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Chatting with Author
Listen to the interview with famous Lantau author Jane Huong who isn’t Vietnamese or Malaysian, but married to a Hong Kong guy who wanted to spell his surname (Hung) differently from the herd. And talking →
CantoNews Live from the Throbbing Metropolis of Mui Wo
Nick (a.k.a. Cassette) and I go to an Italian restaurant in the throbbing metropolis of Mui Wo, centre of the universe and make a programme about lots of interesting things – specifically the idiotic spelling →
Last Column
Yesterday I had an email from a … person, who said: “I sobbed vehemently when I saw your last Sunday Morning Post entry had come and gone.” Me too, mate, me too. Except I didn’t →
Happy Hong Kong Celebration of the Glorious Return to the Motherland Day Extravaganza!
July 1st! July 1st! That day in year zero for Hong Kong, 1997, it was rather wet. OK, it torrentially bucketed down for about three weeks before and after that momentous day. Coincidence? I think →
“Don’t Look at my Spleen!”
Here is an interview I did for Radio Lantau a couple of weeks ago, with Edward Bunker from Mui Wo. Every single person I told this to said the same: “Oh, he’s lovely!” Not a →
Books Books Books
Can you learn Cantonese from a book? I would say no, not least because of the crazy spelling that bear little or no resemblance to the sound of the words. Can you indeed learn any →
Beautiful Day On “Dark” Side
It’s so much fun to have friends visiting Hong Kong, especially when the day they arrive kicks off a week of unprecedented beautiful weather! I shouldn’t say unprecedented; the weather was probably like this every →
How Now, Guangdong Prov?
I’m just about to write my last column ever for South China Morning Post; ever! When I was told the page would be discontinued, I was so sad. How now would I be able to →
CantoNews 5 Live From Roof!
Hello everybody, welcome to my roof! I normally arrange Sichuan dinners and lunches there, but this time it doubled as a recording studio for the best Cantonese news currently available on cassette! (And telex.) Talking →
Running Interview Live from Garden Café
A couple of weeks ago I interviewed the beautiful and delightful Zein Williams, mother of three and tireless champion for the Nepali people about her life and work – with the earthquake victims especially – →
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New Canto Film!!!!!
It’s been a year but finally more Cantonese. If you want to be in a film, give us a shout! This one wasn’t as easy to make as normally, logistically. But with iMovie and some →
Good Old Aluminium Man
Yesterday we finished shooting In A Whorehouse – The Sequel, so soon there will be a brand new Canto extravaganza on YouTube. About time, some would say, as the last one, ‘Romeo and Juliet – →
New Podcast! (From Sober to Drunk in 10 Minutes)
Last weekend saw me in Guangzhou with the ridiculously handsome and delightful Kendall, a Guangzhou resident (above) to shoot my new Cantonese-worshipping movie ‘In a Whorehouse – The Sequel’. I will say no more about →
Ah-Mok Rides Again!
I suddenly realised it’s been over a year since my last real Canto-film, Episode 30, Christmas Extravaganza. I quickly decided to do something about it and you’ll be able to see the result on YouTube →
More Proddie Placie. I’ve Earned It.
Finally it’s here (maybe you didn’t even know that it was going to be here???) – the second installment of Cantonese – The Movie. This DVD, all two hours of it, is for people who →
A Little Proddie Placie
Wei wei, it’s finally happening: I’m launching my new book Don’t Joke On The Stairs on Blacksmith Books this week. I actually wrote most of it four years ago and had signed a contract with →
Day Trip To Tibet
Not far from Lanzhou, transport and travel hub of the north, is the small town of Xiahe, dominated by the large and imposing Labrang Monastery. Last time I went there the main drag (the only →
дима: Ты лучше всех!
I’ve just come back from another Russian lesson with the excellent Dimitri. People: You think Cantonese is difficult – try Russian. Every word, I mean noun, adjective, verb and adverb, has hundreds of different forms. →
When You Gotta Go, You Gotta Go
So! Yesterday was the last day in the studio followed by three pre-recorded programmes in the series Naked Cantonese on RTHK. And the last episode ever was, very appropriately, recorded in the same public toilet →
New Film: Learn Cantonese and Become a Babe-Magnet
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Wetlands Lament
Above: BEFORE. Halcyon days of yore, etc. A part of the interlinked Pui O wetlands in 2012. A lovely, lush vista scattered with grazing water buffalo,
egrets, starlings and other creatures, even fish have seen fit to elbow their way into the water grooves dug by the buffalo. Fast forward to 2015 and:
A rain shelter, a washing machine, metal fences everywhere (to keep what? Who? Out of a dense copse of trees) and of course lots and lots of concrete plus some house-like structures. NOT permanent, you understand. That would be against the law. Because this is, amazingly, all legal! Courtesy of the Environmental Protection Department.
Now, however, egged on by the dumping all around, some people have found it easier not to bother with the applications to dump. Why not? It will only be approved anyway. This is the result:
We must save the Pui O wetlands, unique in the world and certainly in Hong Kong. But how? Suggestions welcome.
白鷺 – Bak lou (egret)
水牛 – Seoi au (water buffalo)
環保署 – Wan bou jyu (environmental “protection” department)
Contact us today
Email info@learncantonese.com.hk
to find out how you can start learning Cantonese.