Comments by "Mikee Forma" (@mikeeforma2281) on "Do Russians think that China is dangerous?" video.

  1. It’s just a tradition, there is nothing else. We had very few direct contacts between our nations in the past (until 18-20 centuries). We’ve just taken the ethnonym of Marco Polo and we liked the way it sounded! That’s it. That’s a usual case in the history when the old name becomes kinda universal. For example, Germany in Spanish sounds like Alemania, and they (Spaniards) mostly just don’t think a lot why it is so. The same with the Netherlands: some call it just Holland but these two ethnonyms mean different things. Word “China” (Чайна) in Russian would be associated with “tea” because “茶” became «Чай» (chai). And if we add a letter «я» to it (Чайная), we would have an adjective from “tea” or a name of a special place where people drink tea (茶室). Anyway I don’t have any problem with that and can name Китай even as «Джонг Гуо» or «Джонгуо» (中国) or literally «Срединная страна» (Middle country) but a very few people will understand what I do mean.
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