Date: Tue, 18 Nov 1997 10:19:18 +1300 (NZDT) From: Jonathan Chen <jonc@pinnacle.co.nz> To: "Jordan K. Hubbard" <jkh@time.cdrom.com> Cc: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: The Language Barrier [Was: Could FreeBSD be ...] Message-ID: <Pine.SGI.3.96.971118100757.5155B-100000@tui.pinnacle.co.nz> In-Reply-To: <3642.879762062@jkh.cdrom.com>
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On Mon, 17 Nov 1997, Jordan K. Hubbard wrote:
> > Maybe in 20 or 30 years the language we will all want to learn as a
> > second language will be Chinese.
>
> Do you mean Mandarin or Cantonese? :-) Mandarin seems to be the
> "official" dialect and the one you'll learn at Berlitz if you sign up
> for their language course, but everyone I seem to meet in California
> speaks Cantonese. In the martial arts, for example, all of our
> instruction is in Cantonese (not english) and though I'm steadily
> increasing my vocabulary in this dialect out of necessity, I wonder
> how practical a skill it's going to be in the future. Anyone know
> the current ratio of Mandarin/Cantonese speakers world-wide?
Aside from Mainland China, Taiwan and Singapore; I'd say that
Cantonese will get you by in most Chinese communities in the world.
What's
> the official language of Hong Kong, now that it's been handed back?
Officially, it's Mandarin; but almost everyone in Hong Kong speaks
Cantonese. It's unlikely to change, for one thing swearing in
Cantonese sounds like you really mean it, whereas swearing in Mandarin
just sounds a wee bit too cultured.
--
Jonathan Chen <jonc@pinnacle.co.nz> | "Vini, vidi, velcro...
| I came, I saw, I stuck around"
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