Chapter 551: The English level is quite good.
As the sun rose higher, the wedding procession finally returned.
The groom, dressed in a red wedding gown, sat atop a tall horse, followed by Shen Zheng and Zhao Sanniu, and then the bridal sedan chair, all amidst the sounds of gongs and drums.
The maids from the Situ family were distributing wedding candies beside the sedan chair. All the half-grown children in the alley came out, and the whole street became lively.
Upon arriving at the Cheng residence, the bridal sedan chair alighted, and the groom kicked open the door to lead the bride out. The two, holding large red flowers, stepped over a brazier and slowly walked into the courtyard.
The officiant was a blessed old woman invited by the Situ family. Under her guidance, the wedding ceremony concluded, and the couple was led to their bridal chamber, where the wedding banquet officially began.
At Cheng Wanwan's table, besides her and Mrs. Lin, as well as Old Lady Cheng and Mrs. Cheng, there were also some old ladies from the alley. Mrs. Lin was not arrogant, and those old ladies were willing to flatter her, so the atmosphere at the dinner table was very warm.
When they were almost done eating, Mrs. Lin suggested going to see the bride.
After the bride enters the new house at noon, she sits in the bridal chamber. During this time, people will keep coming to the bridal chamber to see the bride. This is a custom in many places.
Cheng Wanwan also wanted to see her niece-in-law, so she stood up together.
At this moment, Cheng Zhao walked around the screen. Although he was a man, he was also the groom, so it was not abrupt for him to come to the women's table to offer a toast.
"Thank you all for taking time out of your busy schedules to attend the wedding banquet. I'd like to propose a toast to you all." Cheng Zhao finished his glass of wine and looked at Madam Lin, saying, "I wonder if the food suits Madam Lin's taste?"
Mrs. Lin smiled and said, "I heard from your grandma that the chef was invited from the Shilixiang Restaurant. The chef of Shilixiang is very famous in the capital, so how could he not be able to please the taste?"
After exchanging a few words with Madam Lin, Cheng Zhao turned to Cheng Wanwan and said, "Second Aunt, may I come over and say a few words?"
Cheng Wanwan was full, so she put down her chopsticks, stood up, and followed Cheng Zhao to a pavilion on the east side of the yard. As soon as she got there, she saw Lord Zhang with a white beard sitting there waiting, obviously waiting for her.
"Second Aunt, Lord Zhang came to the wedding just to meet Second Aunt," Cheng Zhao said. "Last time during the Emperor's birthday celebration, the foreign characters embroidered on the birthday gift by Second Aunt really impressed Lord Zhang. Previously, he hadn't had the chance to meet Second Aunt, but now that Second Aunt is in the capital, Lord Zhang naturally came to visit. If Second Aunt finds it inconvenient, I'll refuse."
Cheng Wanwan was a little curious. She had copied those words from Lord Zhang's book, so why did they shock Lord Zhang?
She was the kind of person who wouldn't leave herself with any doubts, and she strode towards the pavilion.
There were always servants coming and going here, so it wasn't considered a private meeting. Besides, most people wouldn't think much of a woman in her thirties meeting a man in his sixties alone.
"Greetings, Master Zhang."
Cheng Wanwan stood on the steps and gave a polite bow.
"A man from Sui'an!" Lord Zhang jumped up and came over. "Ever since the Emperor's birthday last year, I have wanted to meet a man from Sui'an. Unfortunately, he lives in a village in Huzhou. I am too old to travel that far, and it has been a regret for me. Now that I have finally met him, I hope that he can enlighten me."
Cheng Wanwan sat down in the pavilion: "Answer my question? What makes you say that?"
Lord Zhang took out a piece of paper from his sleeve. There were a few lines of words written on the paper. These were the words that Cheng Wanwan had embroidered on the quilt.
Cheng Wanwan had read some foreign books. In fact, the territory of Dayu Kingdom had some similarities with the dynasties in her history. For example, there were some ethnic minorities in the south, north and west who had established their own countries and paid tribute to Dayu Dynasty every year. There were also some distant countries, such as Serso Kingdom, which was similar to Persia, Lakki Kingdom, which was similar to Japan, Assab, which was similar to the West, and Bani, which was similar to Arabia... That was why she understood the languages of these countries.
However, the exact locations of these countries were slightly different from what she originally knew...
"The countries of Seso and Dayu have the most exchanges, and have always traded silk and porcelain. I basically understand their writing systems. The writing system of Laji is similar to Dayu, and I also understand a little bit. I won't talk about these two countries anymore." Lord Zhang said quickly. "Assab is very far away from Dayu, and there are relatively few correspondences. I don't understand much, so I want to ask, how did the people of Sui'an translate this sentence? And the last line... I only found out it was written in the language of Banni when I went back to look it up in the book. May I ask how the people of Sui'an knew to write a birthday message in the language of Banni?"
Cheng Wanwan looked completely innocent: "Lord Zhang, aren't these words from the book 'Records of Other Places' that you had published? I wrote them down from there."
Lord Zhang immediately took out a book, because in the entire Dayu Dynasty, only this book had the language of the Banni Kingdom. He had copied it from the letter brought by the Banni Kingdom's envoy. However, he did not add any translation next to the text. How could the people of Sui'an know that this was a birthday greeting?
Cheng Wanwan took the book and turned to a page in the middle: "This is an article introducing the culture and customs of Assab. Here are some words: sun, moon, mountain, collapse, etc... I strung these words together to form the word 'longevity,' wishing for the rising sun, the constant moon, and the longevity of the Southern Mountain, never waning or collapsing. As for the Kingdom of Bani..."
She couldn't explain it. She saw a long string of Arabic in the book and assumed that the Dayu Dynasty and the Bani Kingdom had close ties, so she just wrote it down herself. But she never expected that the Bani language only existed in this book and hadn't been translated at all. She should have known better than to write it down...
"Let's not talk about Benny Country for now. They only exchange letters every three to five years, so it's not worth mentioning." Lord Zhang was excited. "Let's talk about Assab. I know these words, but how did the people of Sui'an know the words that string them together?"
Cheng Wanwan: "..."
Asab's language is English. It can be said that every Chinese person has been poisoned by English. She studied English for more than 20 years. After becoming the head of a company, the more foreign clients she came into contact with, the more she felt the importance of English. She attended many English training classes in private, and her English level is quite good.
When she saw words like "moon" and "sun" in the book, the prepositions and conjunctions in between would automatically pop into her mind... She had never considered that the Dayu Dynasty had only studied the nouns and adjectives of the Assab country, which were easy to understand, and had not yet touched on prepositions, conjunctions, transitions, or tenses... And this birthday poem had four conjunctions, two transitions, and the future continuous tense...
Stared at by Lord Zhang's bright eyes, Cheng Wanwan braced herself and explained, "When I went to another place before, I unexpectedly met an Assab merchant. Out of curiosity, we chatted for a while, so I have some understanding of the Assab language... These words are commonly used in their spoken language, and I just wrote them down out of habit. Lord Zhang, I didn't write them down wrong, did I?"
Lord Zhang immediately took out a pile of letters from his sleeve.
Cheng Wanwan: "..."
Just how much stuff was hidden in those sleeves? It felt like there was no end to it all, and she suddenly felt a chill run down her spine.
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