A bilingual reading card that aims to help the Chinese learn simple English words and phrases ahead of the Shanghai World Expo, which begins May 1, has sparked debate in the city.

The "Bilingual Instruction of Luwan District for Expo" has listed some English terms and phrases, which are important in everyday use, alongside Chinese characters that may not mean anything but definitely sound like English.

The Chinese characters for "good morning" read "gu de mao ning", "I'm sorry" translates to "an men sao rui", and "bye bye" is written in Chinese as "bai bai".