I've seen this explained before; from memory, it's a type of cousin, with specifiers: Chinese has distinct words for relatives of the same generation (siblings

I've seen this explained before; from memory, it's a type of cousin, with specifiers: Chinese has distinct words for relatives of the same generation (siblings, cousins) who are older or younger than oneself. Like "big brother" and "little brother" in English, but you always include the big/little part. "Younger" specifies that this cousin is younger than the person whose contacts book this is. Female - Chinese has separate words for male and female cousins The rest of the word salad specifies a relationship that is approximated by answering the question "is her (maiden) surname the same as my (maiden) surname?" in the negative — either she is a daugher of one of my mother's siblings, and doesn't share my surname because I have my father's surname, or she is my father's sister's daugher, and thus has her father's surname, which again is not the same as mine.