08.17.08
加油中国！ China Needs a New Cheer
Last night (on TV) I witnessed the most competitive match I have seen thus far in the Beijing Olympics. A vastly improved Chinese basketball team led by Yao Ming, jumped out to an early lead, and managed to fight off a late comeback by Dirk Nowitzki and the Germans. The teams both fought hard the entire way and the game infinitely more entertaining than the USA’s drubbing of Spain which followed. At the end of the first quarter though, I nearly turned the game off, or at least put it on mute. Why? The heavily partisan Chinese crowd had been yelling their jia you (加油) cheer on nearly every possession. After a week of the Olympics, I feel like my brain is rattling back and forth in my skull, to the rhythm of jia you.
Jia You is not a bad cheer. It’s simple, catchy, and easily customizable to any team, country, or individual. The literal meaning of jia you is “add oil.” It doesn’t make a lot of logical sense, but then again most good cheers don’t. It works like this. The leader shouts out the name of the team, for example “China” and then the others shout “jia you.” The leader then shouts “jia you” and the others reply with “China.” My beef with jia you is that it is the only cheer in China, and is cheered on auto-pilot at virtually every event where China is competing. In fact China has added so much oil this Olympics that it makes one wonder whether it is the impetus behind China’s rapidly rising gas prices.
Jia you is so prevalent, that cheering sections for other countries, (possibly ironically) have even been creating their own variations of it as well. At the soccer game Wednesday, on numerous occasions “Jia You, Argentina,” cheers could be heard echoing throughout Worker’s Stadium. When talking to China newbies this Olympics, one of the first questions I hear is “What is it they are all saying during the competitions?” I’ve even heard several spectators inquire whether jia you is the way to say “China” in Chinese.
Back when I taught English, my students would often ask me how to translate jia you into English. This was not an easy question to answer. If you are in Kansas, jia you could mean “Rock Chalk Jayhawk.” In Nebraska it’s “Go Big Red.” At Arrowhead Stadium, jia you is signified by waving your arm up and down like a tomahawk, and howling a war chant. But in China jia you is the be all end all for every single team, at every single event, and in every single sport. In almost four years in this country I have honestly never heard a different cheer. Maybe with the Olympics in town, Chinese fans come up with a new chant to put some variety into their cheering sections. Somehow though, I don’t see that happening over the next seven days.
intotherain
said,
August 17, 2008 at 9:22 am
确实，在中国，无论什么比赛，你都可以对你支持的人说“加油”，这是一种鼓励，一语通用神州 呵呵
maxiewawa
said,
August 17, 2008 at 10:43 am
In Australian English, “jia you” is translated as “aussie-aussie-aussie, oi-oi-oi”.
The same phenomenon happened at the Sydney Olympics. “Aussie-aussie…etc” was the only cheer we could come up with. 8 years later, and I still feel like punching any one of my countrymen who yells “aussie-aussie-aussie” at an international sporting event.
NJD
said,
August 17, 2008 at 11:40 am
Well, as far as chants for a national team go, they both beat “U-S-A.. U-S-A” for originality, though a little “P-R-C…P-R-C” chant would be a welcome change from jiayou right about now.
Though I think you should have told them that in English “jia you” is more of a painfully generic “let’s go!” chant, imagine the pain if every team in the US only did as in China “Let’s go , Let’s go!” You could have sparked the mind that would develop the chanting culture to change the country.
Josh
said,
August 17, 2008 at 12:30 pm
Amen! I’ve lived in China for the past two years and as I have enjoyed taking part in basketball matches or watching track meets, I have become so bored with the singular use of the phrase “jia you” as a cheer.
I read an article before the Olympics talking about how the BOOC issued a cheer to be taught and used by all spectators at the Olympics. I got so excited thinking that maybe – just maybe – a new cheer was being added. Unfortunately they just added a couple claps and some thumbs up to the “jia you” cheer. What a disappointment.
I’m jealous you’re there watching the games. Have fun and cheer hard.
加油中国！ China Needs a New Cheer
said,
August 18, 2008 at 1:11 am
[...] When talking to China newbies this Olympics, one of the first questions I hear is “What is it they are all saying during the competitions?” I’ve even heard several spectators inquire whether jia you is the way to say “China” in Chinese. [Read] [...]
ja
said,
August 18, 2008 at 2:17 am
Do Americans chant anything other than USA! USA! USA!? It’s getting old and stale, having been used since previous Olympics. This is the first time the west has been exposed to jiayou, which is fresh to the ears.
Dan
said,
August 18, 2008 at 4:13 am
Ben,
On several occasions the commentators of whatever particular sport is being shown at that time have stated that jia you means “come on” Is this just a simplification for the american viewer or can it be translated like that?
Benjamin Ross
said,
August 18, 2008 at 8:29 am
@Ja
USA, USA is definitely stale, but at least we only have to hear it every 4 years. I used to live next to a university basketball court in China (big mistake). It was constant jia you every single day. I never once heard any variation on the cheer.
@Dan
“Come on” isn’t a wrong translation necessarily, although I can’t imagine a large group of English speakers simultaneously chanting “Come On!” If I had to translate it, I would say “Let’s Go” is probably more accurate.
Alan
said,
August 18, 2008 at 8:55 am
@Ben,
“In fact China has added so much oil this Olympics that it makes one wonder whether it is the impetus behind China’s rapidly rising gas prices.”
Shhh… please don’t broadcast this secret.
Jet So
said,
August 18, 2008 at 9:10 am
The “加油”expression of support came strangely from the overseas Chinese community at first – possibly either from HK and/or Taiwan in response to the Japanese’ Ganbade. Perhaps, grabbing a slogan of the past such as “把握机遇!” could be more inspiring?
Jiang
said,
August 18, 2008 at 3:38 pm
When I was in primary school, we chanted 加油（add oil）to our team. But to opponents, we chanted 漏油（oil leak）.
cerebus
said,
August 18, 2008 at 10:54 pm
jia you! to you on this post. i’m sick of it too, but there’s one other thing in beijing that makes me want to stab myself in the ears with a pair of kuaizi:
beijing… huanying… ni…
ja
said,
August 19, 2008 at 7:40 am
maybe cerebus should get a one-way plane ticket back to the states if beijing is getting under his skin. Meiguo huanying ni!
cerebus
said,
August 19, 2008 at 9:05 am
the song is getting permanently etched into my internal ipod, is all. and i have a t-shirt that says “wo bu shi meiguoren”, clearly meant for people like you.
More than just adding oil
said,
August 21, 2008 at 3:19 pm
[...] China Daily also examined how China might need new cheers and compared China’s cheering to the organized South Korean effort. Is the simple 加油 really that boring? [...]
Paul
said,
August 21, 2008 at 3:33 pm
Hey – great post – had the same experience myself while watching the Spanish womens team take on China in the women’s tennis doubles semi-final, a small but very vocal group of Spanish supporters competed with the “Zhonggou Jiayou” that 95% of the supporters were shouting – the thing is, the Spaniards had the Chinese beat because of the variety of their chants/songs etc. However, i would add one thing, “jia you” is the official “putonghua” chant – i know for a fact that at Sichuan and Chongqing sporting matches people shout 勇气 yongqi, and given the richness of the Chinese language (you should see how many different ways they have to say scissors, paper rock), i’m sure there are a lot of other regional variations on the over-used Jia you.
Benjamin Ross
said,
August 21, 2008 at 3:47 pm
@Paul
Interesting information about Sichuan and their variation on the cheer. Ironically, most of my time living in China was spent living in Fujian, arguably the most linguistically diverse province in China, and I still never heard anything other than the putonghua 加油. I’ll have to ask some old friends how to say it in Fuzhou hua, and if it is ever (or was ever) used.
Keith
said,
August 22, 2008 at 11:22 pm
There is are slivers of hope. Over the last several days, my friends and I have been inspiring the Chinese to perform some slightly different chants. In addition to getting crowds to chant athlete names and countries in place of zhong guo, I’ve had some success getting them to shout names and countries on alternate beats, for instance “Ti-Na, Mei-Guo” or what have you. It’s still to the jai-oh beat, but it’s progress.
The best foreigner leading Chinese chanting I’ve seen was a Mexican all decked out with his country’s flag, coordinated wig, and patriotic outfit. He was using a whistle, grand gestures, and hopping along a walkway to excite the crowd to shout the Chinese translation of Mexico. Once he got them started with his own shouting, they would continue just by his use of the whistle.
I still haven’t seen a Chinese crowd convinced to shout U-S-A, though, despite their easy inclination to shout the same thing in Chinese.
Benjamin Ross
said,
August 23, 2008 at 1:12 am
@Keith
Not sure if this counts or not, but during the Argentina vs. Brazil soccer game there was quite a large contingent of Chinese fans cheering “Kobe, Kobe” when Kobe Bryant came into the stands. This continued periodically throughout the entire match.
Jeremy Yeh
said,
August 24, 2008 at 10:30 am
well,definitely ‘jia you’ is dominant, but in sichuan,chongqing and probably guizhou as well,ppl prefer ‘雄起(xiong2 qi3)’, which means to cheer up.
anon
said,
August 24, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Sure hope the Spanish crowd didn’t do that dumb ’slant eye’ gesture while cheering.