The Chinese electronic commerce company called AliExpress offers for sale this unusual product:
Magic grass of queerness diy desktop mini plant bonsai mosquito radiation-resistant qu wencao
Because I know Chinese and am used to reading Chinglish, I could figure out this product name on the first go, but to provide an adequate exegesis for Language Log readers, I shall endeavor to recreate the Chinese upon which it is based, then retranslate it into more immediately intelligible and idiomatic English.
Before reconstructing what must have been the original Chinese, however, a few annotations are required.
The first and most important thing to do is figure out what "qu wencao" is. Somehow or other, even though the Pinyin is divided incorrectly and lacks tones, I immediately sensed that this must be qūwéncǎo OR qūwén cǎo 驅蚊草 (lit., "grass that drives away mosquitoes", i.e., "mosquito repellant grass"). Here are some Chinese encyclopedia articles about this type of grass.
At the latter site, it is said to be Pelargonium X Citrenella.
Following the latter allegedly scientific name, we are led to this Wikipedia article.
Although this plant is supposed to be effective in driving off mosquitoes, note what is said about it in the Wikpedia article:
The "citronella plant" is a geranium plant marketed as "Pelargonium citrosum", but according to the American Botanical Council, " 'Pelargonium citrosum' is not a valid taxonomic designation." "Pelargonium citrosum" is marketed as a mosquito plant, or citrosa geranium in stores in the United States and Canada, but research indicates Pelargonium citrosum is ineffective against Aedes aegypti mosquitos. "Not only was the plant ineffective at protecting humans against Aedes mosquito bites, the mosquitoes were seen landing and resting on the citrosa plant on a regular basis."
So much for the mosquito repelling qualities of qūwén cǎo 驅蚊草 (lit., "grass that drives away mosquitoes").
Not knowing the common English name for qūwén cǎo 驅蚊草 (lit., "grass that drives away mosquitoes"), I checked:
Google Translate — M. buster
Baidu Fanyi — Mozzie buster
Bing Translator — Mozzie
Not having heard of "mozzie" before, I had to look it up. Apparently "mozzie" is also spelled "mozzy" or "mossie", but none of that helped very much, since "mozzie buster" sounds like a Chinglishism. At least it's not a plant name that I'd ever heard of before. In my estimation, the names for this plant that are being bandied around are part of the marketing hype and do not have taxonomical legitimacy or sanction through long usage in English.
Moving backward through the name, how about "radiation-resistant"? Does this mean that the plant can stand up to high doses of radiation? I think, rather, that, preposterous as it may seem, the plant is thought to ward off or protect from radiation. In Chinese, that would be fáng fúshè 防辐射.
But how can that be? In the event of a nuclear attack, can we rely on this lowly plant to deflect radiation away from us and absorb it into its own body? Well, here are "13 Natural Remedies For Radiation Exposure" from the Global Healing Center. Note that #13 is Organic Germanium-132. N.B.: that is "Organic Germanium-132", NOT "Organic Geranium-132". But read this description of Organic Germanium-132 from the site carefully:
An oxygen-rich, free-radical scavenging organic compound. When we are exposed to radiation, the rays from this exposure release harmful electrons the kill blood cells (haemoglobin). Organic geranium has been shown to snatch up these radioactive rays, allowing them to move freely inside the nuclear structure of the Germanium, instead of entering the human cells and bloodstream. This is related to geranium’s ability to protect the amino acid cysteine, in the human body. Other studies showed promising results involving the use of germanium-132 and a strong reduction in cell death in those cells exposed to cesium-137 and gamma rays. Currently, the Japanese are recommending 100 mg. per day.
Twice in this description, "Germanium" is spelled as "geranium"! Note further that qūwén cǎo 驅蚊草 (lit., "grass that drives away mosquitoes") is a type of geranium. What is still more mind-boggling is that geranium plants contain significant amounts of Germanium, even though "geranium" and "Germanium" etymologically are completely unrelated.
Continuing backward toward the front of the name of the plant, we can more or less figure out what "desktop mini plant bonsai mosquito" is supposed to imply, now that we know what qūwén cǎo 驅蚊草 (lit., "grass that drives away mosquitoes") is.
As for "diy", this is one of the highest frequency acronymic English borrowings into Chinese: Do It Yourself. In the present context, this means that you can easily grow the grass yourself (it comes in a container like that used for making instant noodles / ramen; just add water [not hot!]).
Finally, reaching the beginning of the sentence, without even looking up anything, I know that "magic grass of queerness" must be shénqí gǔguài cǎo 神奇古怪草 because shénqí gǔguài 神奇古怪 is a common expression for something that is "wonderfully / amazingly weird".
When I googled for similarly sounding advertisements, I found plenty. Here are a couple:
Summer the necessary * bonsai drives the mosquito grass seedling * indoor vanilla to drive the mosquito grass big seedling initial cost 10 Yuan
Magic DIY odd grass office desktop mini plant potted bonsai anti-mosquito anti-radiation drive midge grass
You get the picture. There are tons of these things on the Web; I'm not about to explain how they all came about. One thorough explication of the sort I've given above should suffice as a representative of the whole lot.
Now, it's time for me to close by reconstructing the Chinese original of this Chinglish name:
Magic grass of queerness diy desktop mini plant bonsai mosquito radiation-resistant qu wencao
The original Chinese was probably something like this:
shénqí gǔguài cǎo DIY zhuōmiàn mínǐ zhíwù pénjǐng fáng wén fáng fúshè qūwéncǎo
神奇古怪草DIY桌面迷你植物盆景防蚊防辐射驱蚊草
("wonderfully weird grass; do-it-yourself desktop miniature bonsai planting of mosquito repelling grass that wards off mosquitoes and protects against radiation")
I'm not going to buy any, even if they're on sale.
[h.t. Jeff Kallberg]
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