Being a Malaysian, I am very proud to say that I can speak 5 languages, or to be more accurate, 3 languages( Mandarin/putonghua, English, Malay) and 2 dialects(Cantonese and Hokkien). But in Hong Kong, people distinguish cantonese as “another language” other than mandarin/putonghua. So i guess its very fair for me to classify hokkien (dialect of Fujian Province, similar to Taiwanese), as another language as well, just to fulfil my ego as a multi-lingual speaker. (evil laugh)
BUT, the pride come with a price.
Being able to speak so many languages means that I cannot speak any of them as if I am a native speaker. Yes, I might be able to speak somehow better than those of non-native Putonghua/English/Cantonese speaker, I never speak putonghua as well as mainland chinese, cantonese as well as local Hong Kong, and English as well as Briton or American (with all the F words).
So, when I hang out with a bunch of HK locals, they will see me as non-HK and there is a small gap between us.
When i mix with the mainlands, they could identify the unfamiliar monotoneous putonghua between my sentences, and again a small gap.
And when I am chilling out with the International, guess what, my poor english sounds kinda nerdy, and again, kinda left out sometimes, and moreover, ALEX, u look too local…sorry….hahah..
I remember a Mexican exchange student says she cant remember me cause she cant distinguish me from the crowd……ARRRGGG
I should wear Batik and songkok from today…….[just kidding, didnt own any of them, anyway if you wonder how do batik and songkok look like, see here:
A malay boy with a songkok on his head.
Typical batik shirt, but this one doesn’t look like Malaysian.
Well, I must say we still manage to befriend with all of the different “gang”s in UST(Uni. of Science & Tech., in case you dont know). The small gap between us with them is minimal. And probably its only me who sense it, it might be no problem at all for all the other Malaysian, as ‘you know lah, my english is super malaysian one…’(a simple demonstration of how Malaysian english aka Manglish works).
[if you see any spelling mistake or grammatical error, they were meant to be there to add some Malaysian flavour into it, XP)
~Alex Yap Shaw Liang, Malaysia
(BEng, Industrial Engineering and Logistics Management, Year 1)
i think to be able to speak 5 languages reasonably well can have its advantages over being able to speak 1 or 2 languages fluently. your circle of potential friends is wider since you are able to communicate with more people theoretically. even though there’s a cultural gap between the people communicate with in one language, at the very least you are able to get to know such people and their culture. i can’t speak putonghua, so i definitely missed out on a lot when it comes to chinese culture.
Maybe you are right. But man, you are still lucky because you understand the complexities of many Chinese dialects. I am a Filipino working here in HK… just starting to appreciate the Cantonese tongue. I understand some words already and can utter a few phrases; but I still need to work on it. Lotsa work…
http://milkcashcow.wordpress.com
Eh, I know the following languages:
fluent:
-English
-Malay/Bahasa Indonesia
-Japanese
-Putonghua
conversational (can read/listen to)
-Hokkien
-Spanish
-French
My problem is that people immediately assume that I’m either a Local or a Mainlander. The mainlanders tend to be more on the ball and understand what I mean when I say that I’m from the USA. The locals however… well… they respond with “but you’re Chinese!” >_>
Somehow i missed the point. Probably lost in translation
Anyway … nice blog to visit.
cheers, Teepee!
hi teepee,
Do you know any student doing or have done mba in HKUST,i need some help.pls let me know if you know some one.
thnx
hi Guys,
Do you know any student doing or have done mba in HKUST,i need some help.pls let me know if you know some one.
thnx