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I was watching a TV show, and some of the dialogue is giving me trouble. screenshot

The father is teasing his son's love intrest (the pictured girl). At least I think that's what's happening. They as her if she has 地X, and she says she does not. She then asks the family the same question, and it definately seems like a big deal.

I can't figure out the third character. It sounds like mei di xi, or perhaps mei di qi.

I thought it could be related to the word place, since the 地 is from 地方. So maybe it's about owning land? It is on a Taiwanese drama from 2007, so if anyone has any cultural context t ogo along with the answer, that would be great!

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    The 'X' is 契, which means 'to carve/engrave', in ancient times contracts were often made (not necessarily only in China) by engraving them into an object, to keep track of things, so 契 has the additional meaning of 'contract' or 'agreement'. 地契 (dìqì) is thus a 'land contract', or a 'title deed for land' (a legal term that says what gives you the right to use a piece of land/property).
    – imrek
    May 31, 2016 at 23:03
  • Actually, in my comment above I gave you the Simplified character, but in the subtitles it is 契 (Traditional character). Notice that the top left-side is different. I wonder why Pleco does not have the Simplified one.
    – imrek
    May 31, 2016 at 23:09
  • @DrunkenMaster The simplified / trad characters you give look exactly the same to me. Also, your comment is actually an answer.
    – KWeiss
    Jun 2, 2016 at 10:53
  • @KWeiss the shape of the character depends on the font used by your browser, maybe they are not a Traditional vs. Simplified pair, but just variants. Here are two images that are not effected by font-rendering: kanji.jitenon.jp/kanjic/1386.gif and p5.qhimg.com/t01fb10e8a789e2f4ec.png
    – imrek
    Jun 2, 2016 at 11:00
  • I would guess the first is a Japanese variant of writing it, based on the URL.
    – Dan
    Jun 2, 2016 at 17:15

2 Answers 2

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The words are "mei di qi". "地契" is a whole word, which means lease.

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契，‘qi'，没地契means there are no land deeds.

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  • So what is the contract the mother shows, if not a land deed?
    – Dan
    Jun 9, 2016 at 18:52
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    Hi Dan, I am not seeing any contract shown by the mother. Anyway, what's likely going on here is that the son's parents are disclosing the family financial situation informally to the potential daughter-in-law. And the girl is probably telling the potential in-laws that there would not be much in her dowry (i.e. there would not be any land deeds included).
    – wchyk-cyw
    Jun 9, 2016 at 22:22
  • Sorry, I forgot to mention that the mother leaves and comes back with a contract, which the girl examines breifly. I watched a few more episodes, and it is now my understanding that both the girl and the mother think they own the house, for some reason. Thanks for your thoughts though, I appreciate it!
    – Dan
    Jun 9, 2016 at 22:50

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