We have often heard a famous quote from the English poet of the early 20th century, Rudyard Kipling: “East is East and West is West, and neverthe twain shall meet.” Linguistically speaking and interestingly enough, though, this is not true regarding the English language’s absorption of worldcultures into its vocabulary mostly due to the British colonization from the 16th century to the early 20th on a global scale. Take Chinese for example,there are many phrases of Chinese origin that have become day-to-day expressions in English.
      Thanks to your knowledge of English, you already know Chinese! Have you ever eaten tofu or used ketchup as a seasoning? When you dogrocery shopping, have you put bok choy in your cart? And what about dim sum, wonton, chop suey and kung pao chichen on Chinese restaurantmenus? When it comes to interior design, a balance of feng shui and yin and yang often comes to a designer’s mind. Also, many westerners now playmahjong for entertainment.
       More often than not, instead of saying, “it has been a while since I saw you last,” people now would probably say, “long time no see.” Onething to note is that, as you must have noticed from the examples given above: some Chinese phrases entered English from Cantonese, such as bokchoy and dim sum whereas many others are from Mandarin, for example, tofu and feng shui.
       In conclusion, the earth is round and the east and west is only comparative and relational. It all depends on where you stand, where you havecome from and where you are going in today’s global context.
35. What is the passage mainly about?
(A) Many Mandarin and Cantonese phrases have entered English.
(B) East is East and West is West, and never the twain shall meet.
(C) Bok choy, wanton and dim sum are originally Cantonese phrases.
(D) Tofu, feng shui and yin and yang are originally from Mandarin.