341 To Exchange

The founder of E2Exchange and advisor to The Mayor of London, Shalini Khemka, comes into the studio to discuss with ShaoLan the philosophy of “exchanging” and how her organization tries to help entrepreneurs to grow quickly by exchanging ideas with each other! ShaoLan teaches the meaning that is wrapped up in the Chinese words for exchange and how the characters represent hands exchanging good things! Shalini had actually been engaging in business development in China a few years ago but felt hindered by a lack of language ability, so she’s keen to learn more from ShaoLan, who continues to teach some extra words for exchanging specific things, such as “money” as you might do at an airport, or “people” as might happen in an election or a sports game.

 The way to say “exchange” in Chinese is 換/换. The left part of the character is the “hand” radical and the right side means “brilliant.” When brilliant things pass between hands this is “exchange” 換/换. To go to a deeper level you can add 交 to the beginning to make 交換, which specifies “going across” to exchange, to show that exchange is happening across a barrier or divide.