Super Men

By Zhenyi Tan

The image features two old books. The left book, titled 地球守護神超人戰士, showcases Ultraman battling various monsters in action scenes. The right book, titled 宇宙超級怪獸圖鑑, also highlights Ultraman, displaying him in dynamic poses.

When I was a kid, Ultraman was called 鹹蛋超人 (salted egg super man) in Chinese. Because his eyes kinda looked like salted eggs. But I always knew him as just 超人 (super man).

Then when I first saw Superman (which also translates to 超人), I thought, “Yuck, who is this lame guy and how dare he share the name with my 超人?”

By the way, Kamen Rider translates to 蒙面超人 (masked super man) and Anpanman translates to 麵包超人 (bread super man). Yeah, the translations are not very creative, but that’s a story for another day…