is “chai” a TYPE of tea??! bc in Hindi/Urdu, the word chai just means tea
its like spicy cinnamon tea instead of bland gross black tea
I think the chai that me and all other Muslims that I know drink is just black tea
i mean i always thought chai was just another word for tea?? in russian chai is tea
why don’t white people just say tea
do they mean it’s that spicy cinnamon tea
why don’t they just call it “spicy cinnamon tea”
the spicy cinnamon one is actually masala chai specifically so like
there’s literally no reason to just say chai or chai
They don’t know better. To them “chai tea” IS that specific kind of like, creamy cinnamony tea. They think “chai” is an adjective describing “tea”.
What English sometimes does when it encounters words in other languages that it already has a word for is to use that word to refer to a specific type of that thing. It’s like distinguishing between what English speakers consider the prototype of the word in English from what we consider non-prototypical.
(Sidenote: prototype theory means that people think of the most prototypical instances of a thing before they think of weirder types. For example: list four kinds of birds to yourself right now. You probably started with local songbirds, which for me is robins, blue birds, cardinals, starlings. If I had you list three more, you might say pigeons or eagles or falcons. It would probably take you a while to get to penguins and emus and ducks, even though those are all birds too. A duck or a penguin, however, is not a prototypical bird.)
“Chai” means tea in Hindi-Urdu, but “chai tea” in English means “tea prepared like masala chai” because it’s useful to have a word to distinguish “the kind of tea we make here” from “the kind of tea they make somewhere else”.
“Naan” may mean bread, but “naan bread” means specifically “bread prepared like this” because it’s useful to have a word to distinguish between “bread made how we make it” and “bread how other people make it”.
We also sometimes say “liege lord” when talking about feudal homage, even though “liege” is just “lord” in French, or “flower blossom” to describe the part of the flower that opens, even though when “flower” was borrowed from French it meant the same thing as blossom.
We also do this with place names: “brea” means tar in Spanish, but when we came across a place where Spanish-speakers were like “there’s tar here”, we took that and said “Okay, here’s the La Brea tar pits”.
Or “Sahara”. Sahara already meant “giant desert,” but we call it the Sahara desert to distinguish it from other giant deserts, like the Gobi desert (Gobi also means desert btw).
Languages tend to use a lot of repetition to make sure that things are clear. English says “John walks”, and the -s on walks means “one person is doing this” even though we know “John” is one person. Spanish puts tense markers on every instance of a verb in a sentence, even when it’s abundantly clear that they all have the same tense (”ayer [yo] caminé por el parque y jugué tenis” even though “ayer” means yesterday and “yo” means I and the -é means “I in the past”). English apparently also likes to use semantic repetition, so that people know that “chai” is a type of tea and “naan” is a type of bread and “Sahara” is a desert. (I could also totally see someone labeling something, for instance, pan dulce sweetbread, even though “pan dulce” means “sweet bread”.)
Also, specifically with the chai/tea thing, many languages either use the Malay root and end up with a word that sounds like “tea” (like té in Spanish), or they use the Mandarin root and end up with a word that sounds like “chai” (like cha in Portuguese).
So, can we all stop making fun of this now?
Okay and I’m totally going to jump in here about tea because it’s cool. Ever wonder why some languages call tea “chai” or “cha” and others call it “tea” or “the”?
It literally all depends on which parts of China (or, more specifically, what Chinese) those cultures got their tea from, and who in turn they sold their tea to.
The Portuguese imported tea from the Southern provinces through Macau, so they called tea “cha” because in Cantonese it’s “cha”. The Dutch got tea from Fujian, where Min Chinese was more heavily spoken so it’s “thee” coming from “te”. And because the Dutch sold tea to so much of Europe, that proliferated the “te” pronunciation to France (”the”), English (”tea”) etc, even though the vast majority of Chinese people speak dialects that pronounce it “cha” (by which I mean Mandarin and Cantonese which accounts for a lot of the people who speak Chinese even though they aren’t the only dialects).
And “chai”/”chay” comes from the Persian pronunciation who got it from the Northern Chinese who then brought it all over Central Asia and became chai.
When you go to a haunted house, it may seem like you’re being funny by trying to scare the actors or jump out at them when you go through a second time, but guess what? ITS NOT FUNNY.
You pay us to scare you. It is your choice to go, so don’t fucking go through if you’re going to ignore the rules and get too close to the actors as a ‘joke’.
These bruises happened because over the course of 4 hours, several people ignored the instructions that CLEARLY stated that they were to wait in the front room until told otherwise. Rather than listen, they ran into the next room and slammed into me- effectively throwing me into the wall. This didn’t only happen once. It happened ten times at LEAST.
Then we had this asshole who thought that once I ‘died’ for the haunt, he could pretend to kick me to see if I’d moved. I, being used to people abusing me- jumped back and slammed my head into the concrete wall.
YOU ARE NOT FUNNY BY BEING RUDE AT A HAUNTED HOUSE. WE ARE PAID ACTORS THAT YOU CHOOSE TO COME AND SEE PERFORM. YOU PAY US TO SCARE THE SHIT OUT OF YOU, SO DONT HIT US WHEN WE DO
I feel that this is relevant considering it is October and more Haunted Houses are opening up. I know it seems funny to scare the ‘monsters’ but all you do is hurt real people. So stop.
It’s not even October but I’m still spreading this
SIGNAL BOOOOOOOOSSSSSTTTTT!!!!!!! Now
Yeah…your director may want to consider reblocking
We don’t have a director? Or blocking??? It’s a haunted house bro, not a play
Reblogging for relevance-
I work at a Haunted House every October, and have been for the past few years. Our house in particular is staffed by Volunteer workers who are either earning credits for Graduation, or people who know the Family that owns the haunted attraction. In our City, we’re one of two Haunted Houses, so while we open in late September, we tend to get incredibly busy during the month of October and often work from 6pm until 2, 3am on weekends.
We do not get paid to help out. Due to our location, we get a lot of drunk guys coming through, and a lot of ‘funny’ teenagers. In my several years working there, I’ve seen Actors get grabbed and thrown, stomped on, kicked, bitten, everything. A lot of the Actors at this attraction are young teenagers, Middle and Secondary School students, so this kind of abuse is terrifying and potentially emotionally scarring.
There’s a position half-way through the house we call ‘Psych Ward’, and it’s essentially a jump scare. The scare is a corner-room, boxed in with walls and broken windows, that the Actor pops out of and shouts and taunts the people going through. October, 2012, a couple were going through the Psych Ward corner and the scare went off as per usual. The girlfriend of this couple got very startled but laughed it off and continued on. The boyfriend, however, back-tracked and went up to the broken window and punched the Actor in the face for scaring his girlfriend. The Actor, who I’m going to call Tracy, had a black eye for a good two weeks solid and the couple had to be escorted out of the house and were banned from the property. Ever since we’ve ruled that Veteran Actors (someone who’s been there for 3+ years) are the only ones allowed in this particular Scaring Spot.
He paid to get scared and then got violent when we delivered.
There are so many stories I can tell of ignorant customers banging back on scares and injuring the Actors inside, grabbing props from the actors and hurting them with it, destroying props because they thought it would be ‘funny’.
I just want to raise awareness that the ACTORS ARE STILL PEOPLE. We’re instructed to get the best kind of scare out of you, sometimes with no pay at all (like this particular attraction), so please respect our work.
We wouldn’t come to your job, mock you, and push you around trying to be ‘funny’. Don’t come to our job and do that to us!
I literally cannot believe people are angry over this post saying “don’t fucking beat up actors”
I work at a haunted hayride and a guy tried to dropkick me in the chest and knee me in the face because he thought it was funny.
I got in trouble for breaking character to tell him to fucking stop.
Ive been hit so many times this season it has left cuts and bruises. Back in 2015 I was fucking choked and dragged behind a wagon because a lady was drunk and her son had to pry her hands off me because IM NOT ALLOWED TO TOUCH YOU OR FIGHT BACK.
Most recently, a customer groped my breasts and twisted my fucking nipples. Apparently, she did it to AT LEAST twenty other actors.
THAT IS SEXUAL ASSAULT YOU ASSHOLES. ITS NOT OKAY.
Most recently a customer fucking kicked me and sent me to the goddamned hospital.
WHEN YOU GO TO A HAUNTED HAYRIDE / HAUNTED HOUSE, REMEMBER YOU LITERALLY PAID US TO SCARE YOU.
THE ACTORS ARE REAL PEOPLE.
DO NOT FUCKING HIT US.
Why the fuck would you even do this holy shit
Hey guys i know this is out of theme but that comment from @witchcryptid was me and my old url. I plan on working this job again this year if at all possible, so here’s an added psa:
If your family or friend(s) force you into a haunting, be upfront as best you can and tell actors as they come up “please do not scare me i am too anxious / scared” and 9.99/10 times we will listen and leave you alone. just communicate with us even though we most often cannot communicate back.
We may be playing monsters, but we are NOT monsters.
Also, please remember to keep your hands off of us during your haunting, and also please try to step in or speak up if you see people trying to touch us, assault us, or talking about planning to touch or hurt a staff member.
We cannot do anything and will most likely get in legal trouble for touching you in defense.
Thank you and have a spooky fall 🌻🍁🍂🍃
Back during my highschool years I worked for a place that had four haunted attractions (three houses and a chain-link maze). Lots of great fun and such in general and for the most part I loved it.
However…
One time while haunting the maze, a woman came in with a couple friends. They were laughing and seemed to be having a good time until one of my fellow actors appeared and did his job (very well, I might add). In a move that had to be practiced, this woman whipped off the belt of her pants and swung, hitting him in the knee with her buckle and causing him to drop. Immediately, a few other actors and I came to his aide while she continued swinging her belt and screaming “DONT TOUCH ME DONT FUCKING TOUCH ME!” (Her friends laughing the whole time) which confused all of us because we are a ‘no touch’ attraction and the struck actor wasn’t even an arms length away when he appeared. I ended up getting struck in the arm before catching a hold of her belt and firmly telling her to calm down. Security arrived shortly after and removed her from the park. As it turns out, they were already looking for her because she had already struck seven other actors in the other haunted houses….which means she willing entered everything attraction…
Another time is when I was dressed as a demon clown in the circus house. Following the cue of the previous scare, I emerged from a wall in time to cause a very well built man to leap backwards a good two feet, dragging his shorter girlfriend with him who screamed, then laughed before edging around me. The girlfriend seemed nice, really enjoying herself and the good natured fun of the scares buuuuut I guess boyfriend was angry I got him because after he recovered and his girlfriend made it by me, he took a swing at me. Now, I can’t swing back but I did block so instead of taking a hit to the face, my arm took the brunt and sent me tumbling backwards through my trapdoor…where the back of my shoulder met a protruding screw… Thankfully a security guard just so happened to be in my back area and witnessed the end of it so she was VERY quick to take the guy down and have a crew remove him. The girlfriend came back looking for him and was told what happened so she said “Well screw that jackass!” And carried on alone XD
I got most of my injuries as the clown. Punched, kicked, tackled, nearly stabbed, had plastic beer bottles (we stopped selling glass for obvious reasons) swung at me, all for doing the job they paid for.
And that was just a small bit of the shit that happened to the others across the park.
Luckily, this was only a few people a night so got the most part, the job was a lot of fun and I loved the crew I worked with. It only got frustrating when I had to spend two weeks at a seated scare spot due to a wrenched ankle from yet another attack.
So again: Why?
Why go to something you obviously don’t like? Why pay you have yourself humiliated? There is no excuse to attack us and if it’s an “automatic reaction of fight or flight” then DON’T GO. If there is even the slightest chance you’ll lash out, DON’T FUCKING GO.
So yeah, P.S.A.:
Be safe this Halloween season. Feel free to enjoy the sights and frights but please, for the love of Mr. Rogers and the Addams family, don’t be a jackass. Make this year a fun and enjoyable one for all!
why the fuck aren’t these actors legally protected, like if it’s a clear rule not to attack/harm the actors being “banned” should NOT be the only result. That is fucking assault, it should be reported because these people don’t give a single fuck if they get banned as long as they get their one kick in, actually having the threat of getting in serious trouble for their shitty actions might prevent this from happening as often
I don’t understand why this is not considered assault???? why are the actors not protected from these kind of people? Why not make guests sign some sort of agreement before going in to the haunted house that emphasises they will get in trouble if they assault the actors? Just because it’s scary and they’re paying to be scared shouldn’t suddenly mean they are exempt from the same amount of shit they’d get in to if they were to attack a retail employee or a disney park character so WHY is this still an ongoing problem that no one seems to be doing anything logical about? What the fuck is wrong with people?
DarkestElemental616 