Anyone interested in Chinese?

Jamesw84 wrote:

If u ask me, Cantonese is an animal language used by people from HK because they think they are not Chinese.

I don't know that Cantonese is an animal language used only by the HK people - Canton is a province in mainland China. But I highly agree with you that HK people have seperated themselves from mainland China (which I may add merely because they had been the UK's colony through the most unfair, illegal and exploitive measures - the opium war[/i] and ever since the handover, have rejected their being handed over back to China some say annexed Rolling Eyes

for no apparent reason than on the basis of biased views.

I'm not playing favourites here, I am a HK person myself who has accepted history and the handover and that the ruling government is now the People's Republic of China.

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pragmatic wrote:

Jamesw84 wrote:
If u ask me, Cantonese is an animal language used by people from HK because they think they are not Chinese.

I don't know that Cantonese is an animal language used only by the HK people - Canton is a province in mainland China. But I highly agree with you that HK people have seperated themselves from mainland China (which I may add merely because they had been the UK's colony through the most unfair, illegal and exploitive measures - the opium war[/i] and ever since the handover, have rejected their being handed over back to China some say annexed for no apparent reason than on the basis of biased views.

I'm not playing favourites here, I am a HK person myself who has accepted history and the handover and that the ruling government is now the People's Republic of China.

The use of ANEX should be with reference to the Brits who took over HK and ruled it for 2 centuries without PERMISSION. Handing HK back to China does not count as being "annexed back" to those who know about the exact nature of history behind the invasion of HK Cool

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Jamesw84 wrote:

If u ask me, Cantonese is an animal language used by people from HK because they think they are not Chinese.

Hmmmm... interesting... I'm not sure how it got to this point since I haven't been here in awhile... agreed... from a different p.o.v though I see Cantonese as an obnoxious and annoying language (even though I speak it)... I know that's harsh... it's my biased p.o.v only though... not saying in general...

Jamesw84 wrote:

The use of ANEX should be with reference to the Brits who took over HK and ruled it for 2 centuries without PERMISSION. Handing HK back to China does not count as being "annexed back" to those who know about the exact nature of history behind the invasion of HK

Agreed about ANEX... at the same time I can only guess all the Brits did were fulfill their contract for the 99 year span... it was probably for the better because Hong Kong doesn't want to be a part of China anyways....

If someone can sum up the "true" reason to Brit's invasion of HK and the history behind it that will be nice... I would guess that Brits invaded HK because I thought they needed land... I know I'm probably wrong...

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Jamesw84 wrote:

The use of ANEX should be with reference to the Brits who took over HK and ruled it for 2 centuries without PERMISSION. Handing HK back to China does not count as being "annexed back" to those who know about the exact nature of history behind the invasion of HK

You're the first person who agrees with me! Very Happy

All my peers whom I have talked to just laugh it off and say who would want to belong to old China anyway! Then again I am in Australia - these are some westerners who are very very biased towards China whom they see as the old enemy - THE COMMUNISTS. Rolling Eyes

I was so angry when I saw the word anexed being used in a school lecture book (this was for a law unit too!!) and I asked the lecturers to delete it because it gave people the wrong idea - but I don't know if they took my advice or not.

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AbleIIKnow_wong wrote:

Agreed about ANEX... at the same time I can only guess all the Brits did were fulfill their contract for the 99 year span... it was probably for the better because Hong Kong doesn't want to be a part of China anyways....

That's not the point of whether HK wants or doesn't want to be part of China - they were mainland China's territory and governed by the government of China until a powerful western third party came along - the method was illegal and personally I think it forms no basis for HK's wish to be a SAR. But fact is fact and HK is now SAR - what can we do? If the Chinese gov try to integrate them more into Chinese internal affairs, they will start screaming that the Gov is acting against human freedom again - what do I need to say it for, just look at what Martin Lee, Emily Lou are all screaming in HK. Rolling Eyes

AbleIIKnow_wong wrote:

If someone can sum up the "true" reason to Brit's invasion of HK and the history behind it that will be nice... I would guess that Brits invaded HK because I thought they needed land... I know I'm probably wrong...

There was no invasion of HK - it was the exploitation of China by the British using opium additions and eventually to counter these imports the Chinese burnt the opium resulting in UK asking for compensation and HK was the compensation. As I understand it however, Deng Xiaoping eventually agreed with Margret Thatcher the current agreement - 99 years and HK would revert back to China - apparently she was so upset after this meeting with Deng that she tripped on some stairs shortly after the meeting. If it wasn't for Deng, HK would still be Chris Patterson their Governor, how horrible. Evil or Very Mad

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AbleIIKnow_wong wrote:

Jamesw84 wrote:
If u ask me, Cantonese is an animal language used by people from HK because they think they are not Chinese.

Hmmmm... interesting... I'm not sure how it got to this point since I haven't been here in awhile... agreed... from a different p.o.v though I see Cantonese as an obnoxious and annoying language (even though I speak it)... I know that's harsh... it's my biased p.o.v only though... not saying in general...

Jamesw84 wrote:

The use of ANEX should be with reference to the Brits who took over HK and ruled it for 2 centuries without PERMISSION. Handing HK back to China does not count as being "annexed back" to those who know about the exact nature of history behind the invasion of HK

Agreed about ANEX... at the same time I can only guess all the Brits did were fulfill their contract for the 99 year span... it was probably for the better because Hong Kong doesn't want to be a part of China anyways....

If someone can sum up the "true" reason to Brit's invasion of HK and the history behind it that will be nice... I would guess that Brits invaded HK because I thought they needed land... I know I'm probably wrong...

This is so haliarious because the HK people were originally Chinese, then China gets invaded and HK gets stolen, then its people decide they want to be with the enemy and decide its best that they "dont want to be a part of their own kind anyways..."

See the logic there?

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If someone can sum up the "true" reason to Brit's invasion of HK and the history behind it that will be nice... I would guess that Brits invaded HK because I thought they needed land... I know I'm probably wrong...[/quote]

The only reason why the Brits annexed HK was because they were selling opium all over China and wouldnt stop doing it unless China agreed to give them something of a more permanent nature, like a free piece of land. They wouldnt have stopped invading the mainland unless China agreed to their ludicrous demands. At the time, mind u, the Brits and their allies had invented rifles ahead of their time and so China had no chance of winning a war against them. If you look at the turnaround at this time of history, China would flatten the Brits in less than 1 week if they wanted to without the use of unclear weapons.

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Westerners always like to put China down for its bad "human rights" record but they dont think about why China is in the way it is. If China wasnt exploited by these Caucasians so much in the past as if Communism would have become the dominant power.

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Jamesw84, I was wondering whether you would be interested in some of these other threads around A2K also regarding China?

China and Taiwan

War with China?

Chinese Censorship

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Ok, but remember HK was swamps and mountains before the brits turned up. There was nothing there. The 'Devils Flux' kept the chinese away. It wasnt like Britain actually stole a city or anything. And bear in mind also that China not only gained HK from it, but also Shenzhen (which was built up to leach off of HK.

That said the English didnt exactly coat themselves in glory (the sack of beijing *ahem*), or in their treatment of China generally. But then again it was the British that supported Mao against the Americans and Jiang jieshi.

Strange how these things go round in circles. Im just waiting for the Isle of White to be annexed now Wink

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wandeljw wrote:

George wrote:
From which dialect are these phonetic renderings?

I've heard some of these phrases in Cantonese and they sound different.

My wife speaks Mandarin. Mandarin has only 4 tones and Cantonese has 7.

Westerners have difficulty learning the tones used in Chinese language. (However, even English has 2 tones: declarative and interrogative.)

Mandarin requires the rolling of the tounge which makes it extremely difficult for Westerners to learn to pronounce the Chinese language. However it is also reciprocal for Chinese students, who cant pronounce the English language properly.

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Michael_S wrote:

HI George,
Cantonese is quite different to Mandarin which is the official language of China. They did have a vote many years ago on which dialect would be the offical language, and Canonese narrowly lost to Mandarin, but there are many more.

Even with Mandarin alone there is more than one way to Romanize the language, with Pinying and the Wade Romanization being the most popular. It is also possible to study Chinese using a phonetic system called Bo Po Mo Fo which is quite easy to learn BoPoMoFo

IT "narrowly lost" because the HK people decided to cast in multiple votes, and the HK people living offshore got the westerners to vote for their language too, its a pity such efforts are still futile Smile

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pragmatic wrote:

Hey - here is a question! Why is the chinese saying of mobile phone da ge da - big brother big???

UM, that would be the HK people who made it up, which doesnt make sense at all

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pragmatic wrote:

AbleIIKnow_wong wrote:
I'm a CBC so it has it's disadvantages since I'm not fluent in Cantonese.

What does CBC mean?

canadian born chinese

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have I ended this topic off permanently or are people gonna reply?

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Jamesw84 wrote:

pragmatic wrote:
Hey - here is a question! Why is the chinese saying of mobile phone da ge da - big brother big???

UM, that would be the HK people who made it up, which doesnt make sense at all

I wasn't going to reply until the 14th Nov when my exams finished - but what the hey.

I know HK slang doesn't make sense - that's why I don't learn it, except my dad says that is a huge disadvantage because I won't understand what HK people say. frankly - who cares? I don't want to learn slang. If I'm going to learn I might as well spend my time learning the formal thing - Mainland mandarin and the simplified version too.

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pragmatic wrote:

Jamesw84 wrote:
pragmatic wrote:
Hey - here is a question! Why is the chinese saying of mobile phone da ge da - big brother big???

UM, that would be the HK people who made it up, which doesnt make sense at all

I wasn't going to reply until the 14th Nov when my exams finished - but what the hey.

I know HK slang doesn't make sense - that's why I don't learn it, except my dad says that is a huge disadvantage because I won't understand what HK people say. frankly - who cares? I don't want to learn slang. If I'm going to learn I might as well spend my time learning the formal thing - Mainland mandarin and the simplified version too.

Actually, Cantonese is more traditional than mandarin, since mandarin has been simplified.

I speak both, and i think that's cool :wink:

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limee wrote:

pragmatic wrote:
Jamesw84 wrote:
pragmatic wrote:
Hey - here is a question! Why is the chinese saying of mobile phone da ge da - big brother big???

UM, that would be the HK people who made it up, which doesnt make sense at all

I wasn't going to reply until the 14th Nov when my exams finished - but what the hey.

I know HK slang doesn't make sense - that's why I don't learn it, except my dad says that is a huge disadvantage because I won't understand what HK people say. frankly - who cares? I don't want to learn slang. If I'm going to learn I might as well spend my time learning the formal thing - Mainland mandarin and the simplified version too.

Actually, Cantonese is more traditional than mandarin, since mandarin has been simplified.

I speak both, and i think that's cool :wink:

Agreed they're both cool.... sometimes Cantonese can sound barbaric though.... My shout out to Pragmatic, how's it going? I can't PM yet so not sure what else to resort too....

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I speak Mandarin, but I am really fond of songs in Cantonese. Actually Cantonese songs are quite popular in the mainland. Smile

Hey, Wong, what do you mean by "PM"?

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Hello all,

I am not chinese (as my name attests) but am interested in learning Mandarin. What do you think will be the most challenging aspect of learning mandarin?

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Anyone interested in Chinese?

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