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Mainland Charmer Sugarcoats Words:
So this is how the common or garden mainlander sees HK people…
No. of course not. This geezer is just an army of one. A rabid minority misunderstanding his own nationality. Oh, and a professor at Beijing University. No doubt an expert on all things cultural.
So here we have it. Hong Kong people are bastards. Running dogs. Thieves. And … oh yes. Yes, running dogs. Yes, it is the 1960’s.
At least the presenter had the grace to look really uncomfortable. But this kind of spouting is very common on the mainland today. He and other of his kind hide behind the cloak of ‘anti-imperialism’ to let rip. He can just say what he wants unchallenged because he knows it suits the mainland government. Imagine what would happen if he said “well, I think Tibet should be free, actually.”
Note how “everyone must speak Mandarin” features prominently in his rant. What is it I always call that language again? Oh yeah, “Imperialist Communist speech-making language.” Heh.
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Today’s Classifier: 套
套， mainly classifier for films, as in － 套戲，yat tou hei – a ‘wrapper'(?) of film. Possibly from when films came in big metal cases. By the way, the origin of 戲 hei is ‘Chinese opera,’ but is now almost solely used for movies.
The word also pops up in 外套，oi tou, jacket or outside wrap. That was today’s classifier, good night.
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Down With Simplified Characters
In a country where the government is so hysterically set on everybody doing everything the government way, for example by banning beautiful, normal Chinese characters on buildings (it must be ‘crippled’, i.e. simplified characters or →
Back By Popular Demand: Classifiers
Photo: 四個靚女 (sei go leeng loy, 4 beautiful girls) Classifiers, measure words, counting words, whatever you want to call them, they are a vital feature of Cantonese. Here you can learn some of them through →
New Series! Countries Of The World In Cantonese
Today: Switzerland 瑞士 Soi si
Super-quick Way To Learn Cantonese: Yam Cha!
Oh, Australia! Even yam cha is great there. Normally no one can quite get it right outside China (my experience consists only of Norway, the USA and Australia though) but in Australia they’ve got it →
Space-saving English
“OK, we’ll have to write Seafood and Hotpot here in English too” “Oh shit! We’re run out of space!” “That’s okay. Just shorten it where you can. No one is going to read it anyway.”
Banjo and Buffalo
I took up the banjo partly to understand what it’s like to learn something new, better to sympathise with my students. Now more than ever I see the importance of practise. I have been practising →
Marching For Mother Tongue
Yesterday was July 1st, what was meant to be a good opportunity for Hong Kong people to worship at the altar of the mainland, thanking its kind government for rescuing us from the slimy claws →
American Odyssey
It’s a while ago now but I suddenly remembered I spent a month in the USA this summer, doing the Canto thing of course:
Public Security Uncle On The Road
Yes, that Public Security Uncle, he does get around a bit. Unfortunately an unfathomable tragedy happened: He lost his badge in a shrubbery incident just outside Santa Fe. Good thing he had his trusty deputy →
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