Quick, before it goes away forever:

This is your last chance to see anything swine flu related for a long time. That sickness is well and truly gone in a big cloud of tiny rocks from inside the Etna something jökull. →

Word Order II: Pre, or rather post-positions

The woman is outside her house (or maybe somebody else’s house, but let’s just presume.) Straight forward, right? You know woman 女人 (leui yan), outside 出邊 (cheut bin) and house 屋企 （uk kei). But as usual, →

A Word on Word Order

It seems to be that one of the biggest problems in Canto, especially for native English speakers, is word order. But that’s what you should pay the most attention to in my opinion. Look at →

All Aboard the Harmonious Forgiven Train

Ahh! Back from another trip to my ancestral home, Guangdong province, cradle of Cantonese language and civilisation. The government must have been working overtime the last month, or since I was there last, to drum →

Oh Cradle of Cantonese – Where Did You Go?

Guangzhou has been my favourite big city in China for years, certainly after the government finished the destruction of Beijiing in the name of the sacred olympics. Two weeks ago I was there again, probably →

Swine Flu – Only Hong Kong Supports It

I’m going back to those scraggy crags today! Now you can come too. Just click on China Tours and you’re there!

Did you know that “Good Friday” is called “Jesus experiences difficulties festival” (耶穌受難節）（ye sou sao laan jit) in Chinese? I bet you didn’t. But now you know, and by going on an Easter trip with →

Come with! Come with!

Epiphany

Dear chaps. In our series “screams and muffled cries from the vault” we bring you another item from our archives. It explains why, when you speak to a HK person in Cantonese, he answers you →

One Step Forward, 1.3 Billion Steps Back

Here’s a missive from 2008, just after the sacred Beijing Olympics when I finally could get a visa to China again: Not that I smoke joints anymore but I do get disillusioned sometimes about my →