>Nothing says I love you quite like… I love you

>With the exception of a few miserable castoffs, the Chinese by and large are not hostile towards foreigners.

When you pass a local in the street, they may speak an English word to you. Often what they say to you is the limit of their English knowledge, and quite often that limit extends only to Hello.

On occasion I hear other things. I’ve gotten hello, how are you, good morning, and jerk ass, the latter in written form only.

Then one day Patricia and I were walking through the backstreet and a man passed us. He spotted me and uttered ‘Hello’. Hello. Such a simple word, so easy to learn. As we passed, I could tell he was fumbling for other words, searching his database for what other English phrases he might have learned.

He found one.

‘I love you.’

Patricia gasped. She was right to.

You may have some competition, baobei.