Gung ho about ketchup and other Chinese words (2)

In the statement provided to China Daily by Heinz, the company says its founder, Henry Heinz, "chose ketchup as the spelling" for his product to "differentiate" it from the rivals' "catsup".

Linguist Yu agrees that the theories surrounding ketchup's origin are noteworthy. "It was a surprise to me," he says. "First, the tomato is not originally from Asia, so that is strange. What is even more strange is that it is somehow related to fish sauce."

In its original incarnation, ketchup was made with something other than tomatoes, Jurafsky notes. Tomatoes were added to the recipe around 1800. From 1750 to 1850 its chief ingredient was fermented walnuts or sometimes fermented mushrooms, he writes. But as the blog points out, Samuel Johnson's seminal 1755 dictionary stated that English mushroom ketchups were "just an attempt to imitate the taste of an earlier original sauce that came from Asia".

Despite their abiding love for ketchup, Americans don't have a monopoly on how the popular sauce is used. Jurafsky's blog notes that people in China like to use it on fried chicken, and in Sweden it's a frequent pasta garnish. In Thailand, teens dip potato chips in ketchup, while in Eastern Europe it is a favorite pizza topping.

Taking her cue from Jurafsky's blog, Anzia Mayer, a writer for the China-focused blog Tea Leaf Nation, has dipped into scholarly literature to highlight other common English words with Chinese links.

"I was shocked to find some common words that sounded really English to me," recalls Mayer, who is a senior at Amherst College in Massachusetts. Besides ketchup, her list includes kumquat, typhoon and gung ho.

At 22, Mayer has already made four trips to China and is "more or less" fluent in Mandarin. She hopes to become a Chinese teacher or journalist after graduation. Of her writing about the surprising influence of Chinese on common English words and expressions, she says: "I'm excited by the feeling of being able to make something foreign familiar."

We recommend:
Those Xiaorenshu we read in childhood	Trip planner: four-day trip to S China	Wonderful snapshots of flying buzzards
Forever Shangri-la: China's heaven on earth	Top 10 ever-victorious generals in history	Dreamy log cabins among woods
Top 10 best airports in China 2012	Mysterious Zhongnanhai in Beijing	Top 10 Chinese 'Kung Fu Kings' in Minguo period