How many of you can count from 1 to 10 in Cantonese?

_________________
Hong Kong Underground Music Scene:
http://undergroundhk.com
Thinking Out Loud:
http://thinkingoutloud.com.hk
Guitars & Panties:
http://guitarsandpanties.com
Sisters of Sharon:
http://www.sistersofsharon.com.hk/

I would be more interested to know how many Guailo (no offense) on Lamma can actually speak Cantonese or Mandarin. I know that many foreigners live in Hong Kong for ages, and some even born here, but they never bother to learn the local language. Or they just pretend not able to speak, so that they can hear what people said behind their back?

My wife has been learning Cantonese in her spare time. And she said no matter how well she speaks, the locals just wouldn't understand. And I can tell you, she is right! Perhaps the locals just wonldn't expect any foreigners can speak this difficult dialect.

Tell me the joy and frustration of your Cantonese/Mandarin learning experience. I am now learning German and still brushing up my English, perhaps we can share a bit of our experience.

As a gweilou who is currently persisting in trying to learn Cantonese, I think that the main problem is simply the difficulty of the Cantonese language for speakers of European languages (tone, vowel length, lack of standard writing system, etc). I have come across many newcomers who are genuinely enthusiastic about learning Cantonese - they buy books and tapes and take lessons, but most of them seem to give up before long, usually feeling rather guilty about it.

Are foreigners pretending not know how to speak so they can listen in to what is being said about them? Definitely not. That would require a far more intimate knowledge of the language than most foreigners have (even assuming they cared). I have a friend who managed to learn Nepalese while living in Nepal in about a year, but still feels he cannot hold his own in Cantonese after several years married to a Cantonese speaker in Hong Kong.

Zep

I think part of the problem IS because most people give up learning. They get embarrassed and frustrated and don't persevere!

One example is when someone gets into a taxi and tells the driver where they want to go. Most of the time the driver is expecting a gwailo to speak English not Cantonese. So when the passenger speaks Cantonese, the driver is thinking 'what English is he/she speaking' and it's only after a few repetitions that it dawns on him that they're speaking Cantonese, by this point the gwailo passenger is pissed off and thinks 'why do I bother?' And this is true for shops etc.

I'm a fluent Cantonese speaker thanks to my Chinese mother. I've experienced the above, after which they normally freak out that my Cantonese is so perfect. Which then leads into the predictable conversation of why I speak Cantonese, where was I born etc. The funny thing is because I don't look Chinese, most people DON'T believe I am half-Chinese ! hahahahaha

I admit that the tones can be hard but I've heard people master them. Come on! Many people in the South of China speak Cantonese with an accent!

I know quite a few foreigners who've made the effort to learn and they enjoy conversing with people in Cantonese. They're not embarrassed to make mistakes and learn from them.

Now GERMAN is what I want to learn! hahahahahhahaha

_________________
Hong Kong Underground Music Scene:
http://undergroundhk.com
Thinking Out Loud:
http://thinkingoutloud.com.hk
Guitars & Panties:
http://guitarsandpanties.com
Sisters of Sharon:
http://www.sistersofsharon.com.hk/

So you want to learn German?

A good start would be to attend some of the German language movies at the MAX! film festival next month. I just finished their website, just click on the banner below...

I know five languages, but Cantonese still eludes me and my teacher at home is not very patient with me...

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

I do believe the major problem is that Cantonese is extremely difficult to master. My mum is a native Mandarin speaker and came to HK when she was 30 years old, now she is 60 and still working. 30 years of learning Cantonese still cannot rid her of the strong northern accent. Worse to my grandma. And I have schoolmates from China, came to HK as teenager, still being laughed at for their distorted tone. And I believe the locals are also to be blamed, for they show absolutely no support to foreigners when it comes to learning Cantonese. Foreigners are continuously being insulted, battered and punched for making even a tiny mistake in their tone. I have every respect to the people who still persist to learn the language, for they must have the amount of courage that could conquer the Everest!

i totally agree with webdog.
personally, i appreciate every effort made by any foreigner to learn our language/dialect. in fact, i find a lot of gwei-lo, gwei-pors speaking perfect mandarin when so many locals couldn't do it. we simply have no place to laugh when someone makes an effort to speak our dialect. while hong kong claims to give a bi-lingual education, too few of use could master english well enough. wish we could all learn each other languages and communicate better.

I can count from 1 to ten and say a whole sentence in cantonese

1-10 is :-

Yat Yee Sam Say Ng Luk Chat Bat Gow Sap

Sentence is :-

Gow gow gow, gow gow gow.

(nine rubber dogs with nine rubber penises)

Wah! Che sing Gwailo Mok-tau

Mo man Tai, Ya mo beerjau fi di ma lo jai !

Actually you will find that most Chinese shopkeepers speak english fluently but are a bit deaf.

The best thing to do when trying to purchase a large tub of Avacado dip, for instance, is just ask for it in English. If the shopkeeper is, say, 92 years old, wearing black pajamas and looks puzelled, just say "A LARGE TUB OF AVACADO DIP PLEASE", in a very loud voice. Speak slowly and lean forward to position your face directly in front of the shopkeeper's while you are shouting. At the same time try to do a mime of a tub of avacado dip.

This will do the trick 99 times out of a hundered.

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

I do not like Avacado, I was just using it as an example.

Also I am very bad at miming and always lose at charades.

To solve my shopping problems I used to send friends to get my stuff for me.

Eg. Keith Jay used to fetch my "Walls Pork Sausages" and The Handley Brothers used to buy "Chinese Dogs testicles soaked in Plumb Wine" (hard to find this item except at New Year), Jackie (Scott) Paul got "Melons", Vince Loden would buy "Nuts" and Ulrik Luttechau had great success buying "Grapes" as he has piles.

This worked fine except that one day Keith J came back with a tub of lard by mistake. Also I once sent David Slough to buy my beer but he came back with one can short of a six-pack so I didn't ask him again.

Your dogs are not so useful. I always get my wife what she wants, and only once I failed because she forgot to put the money in my mouth.

Does that make you a running dog of capitalism WD?

Or just a Web-Gow with no chin?

_________________
Click here for Lamma-zine stories and recent Lamma Spotlights of the Week:
Photo, Video, Person, Wildlife, Bird, Artwork.

I'm a zhou gow "running dog", and I hate cats!

Well I will forgive you for hating cats, I think all dogs do. You would be a very strange dog if you didn't hate cats.

Cheshire cats are very strange cats though, they like dogs very much, especially at Chinese New Year. Perhaps you would like to come round for dinner sometime?

You live in Cheshire (god knows where that is!) and I live on Lamma, please tell me how am I going to visit you without costing an arm and a leg? If you meant to be friendly or submissive to dogs, then come back to Lamma and buy everybody a round of your English warm beer.

Hi WD,

Info about cheshire is here http://www.cheshire.gov.uk/

Cheshire is an English county to the south of Manchester to the East of Wales and North of Shropshire and Warrickshire. It is famous for being very flat, cheshire cats, cheshire cheese, and not much else that I know of. Chester is the County town and it was built by the Romans who are gone now: which is good thing because they were a greasy lot (still are probably).

There is a map here. http://www.funforall.co.uk/Map_of_Great_Britain.htm

Look in the middle left and you can find it.

Luckily Manchester airport is only 20 mins away from my house by car so you can fly direct to there from HK and I will pick you up. Alternatively I can fly over there and have dinner at your house. It takes 13 hours. I don't mind buying a few drinks but not for the whole island as I know some bottomless beer pits live there still.

PS. You are correct, God does know where Cheshire is. He comes round to my house often to watch TV and drink beer when his wife is in a bad mood with Him. He is a handy bloke to know as if we run out of beer He does this trick with a bucket of tap water and it comes out like wine.

PPS Cheshire cats don't like warm beer they drink cold Dutch Pilsner. When in HK they make do with Danish Larger brewed under licence in the New Territories.