Bad Person 壞 人 As much as I enjoy speaking Cantonese, I sometimes run into difficulties. Last year, when I was in Hong Kong, I remember two small incidents. The first one happened while I was enjoying a tasty bowl of 雲 吞 麵 (wan4 tan1 min6) won ton noodles at 羅 富 記 (lo4 fu6 gei3) Law Fu Kee in 中 環 (jung1 waan4) Central. I wanted a paper napkin and asked the waitress: 唔 該 俾 條 紙 巾 我 (m4 goi1 bei2 tiu4 ji2 gan1 ngo5) Please give me a paper napkin. She replied back: 你 咪 有 條 磁 匙 囉? (lei5 mai5 yau5 tiu4 chi4 gang1 lo1) Don’t you already have a spoon? In Cantonese, paper napkin and spoon sound fairly close, and I guess that she misunderstood me. We both had a good laugh when I clarified that I meant paper napkin, not spoon. In my defense, it seems that paper napkins are not that common in HK restaurants. So she may not have been expecting me to ask for one.

The second incident happened when I was talking on the phone with Mr. C, a postcard dealer whose shop I wanted to visit. I had never met him but had bought some old HK postcards from him and exchanged some emails. Anyway, when I was talking Cantonese with Mr. C, he suddenly asked me: 你 係 唔 係 華 人? (lei5 hai6 m4 hai6 wa4 yan4) Are you Chinese? The problem was I had never heard the term 華 人 before. In the U.S., I had always heard 唐 人 (tong4 yan4) or 中 國 人 (jung1 gok3 yan4) used to refer to Chinese people. So I thought that Mr. C was asking me whether I was 壞 人 (waai6 yan4) a bad person, which didn’t make any sense. It wasn’t until I asked him to repeat the word that I realized he was paying me a compliment rather than dissing me.

Fortunately, I have been speaking Cantonese long enough that I seldom have a problem with people misunderstanding me. But there’s always room for improvement. Next year, when I go to HK to study Cantonese, my goal is to improve my pronunciation and vocabulary to the point where people never misunderstand me. In the meantime, at least I can laugh at myself about some of the funny incidents that I have run into.  ¶ 9:00 PM