Have you ever seen this guy before?

His name (I just discovered) is Lefty.  He used to show up on occasion on The Muppets / Sesame Street.  If my memory serves, this infamous fellow would often beckon a gullible soul (like Ernie) into an alley or side-street in order to sell him something (i.e. the Letter ‘A’ or a shiny new wristwatch) from the blackmarket.  Lefty usually pulled his wares from the inside of his trench-coat.  You know the type…

The reason I mentioned Lefty at all is because I think I spotted him today.

I was minding my own business, on my way to school, when this anonymous-looking Chinese gentlemen stepped in front of me…

He wasn’t wearing a trench-coat, but I could tell he had a plan in mind when he approached me.  He said one word to me in English and started to pull out a bag which was suspended near his hip.

"Com-pu-ter," he said in fairly clear English.

I realized he was carrying a bag which contained a laptop in it.  He showed me a peak of metallic under the black canvas of the bag.

("Yes, that is a computer," I thought to myself.)

"Dian-nao," I responded in near-perfect Chinese.  (That’s the word for computer…diannao.)

Then we stared at each other for a second.  (It was very strange.)  I wasn’t exactly sure what the next step was in this conversation.  We both had identified the object in our respective languages, but we were both still standing there in the street.

Then my friend, Lefty, spoke again in Chinese.  (Mai ni gei, yao bu yao?)

I gave my typical response to any question or comment I receive in Chinese: 

Shenme? (What?)

He repeated his question.

My brain checked in (finally) and I knew what I needed to say: "Bu yao."

In English, "Don’t want."

Sadly, Lefty didn’t make a sell today.  I guess in this cynical age not all foreigners are ready to buy laptops on Xining streets from strangers.  But maybe if he had been selling the "letter A", I might have felt differently…

Almost definitely.