I know I posted in forever, but this is something I thought was pretty appropriate for the time. I wish everyone a Happy New Year! 新年快樂！事事如意！工作進步！學業進步！

Hi everyone, as you obviously can tell, I haven’t updated this website in a quite long time. Aside from the Cantonese project that I have been trying to start up and get to work (my apologies for those who I have stated I wish to collaborate with and I have not been able to contact much with), I also have been having many personal matters that must be taken care of first. As a result… well it’s quite obvious that nothing’s been getting done right? I do appreciate whatever support I have been getting and I hope to get back onto this as soon as possible.

Until then, 下次再見！

P.S. No, I’m not leaving, I’ll work on things soon =/ bear with me in the meantime my friends!

Wait... Run? Walk? What?

I cannot say I am 100% fluent in both Mandarin and Cantonese (in fact, I can’t say I’m 100% fluent in English either, I have no way to gauge where my fluency is), but I can vouch that I am pretty well adept at all three languages to a certain degree. I find it often that I would want to help people native to one of those three languages learn another one since I have the ability to, why not? (Maybe I should start charging… but who’s to say I have the qualifications to do that? I’m just being a good Samaritan, a cultural ambassador to an extent, and an interpreter to a degree). There were a couple of friends I had from Mainland China who were not Cantonese. One of them however did know Cantonese to a small certain degree. Now, naturally their native language was definitely not English and Mandarin was their native (or one of) their native languages. In teaching them some bits and pieces of English, I learned several things about Cantonese and Mandarin that I didn’t know before, aside from the obvious fact that my Mandarin needs improvement, here’s what I learned. Hopefully this comes in hands for you guys reading out there. Oh and yes, this serves as a Cantonese lesson too!

So the first problem I encountered was that in the Mandarin language, the word for “to walk” and the word for “to leave” or “to go” was the exact same character: 走 (M: zou3). So the way that you determine whether or not you’re walking to the store or leaving the store depends on what other words and context surrounds it. Sometimes it doesn’t help at all and it’s left ambiguous. No, the language still works, in English there are things that are left ambiguous and we don’t really notice nor care because it’s not important or you have extra words in context that tell you what’s going on. For example in Cantonese the word 挖 (C: waat6) means “to dig out” but in the sense that you have to exhume it out, has a nasty connotation/image at times, and it’s not digging with a shovel but implied that you use a hand or some other instrument and… yeah anyway.

So What was I supposed to do and what I was supposed to make again?

So now when you go to Cantonese, what’s the difference? The word “to walk” is translated as 行 (C: haang4) while to word for “to leave” or “to go” is 走 (C: jaau2). Teaching someone who’s native in Cantonese or knows Cantonese what “to walk” and “to leave/go” means is MUCH easier as a result than someone who’s solely native in Mandarin. What happens often is that they will run into troubles and mix “to walk” and “to leave” up sometimes while speaking in English. While for these pair of verbs, it’s quite alright, I mean people can understand when you say “I left to the store” and “I walked to the store” have similar albeit different meanings, but what if your words were something else?

Cantonese – English – Mandarin:
整 (jing2) – to make – 做 (zuo4)
做 (jou6) – to do – 做 (zuo4)

Catch my drift here? What if you wanted to say “I am making dinner tonight” and it becomes “I am doing dinner tonight”? Now granted it can be interpreted correctly, but at the same time it also can’t. Depends on who’s on the receiving side listening. Now granted, I bet you if English has such faults and Mandarin has such errors then Cantonese has a couple too; I just can’t think of any right now but if you can think of some be sure to leave that in the comments for us (or me) to discuss and learn upon!

In lighter news, I’m still working on that project… and 中秋節 (Mid-Autumn Festival) is coming up! So if you have anything you guys like to share about it, make sure you leave it in the comments!

Picture Link Credits:

http://www.walkfortheshelters.com/?p=68

http://www.thesmartcodes.com/organize-your-tasks-online-with-to-do-lists/

Wait... Run? Walk? What?

 

Pop or soda? Trash can or rubbish bin? Lexical differences in the names of daily objects exist in regional varieties of Cantonese, just like in English.

Most regional differences develop from tradition. Guangdong Cantonese uses vocabulary that most closely resembles Mandarin, while Hong Kong Cantonese uses another set of terms. Here are some examples:

Air-conditioning 空調 (hung1 tiu4) ＝ 冷氣 (laang3 hei3)
Refrigerator 冰箱 (bing1 seung1) ＝ 雪櫃 (syut3 gwai6)
Paper-clip 回形針 (wui4 ying4 jam1) ＝ 萬字夾 (maan6 ji6 gaap3)
Drinking straw 吸管 (kap1 gun2) ＝ 飲筒 (yam2 tung2)

Furthermore, English spoken during the British colonial years greatly influenced the language used by Hong Kong people. Many Hong Kong Cantonese terms are loan words from English, without any particular meaning when broken down word by word.

Bus 公交車 (gung1 gaau1 che1) ＝ 巴士 (ba1 si2)
Taxi 出租車 (cheut1 jou1 che1) ＝ 的士 (dik1 si2)
Strawberry 草莓 (chou2 mui4) ＝ 士多啤梨 (si6 do1 be1 lei2)

Sometimes, different terms from Cantonese varieties involve just switching the order of the words! (But with slight tonal changes.)

Eraser 擦胶 (chaat3 gaau1) ＝ 胶擦 (gaau1 chaat2)
Midnight snack 夜宵 (ye6 siu1) ＝ 宵夜 (siu1 ye5)
Boxed lunch 盒飯 (hap5 faan6) ＝ 飯盒 (faan6 hap2)

Here are two websites with further examples. Keep these differences in mind next time you visit Cantonese-speaking regions to avoid mix-ups and confusion!

I’m sure you all have read the previous post where I discussed a small Cantonese lesson with some irony in it. Well, that’s not the only thing that gets to my head between Cantonese and Mandarin! First of all you have to remember that I come from a Cantonese background without any influence of Mandarin. Let me introduce to you two Chinese characters:

樽/罇　(C: jeun1, M: zun1) Yes I realize there are two variants of this character, I will stick to just the first one because it comes up first when I’m typing and I’m pretty lazy.

瓶 (C: ping4, M: ping1)

If you guys know what these characters mean, then I want to you first forget all about it and just listen to me for now (just temporarily, no brainwashing involved). Think back to pre-1900s, there were no such things as plastic bottles. ‘Bottles’ as we know them today were not always the same. The world for bottle referred to “a rigid container with a neck that is narrower than the body and a ‘mouth’”.

Now, fast forward into the future, the world now has these entities know as “bottles” that you see which are typically your plastic bottles! China, catching up to the modern world at the time, imports this entity… what do you call it?! Cantonese: Let’s call it a 樽! 樽s were jars, goblets, used to hold liquids and drinking, and other things iconic of a bottle! Mandarin: Let’s call it a 瓶子! 瓶s were pitchers, vases, jugs, and other things iconic of a bottle!

Wait… Mak what’s the issue here? Let’s give you a hypothetical that essentially happened.

Person: Hey bring that 瓶子 of water.
Me: What? A VASE of water? You mean the BOTTLE? aka 樽?!
*insert 20 minutes of “why is this happening”

Ultimately, if you speak Mandarin 樽 will refer to bottle, but it’ll refer to jars/jugs more likely and you’ll begin thinking “I want a BOTTLE not a huge Jug! If you speak Cantonese, 瓶 will probably make you think vase and you’ll probably be like me thinking “Bottle for drinking! Vase for flowers!”

I believe the generation that learns both languages will never have a discourse like this, but I found it funny and decided to share with you guys. Haha. I still think 樽 sounds more legitimate than 瓶子. Use 瓶 in front of me to refer to a bottle in Cantonese, and I will rip my hair out and respond with “你有無搞錯啊？！樽就樽！瓶就瓶！樽就裝水！瓶就裝花！” (C: nei5 yau3 mou3 gaau2 cho3 a3?!  jeun1 jau6 jeun1!  ping4 jau6 ping4! jeun1 jau6 jong1 seui2! ping4 jau6 jong1 fa1!”. Translation: “OMG! Are you serious?! Bottles are Bottles! Vases are Vases! Bottles are for water! Vases are for flowers!”

Epilogue: Before you guys make mistakes or begin cursing me because I steered you the wrong way and someone native looks at you weird (haha). Both words work. They just sound weird if you use 樽 for Mandarin and 瓶 for Cantonese. Acceptable, but let’s just say it’s more fauxpas.

P.S. Both characters are also 量詞 (Measure Words) in addition to nouns. I’ll go in depth on those someday in the near future My Cantonese project first and just short posts like these for now.

I didn’t think this would be funny but it’s something I found interesting. I was watching a Hong Kong drama and we all know that in each of these dramas, the subtitles were in Standard Chinese rather than Standard Cantonese (they also come in English now!). Well, it’s not surprising that the subtitles translate the dialogue from Cantonese to Mandarin. Fair enough right? So there was this one scene that a police offer stops a driver and tells him to step out of the car. She said (in Cantonese).

即刻落車 (C: jik1 haak1 lok6 che1)

Where 即刻 (C: jik1 haak1) means immediately, 落 (C: lok6) means “to go down, or come down”, and 車 (C: che1) means car. Now Mandarin doesn’t use these characters, they use 馬上 (M: ma3 shang4) for immediately and 下 (M: xia4) for “to go down, or come down”. Therefore your translation which came out in the subs became this.

馬上下車 (M: ma3 shang4 xia4 che1)

Wait, wait, wait, who out there knows Mandarin? 馬上 also literally means “on a horse” because “being on a horse” means “immediately”. So basically you just said “on the horse, off the car!” and that translates to “step out of the car immediately”. Wow, I found that ironic. I think it’d be funnier if the police officer told the guy to get off of a horse, then it’d be:

馬上下馬 (M: ma3 shang4 xia4 ma3)

Currently I’m working on a large Cantonese project with some supporters, I need all the help and brainpower I need. Hopefully this comes to fruition. In the meantime, here was your minor Cantonese lesson!

In Cantonese, you say 即刻 (C: jik1 haak1)
In Mandarin/Standard Chinese, you say 馬上 (C: ma3 shang4)
In English, you say “Immediately”

I know there are discrepancies that exists, voice them out in the comments for me I hope to write more soon!

Not mine but I definitely can relate. As a side question, who doesn’t think that tones are the most difficult part of learning a Chinese language? That’s perhaps one of many misconceptions I’d like to dispel about Cantonese. Also, this opens up discussion about the utility of Cantonese, especially for foreigners. Some would say it’s better to stick to English, and keep your knowledge of Cantonese to that of understanding when they talk abou you! Some would say Chinese girls don’t find it as foreign-exotic if you’re too good at Chinese. Experience, thoughts, complaints?

Rain~~~! 落雨啊！

Thanks to my good friend Jeff from Jeffinous Tang Poetry I have this following CANTONESE poem. Yes you heard it right, it’s a Cantonese poem; in fact this is one of those songs you would sing as a little kid in Cantonese. I’d say it’s similar to how you would recite things such as “I’m a little teapot, short and stout” or “Rain rain go away” or “Ring around the rosie”. This poem, or nursery rhyme if you want to call it that, is singing about what happens when it rains. So picture looking outside your window right now with the rain and try to embody this poem. You’d do the same with an English or Mandarin poem wouldn’t you? Without further ado, here is the poem that I personally translated and romanized in Yale for you guys.

落雨大，水浸街，
lok6 yu5 daai6, seui2 jam3 gaai1
It’s raining hard, the streets are flooded

阿哥擔柴上街賣，
a3 go1 daam1 chaai4 seung5 gaai1 maai6
Big brother’s taking firewood up the street to sell

阿妹出街著花鞋，
a3 mui6 cheut1 gaai1 jeuk3 fa1 haai4
Little sister’s wearing flowery shoes on the street

花鞋花襪花腰帶，
fa1 haai4 fa1 mat6 fa1 yiu1 daai2
Flowery shoes, flowery socks, flowery belt

珍珠蝴蝶兩邊排，
jan1 jyu1 wu4 dip6 leung5 bin1 paai4
Pearl Butterflies on both sides

有錢打對鈴琳鼓，
yau5 chin2 da2 deui3 ling1 lam1 gu2
If you have money, hit some tambourines

冇錢打個石樓牌。
mou5 chin2 da2 go3 sek6 lau4 paai4
If you don’t have money, hit some signboards

Some key things to point out is that right from the first line you’d see 落雨 (C: lok6 yu5) and  水浸 (C: seui2 jam2). Let’s break that down for you right now in the three languages.

English: to rain
Cantonese: 落雨 (C: lok6 yu5)
Mandarin: 下雨 (M: xia4 yu3)

English: to flood
Cantonese: 水浸 (C: seui2 jam2)
Mandarin: 水淹 (M: shui3 yan1)
Although you can read the Mandarin words in Cantonese and still have it make sense properly, it loses the essential Cantonese feel to the text. If you speak Cantonese and say 下雨 instead of 落雨, or 水淹 instead of 水浸 most people will just think you speak Mandarin and are doing badly learning Cantonese. So if you want to keep the spirit of Cantonese alive and well, you know what to do .

Now for some more difficult stuff: 鈴琳鼓 (C: ling1 lam1 gu2) I called tambourines also known in Mandarin as 搖鼓 (M: yao2 gu2) but they are more like these in this picture below. Typically only those who have enough would be able to afford one as you can see through the poem. Spin these in the palm of your hand back and forth and the spheres will rattle the drum!

Strike one of these and they'll go 鈴鈴琳琳!

However, as the poem also states, there’s also those who cannot afford such a toy. So what exactly is a 石樓牌 (C: sek6 lau4 paai4)?

English: Paifang
Cantonese: 牌樓 (C: paai4 lau4)
Mandarin: 牌坊 (M: pai2 fang1)

These are the memorial arches or gates at the entrance of a city classically. If you don’t have money to rattle your drum, then why not join the rest of the little kids in the city and start rattling on the city sign? (Not saying that was a good thing to do haha)

For in depth reference, check out this video.

Pictures from:
http://becozwoo.blogspot.com/2010/06/blog-post_24.html
http://tw.ttnet.net/ttnet/gotoprd/TY105/010/0/054303030313636333.htm

Remember, all romanizations are either in Cantonese or Mandarin. Either they’re specifically stated or inferred by the context of the sentence. When in doubt, it’s probably Cantonese.

Ancesteral Graves in China

This article will be written a bit earlier than the intended day, but it will serve the same purpose of informing you.

One of the main festivals in Chinese Culture which encompasses Cantonese culture as well is the Qingming Festival (Ching1 Ming4 Jit3 清明節). For those of you who don’t know, this is a Traditional Chinese holiday centered around those of one’s ancestors. According to the Traditional Chinese Lunar Calendar where a couple of other holidays are judged similarly. Every year this holiday is determined by the 15th day from the Spring Equinox. This year it takes place on April 5th, which happens to next Tuesday.

Traditionally what happens in a nutshell is that families will visit the graves of their ancestors as a yearly practice. Other holidays one might do this as well would include Chinese New Year’s but Chingming Festival is of special importance. Another name that I have heard this holiday being referred to in English includes “Tomb-Sweeping Festival” which I believe is appropriate due to some of the things you would do when visiting your ancestors’ graves. A family that goes usually has many tasks which include cleaning the gravestones and lighting incense for these individuals. Flowers would be placed just like western practice as well. Many times people would also bring food for the ancestors which is symbolic of giving them food. In an previous article I have mentioned before the importance of incense and chopsticks which you can see the importance of such actions in regards to visiting ancestors’ graves. In western countries with large Chinese populations, you may see cemeteries these next few days pretty packed and you will know the reason why!

Paying respect to ancestors

Now for some useful Cantonese phrases. I consider this useful in the sense that it is more helpful and will help you avoid situations where you would not want to accidentally say things you do not mean. Cantonese like many East Asian cultures do not like introducing things related to death and this is how you can avoid accidentally mentioning death.

So the other day I accidentally ran into an article on Wikipedia, Cantonese Wikipedia to be exact, which gave many phrases that refer to death. Let’s go through some of them:

The normal way to say someone has died is through the verb “to die” 死 (sei2) such as:
“He died” – 佢死咗。 (keui5 sei2 jo2)

Obviously this isn’t an appropriate way to address someone as you would not say this in English either, you would say “He passed away” or “He’s gone.” Cantonese works the same, here are some ways to say it. They are all verbs in Cantonese. All romanization are in Yale Cantonese.

Polite Ways:
過身 (gwo3 san1) – Passed Away
過世 (gwo3 sai3) – Left this world
去世 (heui3 sai3) – Left this world
去咗 (heui3 jo2) – Left
走咗 (heui3 jo2) – Gone

Some things that means a person has died but isn’t necessarily obvious.
瓜柴 (gwa1 chaai4) – Literally: Gourd Firewood
瓜咗 (gwa1 jo2) – Literally: Gourd-ed
瓜老襯 (gwa1 lou5 chan3) – Note: In Cantonese, use of the word Gourd/Melon (瓜 gua1) in a verb sense typically means death, so be careful when you’re using such a term.
釘蓋 (deng1 goi3) – Literally: Nailed a cover, think of when you’re being buried, the coffin is nailed over right?
釘咗 (deng1 jo2) – Literally: Nailed, same as above
香咗 (heung1 jo2) – I don’t quite know why this means this, but 香 here could refer to incense and you’d know what this means
淋咗 (lam3 jo2) – Kinda means he fell (as in died)
長休 (cheung4 yau1) – Literally: Long Rest, similar to Rest In Peace for concept
玩完 (waan2 yun4) – Literally: Done playing (as in done playing this game of life)
賣鹹鴨蛋 (maai6 haam4 ngaap2 daan2) – Literally: Buy Salted Duck Eggs (I actually don’t know the reasoning behind this one if someone can tell me that would be nice, but try not to accidentally say this)
百年歸老 (baak3 nin4 gwai1 lou3) – Can’t really translate this, if someone can help me that’d be nice too.

If anyone has any others that they would like to add, please let me know. I know this post is not as informative as my other posts, but I wish to make more posts like these that start teaching people vocabulary they can actually use. However, I will still continue to make opinion, facts, and concept posts (or whatever you would like to refer to them as) as I have done since the beginning of this sight. Thanks for reading

Pictures from: http://www.zimbio.com/pictures/iFbxf-cPzFE/China+Marks+Qingming+Festival/PLX_i_zWDW_

I remember one of the reasons I wanted to learn French was that it sounds so good when you argue! I found this intense duet by Edmond Leung and Miriam Yeung that gives Cantonese learners all the ammunition needed to argue with your SO.