CHAT: ¡Viva el Kou! (was: Re: CHAT: Dutch dictionary recommendations?)

Sally writes:

>Hi, Kou.
Hej! (I'm on a Scandinavian jag these days)

>So what does OTT mean?  ("Oh Too Twee"?) <G>
As John pointed out, it's "over the top", but I *really* like "oh too
twee". May have to incorporate that into my repertoire of verbal
ticks.

>Do you derive "Kou"
>from the "ou" of Douglas and the "K" of Koller?  Or is it a name that you
>picked up in Japan?  (You were in Japan, weren't you?)
Actually, "Kou" (first tone) comes from the "Ko" of "Koller" (read
/ko:/). It's an arcane surname character which I adore 'cause the
natives have trouble reading it. The full name is Kou1 Dao4guang1.
"Dao" is the "dao" of Taoism and covers the "Dou" of "Douglas";
"guang" means "ray of light", and at least covers the "g" of
"Douglas" (plus it's a character I like aesthetically). Add to that
that Daoguang was a Qing Dynasty emperor and, well, that kind of
cinched the deal. *And* I actually managed to make it stick both on
the mainland and Taiwan (on, like, legal stuff), as opposed to the
wildly unwieldy "Dao4ge2la1si1 Ke1le4" (blech!). Friends from
"Douglas: The China Years" still refer to me as "Lao3 Kou1" (The Old
Koumeister) or just "The Kou", hence the moniker.

Yes, I did live in Japan for two years, but couldn't get character
variants to stick there, try as I would (save a Chinese-speaking club
I stumbled on to at the end of my first year; talk about your opening
doors into places you wouldn't ordinarily get to go). Alas, I would
forever be "Dagurasu Kooraa" in katakana. Lovely. :(

To perhaps better answer Jan's question: my e-mail address is simply
latinfrench@...etc. Why all that extra stuff gets into the mix, I
don't know. I'm not a tech guy, and *I* certainly didn't put it in
there. Maybe the MIS person here threw in some weird default thingy,
so that you always get the full shmegegge. Blame her.

Kou

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