost and still find your way because of the Filipino hospitality (and just being helpful). A well known trait for Filipinos.
At a Chinese restaurant, I asked a Chinese waiter one time, from which city in China
he originated. Despite asking several times, he would only tell me, "from the south."
It took me a few minutes to catch on, he was in the US illegally and didn't want to
tell me anything at all about himself. Duh! Silly me, eh?.
Many of them are from rural villages in the South and too ashamed to admit...even if he told you where he came from, you will never know where the place is.
@@icebaby6714
Yeah....you may be right about that.
Thanks. Cheers!
@@icebaby6714
It would be easy to mention the next bigger city then. If someone asks me, I am always saying near by Collogne.
Many people in Asia do not even know which is the nearest big city. Don't believe it, up to you, then that's ok with me. My experience, and it is not only China, it is everywhere in Asia. For example go to Bangkok and ask a person born in Bangkok how many people does Bangkok have? 90 % have no clue, not even losely.
@Peter Kroll Genau gesagt, sehr gut Peter. Also, ich habe mein Herz in Berlin verloren.
Maybe not Chinese at all. South like Nepal south, no offense to Nepal.
I can tell the difference. Does help I’ve been married to a particular asian woman for many years, who explained the differences.
Can't tell physical differences between people from Thai/Singapore/Cambodia/Vietnam/Laos
Also Kazakh/Tibetian. But I have a good ear for languages. That's the only way I would know tbh.
I have the same with germans, Dutch, Belgian, swiss and Scandinavian people. It's really hard to tell
In Cambodia there are quite distinct races. The Kmai (Khmer) are dark but then you have the people who look like Thais (and probably are), who are light skinned and most resemble the northern Mongoloids, and then you have the other race that looks like Vietnamese (and probably are).
And then you have me, a Spaniard from Honduras, the only one here! :-) Even English teachers think I'm exotic! One time a hot woman turned around on her bike to stare at me. And when I had a beard, Indians payed more attention to me. Today blacks looked at me funny, like "This guy ain't like the rest." I love being exotic.
In Singapore and Malaysia (1900s -), we have Chinese ethnic as well. The Chinese ethnic speak Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien and other dialects originated from Mainland China. Most common dialects you will hear in Malaysia are Cantonese and Hokkien. The Hokkien speaking is very similar to Taiwanese. Cantonese speaking is same as in Guangzhou and Hong Kong, however, there is slightly slightly different, just like UK vs US English.
Winston, do you have CCTV in my apartment? You were spot on with your description. I usually watch in my living room with snacks in my face and a nice cold beer.
I can tell the difference...Ok time to actually watch the video
Lol is that Ben Shapiro in bunny costume lol?
It's a bunny wearing a ben Shapiro outfit
Andy w Well usually the UK ones look quite different when they’re at home wearing their black suits.. still not very good manners when they’re abroad.. Americans are easy since they only talk about America and can’t seem to process the fact that there are other things to talk about.. Kiwis and Australians like beer.. can’t think of anything bad to say about them other than they seem to be everywhere.
In my experience, East Asia is just as diverse as Europe, and it is only at the most superficial level you could lump all East Asian countries together. Yes they shared some things, such as writing systems and festivals, but so does Europe. It does not take long for someone to realise that they are in Japan, not China, just as it does not take long for one to see that Germany is different to France despite them sharing the Latin script and Christmas.
On C-Milk’s point, generally speaking, I have found in some parts of East Asia, their expectations of one’s knowledge are so low, they often feel affirmed if one does not know something, but on the flip side, when one does know something, that is when some people get frustrated as I have found with some people a curious need to ‘know more than the foreigner’ and so you end up in this situation when they will start aggressively trying to prove your knowledge is limited and that you could never truly understand their culture. This is with some people at least.
Holy crap, the shirt that said rocket man... my side hurts from laughing.
I get the feeling that the guy taking the lead has to be a very understanding and patient person to deal with the other guy. The second guy seems abrasive sometimes and easy to get off the subject at hand. I LOVE your vids, keep them coming!
korean language system(structural consonants+vowels like english)and chinese language system(quasi hieroglyphics) is completely different. it's not based on chinese.
I guess you didn't listen to the video.
@@yes8515 they did say those four countries used to share a language.
@@Sayu277 which countries? If you mean china korea and japan then no, not at all. There is a possible link between japanese and korean but chinese is a totally different language family
@@yes8515 i know that. It's whynthe japanese developed the kana. but they were talking about china japan korea and vietnam and then said they used to share the same language or written language. I would like to note that written language is not just the script.
Funny video. By way of background, I've lived in Vietnam for years, my wife is Viet. So I'm a white guy but I am surely better than most picking out Asians. Some are easier, like Cambodians have a distinct look. Between Vietnamese and Chinese, it's hard but you can pick it out by the mannerisms. Koreans and Japanese have a distinct look too, many Japanese have "moon faces" as my Korean friend derisively points out. Koreans sometimes have really distinct -- and attractive -- look with really angular features. But the loveliest women, of course, are from Vietnam :D And if you're a real pro, you''ll notice that northern Viets like my wife look more Chinese. Southern Viets look more like Thai.
absolutely agree!
C-Milk don't compare me to a redcoat. I am an american.
😂
North, Central, South or Middle Eastern?
I am a Minuteman.
@@lifeyang2 A minuteman? Perhaps you should purchase a local anesthetic from a pharmacy. Otherwise, you'll never make a lady happy.
@@ZeldaZiplock - Funny, you're joking back with me. Lol. Anyhow, for those who do not know what a Minuteman is, they were members of American volunteered militiamen ready to fight the Redcoat at a minute notice. The American Revolution is my favorite piece of history. 1776 was a historical year indeed.
My fiancé is Thai Naturalized US Citizen and I’ve done biz in Asia so this is interesting-her 90 yr old Mama says she’d get you REAL THAI FOOD YOU’D like! Love seeing different cultural areas usually there are a couple of things I didn’t know though I’ve spent time with the cultures! Be in Thailand soon
Must ... buy ... motorcycle. And a VPN ;)
Yes I can. I can distinguish between Chinese, Japanese and Korean people. Most of the time.
Me too and Myanmar, Thai, Lao, Khmer, Bhuntanese, Bangladesh, Indian, Malay traditional and Iban, Indonesian, Papuan on the Indonesian side.
Thank you Nord VPN. Thank you ADV.
I spent 6 months in Vietnam and 2 months in Cambodia. What he said about learning a language with a Roman alphabet being a lot easier is definitely true especially for the casual learner. I didn't even try to learn Vietnamese but I learned a lot just by seeing certain things everyday. I learned virtually no Cambodian because I never bothered to learn the alphabet and so could never tell what anything was saying.
Chinese people will probably like this video, as do I, but if you say anything bad about China they don't like it. But at the end of the day all you guys ever do is tell the truth...that's what real news and real information is about.
Everything already said below, as I'm busy catching up, so late to the party, but thanks anyway for the fascinating ride!
Actually C-Milk...
Jk, have a good day
Yes I can. Japan, Korean, Philippine, Vietnamese and Main Land, China have distinct cultures, languages and ethnic differences. They look different as well.
The French played a huge part into our governments structure as we know it.
I haven't seen the video yet, but just responding to the title, I did live in Japan for nearly a decade (and in Singapore for a year), and I think I can tell Asians apart generally. Of course, it is far from 100%. But if you give me two countries and general people from each, I would likely be 70+% accurate. Difficult would be Japanese and Koreans, and maybe Southern Chinese and Vietnamese, which can kind of blend in with each other. Also, besides just natural appearance, fashion (including makeup, hairstyles, etc) play a major role. That is, I would assume that a Chinese person dressed in a very Japanese way would be Japanese due to the fashion displayed more than any physical characteristics. (This is why it is harder to tell Japanese Americans from Chinese Americans, as they often do not have the fashion giveaways.) And of course, if we are talking about those who do not look like the generalized types (that is, if they are "trick questions"), then that accuracy might go out the window, as it should with trick questions.
Honestly .. "I Remember U" is waaaay better than "I'm A Dude" .
Although I do have a sick imagination wondering what "I Remember Yuri" crossover would sound like. (Probably just for the pun.)
Or... Cardood feat. Yuri Wongtsmann - I Remember Jüri
Woah, both dudes have pretty much the same name!
I was thinking they're just adapting a song per country but apparently not.
Absolutely
Oh yeah, I've had people ask me if I can speak Japanese living here in Hong Kong. You even have university professors who ask if Hong Kong is in Japan.
I miss the longer episodes
A clarifying point about hangul is that it’s based off of the spoken korean language more than the Chinese writing system. Hangul is designed to be very phonetic and operates in a unique way that you write based on syllable blocks and it uses a letter system instead of a pictogram or character system like Chinese
I enjoy seeing your videos and learning a bit about places I'll never see, I don't drink coffee or alcohol though (or tea).
Japanese uses the traditional Chinese characters in some cases (馬) and in other cases uses the simplified characters (号)(医). In yet other cases Japanese uses their own version of simplified characters (広)(歯). Interesting video overall...謝謝！
Xin chào and 新橋 do not even sound the same. LOL. How to read 新橋 in Vietnamese way? Tân Kiều
千朝
Great episode. Classic ADVChina.
Hey young man, it's wrong to say America is like UK! :-)
I can distinguish between koreans, vietnamese, japanese, chinese, burmese, indonesians and malay with good accuracy. The less migration/immigration a country has the easier it is. Something about the facial structures really speak to me, and I memorize where I've seen it before. It's very hard with europeans, downright impossible in some cases.
I was surprised to see so many people wearing that wide conical rice farmer hat in day to day life. I figured that was just an outdated stereotype. Maybe that's part of the promotion of Vietnamese culture?
The Ehiji Soto Zen Buddhist monastery in Japan, chant the daily Sutra chants in Mandarin, (classical chinese?)because this is how they were chanted in the 12th century, when they first arrived there from mainland China. Tradition.
Normally i can tell the difference... its just the Ladyboys that make it hard.... i mean confusing
Correct on the first statement.
I am still struggling to see how Korean writing system or Hangul is “based” on Chinese logographs or Hanzi... I am sure either you don’t speak, or write to be more exact in this case, either Korean or Chinese, or even worse neither of the two languages. Plus, it’s not just North Koreans that said goodbye to Chinese characters or Hanja as it is called in Korean, average South Koreans do not comprehend Chinese script either. Unless of course they studied Chinese or Japanese, and that is exactly how I understand written Chinese, albeit the pronunciation will surely come off totally different from the Chinese way.
great tips for uses of vpn XD
As another point of note, should anyone be interested [the argument that] the spread of Chinese culture to Japan occurred during the Tang Dynasty, was supposedly carried out by a Buddhist monk from Yangzhou. He was successful in carrying out this task on his seventh attempt, having failed on the previous six occasions of getting to Japan. You may visit the 'Da Ming Temple' [on the outskirts of the Slender West Lake] in Yangzhou City, Jiangsu Province to learn more.
The spread of Chinese culture isn't only a one-off event. Ancient China was dominant for a very long period of time. Many of its cultural practices and technologies were also indirectly passed on to Japan by first spreading to Korea and then from Korea to Japan.
@ Eric sure, you are correct. The Chinese just claim that this particular monk from Yangzhou, was the starting point of the spread of some aspects of Chinese culture to Japan.