Baffled by ‘Belt and Road’
I confess that I am baffled by the nomenclature used by the Chinese government to label their “Belt and Road” project.
The excellent map in your May 13 edition (“China building a new world order?”, Insight) clearly shows a land route and a sea route, both extending westward from eastern China to Europe. The land route traverses Asia, and the sea route touches on Africa. While the land route qualifies as a road, it is hard to see how either route qualifies as a belt.
All of this suggests that, while the gentlemen who run China may be skilled at crushing dissent, repressing human rights and building highways, railways and airports, they are not so good at crafting meaningful nomenclature. After all, they were trained to be engineers, not poets. (And may I note in passing that, at this point in history, China could use more poets and fewer engineers.)
I believe that some serious rebranding is in order here. One straightforward name for the project could be “One Road, One Sea-lane”. That makes sense, but does not sing. A better choice would be “Two Tentacles”, as of an octopus or a squid. That may not sing, but at least it alliterates. It also gives us a pleasing metaphor: that of the Middle Kingdom as a giant squid, extending its tentacles to seize the trembling nations of Asia, Europe and Africa and draw them into its insatiable maw. A Chinese-language equivalent might be “Liangtiao Chujiao”, which at least rhymes. “Two Tentacles”, or “Liangtiao Chujiao”, might serve as a stopgap name until something more euphonious can be devised.
Ye Olde Pedant
