Have You Seen a Doctor?

It’s no secret that Hong Kong people are very enthusiastic about fraternising with people from the medical profession at any opportunity. Last night one of my students turned up to the glorious Canto session with →

Gagging To Go

Hi people! I’m going to take Adventure Trip off my new website as there wasn’t a big market for going into Guangdong province (weird) but the trips still go on, of course. There are so →

China Bound

This year is the first summer for ages I’m not going north and I don’t like it! I want to go to Xinjiang in August. Meanwhile if you’re going anywhere in China this year and →

Another Company Caves

So it’s the private companies that will be driving the communist hieroglyph takeover? Last week it was Hang Seng bank, now it’s HSBC itself. HSBC – isn’t that a British bank? A few years ago →

Creeping Simplification

Who is supposed to be the mainlander, who the HK guy in this photo, advertising a big fiscal cooperation between the two entities? Who knows. But they will make shitloads of money, with the help →

New Service!

Ah – so beautiful, so civilised. Doesn’t she look like an advert for a particularly expensive brand of tea? But guess what, she’s not. She’s just having her weekly dose of lovely Cantonese, right in →

Order On The Table, Order In The Head

I have some victims who have been at it (learning Cantonese) for a while, and have dozens if not hundreds of pages of course material. In loose sheets. When I suggest they try to put →

Rare Article Sympathises With Cantonese

First of all: Please buy my latest book and second: You’ll never guess where I ended up this week! HKTDC!!! Which I have no idea what stands for. Some magazine. The article is quite sympathetic →

New Book About China and Cantonese

Hoi hoi, students new and old Did you know that I have just published my second book, Don’t Joke on the Stairs, on Blacksmith Book publishing house. It is about how much fun and laughter, →

Shi Shi Shi Shi (Reasons To Learn Canto #220)

The above film is a true picture of what Hong Kong will be like if the Chinese government get its way in forcing all us lowly subjects to speak the holy language Mandarin, or Putonghua →

Deep-Felt Advice From The Arse

I’ve just come back from a rather brilliant yam cha at Holly Restaurant in 東涌 (“Tung” [Dung] Chung), followed by shopping for tomorrow’s Dinner For Spares. (Yes I’ve started a new scheme: Come as you are to Sichuan dinners at my house and meet new people instead of scrambling to get eight or more people together on the same day. The next one will be in the beginning of November.)

As usual all the people working in the restaurant and market in Tung Chung complimented me on my Cantonese, as if they had never met me before. (I see them every week.) Yes, I can say 早晨 (Jo san – morning) and buy spring onions at the same time. Still, a bit of fawning never goes amiss, and everything’s better than being ignored or kicked in the face.

But when I came home I fell off the cloud of Canto-induced euphoria quick smart. My student, let’s call him Flying Eagle, sent me a list of Cantonese expressions with “translations” (explanations) also in Cantonese characters. I hardly knew any of them!!! I mean, I could read the characters but didn’t know the expressions.
Must kill self. One I actually had heard before was: 鬼佬月餅 (gwai lou yuet beeng) which is a deep and intricate pun. Gwai lou yuet beeng, Damned Foreigner (English speaking) Moon Cake. “Moon Cake” in English but with that special Hong Kong pronunciation: Mun Kekk (悶極). Mun Kekk: Bored Extreme. So, ‘Gwailou Moon Cake’ means bored senseless!

Flying Eagle got the list from one of his guys in Cantonese language exchange and here comes my advice: As well as taking lessons from me, please consider joining for example Meetup for language exchange sessions. Two of my students do, and they’re improving faster than other victims. You’ll thank me for it later!

好悶 (Hou mun – bored)
蔥 (Jung – spring onions)
飛鷹 (Fei yeng – Flying Eagle)

Learn Cantonese Free! Wanted: Partner In Crime For Podcasts

Wei wei wei, do you remember Naked Cantonese on RTHK? I do. Oh, happy times with ah-Sa! The laughter, the tears! We travelled to public toilets and other wonderful places; one one weird occasion we even went to Shanghai and did Naked Mandarin. (It didn’t take.) The last poddie castie was four years ago, but people still contact me about it…

Since then I’ve done a few solo podcasts (you can listen to them on this page, I believe they are listed under podcasts), but it’s just not the same! I need a wingman, a sidekick, a black to my white and green to my yellow, a handkerchief to my snot, a friendly banter victim opponent pal kick-ass co-conspirator who isn’t afraid of adventure, laughter, tears, etc. And joy.

We’ll be broadcasting on a platform called Radio Lantau (coming into being within the next month) so it would be good if it was someone living on Lantau and especially someone who had a car so we could easily get around to public toilets, markets and restaurants. And beaches, villages, airports…

But this will be different from RTHK, of course! For one thing, we’ll have no constraints. On RTHK I wasn’t allowed to say ‘crap’, for example. I like saying crap and want to say it every day, and especially on the radio. So sign up, sign up for co-broadcasting! Learn Cantonese free and without really trying!

And while we’re at it, might as well make films too, covering the same material. Rollie uppie! Rollie uppie!

喂 (Wai,wei – hello, hi, hey!)
廁所 (chi soh – toilet)
香港電台 (Heung Gong din toi – RTHK)
大嶼山 (Daai Yu Saan – Lantau Island)

Going Native

Don’t Joke on the Stairs – The Movie

Special: Going Native and Cantonese – The Movie

Yam Cha