In a conversation about the obstacles of translating Chinese classics like The Analects of Confucius and Tao Te Ching, Icelandic Sinologist Ragnar Baldursson shared an informative anecdote highlighting essential cultural differences.He stated a conversation with a Chinese schoolmate about the color of soil.
While Baldursson explained it as light brown, contrasting it with the dark brown of Icelandic earth, his schoolmate insisted it was yellow.
This seemingly easy argument revealed a conceptual difference: in the Chinese color system, brown is not a primary, often falling under the spectrum of yellow or other descriptive terms.