Sun nien fai lok

 

lei si dau loi



My fiance told me to say that to her aunt when we see her. I'm slowly learning Cantonese. It is getting a little easier. It helps when her and her mom really only talk to each other in Chinese. I can pick up a lot.

It freaks people out when we're in the store and people see some white guy saying stuff in Chinese. hehe.

This is the last year of getting the envelopes for us. We get married in September, so next year I have to carry them around with me.

 

One of the pastors at my church, he and his wife were missionaries in China for 7 years (yes, they're VERY white). . . it's epic when they're at the Lion Food (Chinese supermarket). . . between reading the food labels, talking to the store clerks, and freaking out gossiping old ladies. . . it was a great afternoon hanging out with them.

 

LOL! Not from me (shows empty pockets).

So cool you're learning Cantonese.

 

chinese store is closed today, sux

 

Oooo yeah. Didn't think about that.

 

Had a chinese dinner last night. Really good one.

 

yea, it is getting easier. The hardest part at first was trying to learn all the tones. I made myself little flashcards with a bunch of words and stuff like that. So for like...tone 4 I would write on the other side of the card...low level falling. And then I had a couple of words as examples. wu and naam.

And I would just sit here at work and go through them. The biggest thing though is that I don't want it to just come down to memorizing. I'm still at a point where they will ask me questions and I have to sit and think about the answer. I want to be able to just answer without thinking.

But I'm getting there. I've got numbers down. And I can carry on little conversations. Most of my talking is done at dinner...time to eat...tastes good...what kind of meat...etc.

 

The tones are SO hard. I'm useless anyway. The same word may be used over and over but with different tones making the meaning entirely different.

Not for you bcs but for others, think of using a one word statement, or question, or exclamation. So, "Help." or "Help?" or "Help!" use different inflections. But in Chinese those different inflections might be three different meanings. I'm sure bcs would agree too, that the tones are far more subtle than my examples.

It's beyond me. Hat off to you bcs.

 

Oh! By the way, in Mandarin this is "Li shi dou lai?" I took your lead and when my Chinese friend said, ""Xin nian hao" I knew she thought I'd say "Gong xi fa cai" but I said, "Li shi dou lai?"

She nearly crapped herself laughing.

Thanks for that... good one.