Fender Bender
First, I'm okay. Last night was an interesting night though. After my Cantonese class, I got dinner and then got on the bus headed home. While on the bus I was listening to a book on my MP3 player (I listen to a lot of audio books!) and watching a little girl play rock, paper, scissors with her mom when all of a sudden we were flying forward. I used all of my strength to keep from falling on the young girl sitting in front of me. It was hard to tell what happened except that the bus driver had slammed on the brakes. The girl in the middle seat at the back went flying forward and thankfully she wasn't hurt. After sitting for about five minutes or so, people started to get off the bus. The lady beside me told me that another bus was coming so we all piled off to wait on the side of the road for the next bus. Once out, I realized that we had hit a mini-van in front of us. It wasn't that bad. The mini-van had a small dent in the back and the windshield of the bus was cracked but it hadn't fallen out (evidently safety glass). I sat on the side of the road for about 45 minutes though. The bus driver was stopping each 681 bus as it went by for people to pile onto. I didn't get on until the third bus. While siting there I realized how much Cantonese I wish I knew or at least could remember without looking at my notes. I mostly wanted to be able to ask "What is happening?" and "Where are we?" I was pretty sure that I was still on HK Island but I hadn't been paying attention so I wasn't sure. Many people left and walked somewhere to get alternate transportation but I didn't know where I was or where to go to find alternate transportation. So I stayed where I was.
Once I got on the bus (the third one), I met a Canadian lady and her husband. We had a wonderful talk as we were crammed in like sardines on the bus. I enjoyed talking with them and even though I didn't make it home until 9:30 I wasn't frustrated. I was very thankful that I didn't get hurt or that anyone got hurt. It was just a much longer night than I anticipated. I did try to take a picture of the bus but it didn't come out well and I felt like I was being rude for taking the pictures so I didn't get a good picture. They are all blurry.
Since I didn't plan on being in a wreck, I had already prepared this post to put up after class on Sunday. So here is my post about my Cantonese classes.
I have loved my Cantonese classes this fall! I was definitely to a point where I wanted to learn Cantonese and not that I thought I should learn. My teacher is great. We are to a point where we don't just learn vocabulary and short sentences but we are learning how to put together our own sentences and questions. Basically we are learning the grammar part. It can be confusing but not as hard as the tones are. William, my teacher, has been saying four words in Cantonese during the last two classes to see if we can tell them apart. They are "tong" with the tone going down, "tong" with the tone going up, "dong" with the tone going up and "tung". Ah so hard! I can't get it right about half of the time. Which means I'm not going to be good at hearing other people that are saying it quickly and without the exaggerated tones.
One thing that I really like is that we have listening quizzes each week. Although they are really hard it is very practical. William says about five sentences in Cantonese and we have to translate them. I'm getting a lot better than I used to be and can now usually get 3 sentences correct but at the beginning I could only get about 1 or zero correct. Last week, I was able to get all 5 correct and I only had to look up about 4 words total! I was very excited. One sentence that I translated without looking anything up was "Yesterday I ate chocolate ice cream. Today I ate mango pudding. Tomorrow I will drink chicken soup." It is nice to know that I am learning that much Cantonese.
William also shares information about the culture and the Chinese people. Here are some of my favorite quotes from William. "Chinese people are like cavemen," when referring to Chinese using characters. "We will eat anything, especially anything with a backbone" when talking about food such as snakes, rats, and dogs that the Chinese people eat. That class he also told us that basically all Chinese food has some kind of meat in it. They even put dead rats or snakes into wine barrels. Needless to say I didn't leave that class wanting to eat any Chinese food for a while. He also shared that when you go to eat with someone from mainland China they will order too much food for you to eat. If you have too much to eat that means to the Chinese that they are good hosts. They just toss the leftovers. This isn't true with Hong Kong people though. They are much more careful not to be wasteful. When giving gifts you shouldn't give a Chinese person a clock because they will think you are cursing them to die. The word clock is similar to the word that means going to a funeral. Also, you shouldn't give a green hat to Chinese man because it means his wife is running away with another man. This past week William told us that the Chinese think the name Robert is a stupid name. They have saying that makes says that Robert is a stupid guy and the use it to express when something has done something stupid. This also applies to the name Bobby. I really enjoy finding out these small tidbits that you normally wouldn't learn about Chinese people.
I'm really sad that my classes end in a few short weeks. I'll actually miss the last class because I will be on my plane home! Although I wouldn't postpone going home, I would like to be at the class. However, I am considering taking the intermediate course this winter/spring because I like the challenge and the activity to do that is not school related. I am no where close to mastering the information in the beginner's class but I want to learn more and master later if I want to. It's not like I'm going to be in a Cantonese speaking environment much longer. It is more for fun than need.
My favorite word in Cantonese is jue koo lick. I like the sound of it but it means chocolate which makes it a must know word in my vocabulary :)
Here are a few notes from class. They are really busy. Also below is a picture from when we went to yum chau a couple of weeks ago. If you click on the picture, it will allow you to open a version that is larger if you want to see it closer.
Once I got on the bus (the third one), I met a Canadian lady and her husband. We had a wonderful talk as we were crammed in like sardines on the bus. I enjoyed talking with them and even though I didn't make it home until 9:30 I wasn't frustrated. I was very thankful that I didn't get hurt or that anyone got hurt. It was just a much longer night than I anticipated. I did try to take a picture of the bus but it didn't come out well and I felt like I was being rude for taking the pictures so I didn't get a good picture. They are all blurry.
Since I didn't plan on being in a wreck, I had already prepared this post to put up after class on Sunday. So here is my post about my Cantonese classes.
I have loved my Cantonese classes this fall! I was definitely to a point where I wanted to learn Cantonese and not that I thought I should learn. My teacher is great. We are to a point where we don't just learn vocabulary and short sentences but we are learning how to put together our own sentences and questions. Basically we are learning the grammar part. It can be confusing but not as hard as the tones are. William, my teacher, has been saying four words in Cantonese during the last two classes to see if we can tell them apart. They are "tong" with the tone going down, "tong" with the tone going up, "dong" with the tone going up and "tung". Ah so hard! I can't get it right about half of the time. Which means I'm not going to be good at hearing other people that are saying it quickly and without the exaggerated tones.
One thing that I really like is that we have listening quizzes each week. Although they are really hard it is very practical. William says about five sentences in Cantonese and we have to translate them. I'm getting a lot better than I used to be and can now usually get 3 sentences correct but at the beginning I could only get about 1 or zero correct. Last week, I was able to get all 5 correct and I only had to look up about 4 words total! I was very excited. One sentence that I translated without looking anything up was "Yesterday I ate chocolate ice cream. Today I ate mango pudding. Tomorrow I will drink chicken soup." It is nice to know that I am learning that much Cantonese.
William also shares information about the culture and the Chinese people. Here are some of my favorite quotes from William. "Chinese people are like cavemen," when referring to Chinese using characters. "We will eat anything, especially anything with a backbone" when talking about food such as snakes, rats, and dogs that the Chinese people eat. That class he also told us that basically all Chinese food has some kind of meat in it. They even put dead rats or snakes into wine barrels. Needless to say I didn't leave that class wanting to eat any Chinese food for a while. He also shared that when you go to eat with someone from mainland China they will order too much food for you to eat. If you have too much to eat that means to the Chinese that they are good hosts. They just toss the leftovers. This isn't true with Hong Kong people though. They are much more careful not to be wasteful. When giving gifts you shouldn't give a Chinese person a clock because they will think you are cursing them to die. The word clock is similar to the word that means going to a funeral. Also, you shouldn't give a green hat to Chinese man because it means his wife is running away with another man. This past week William told us that the Chinese think the name Robert is a stupid name. They have saying that makes says that Robert is a stupid guy and the use it to express when something has done something stupid. This also applies to the name Bobby. I really enjoy finding out these small tidbits that you normally wouldn't learn about Chinese people.
I'm really sad that my classes end in a few short weeks. I'll actually miss the last class because I will be on my plane home! Although I wouldn't postpone going home, I would like to be at the class. However, I am considering taking the intermediate course this winter/spring because I like the challenge and the activity to do that is not school related. I am no where close to mastering the information in the beginner's class but I want to learn more and master later if I want to. It's not like I'm going to be in a Cantonese speaking environment much longer. It is more for fun than need.
My favorite word in Cantonese is jue koo lick. I like the sound of it but it means chocolate which makes it a must know word in my vocabulary :)
Here are a few notes from class. They are really busy. Also below is a picture from when we went to yum chau a couple of weeks ago. If you click on the picture, it will allow you to open a version that is larger if you want to see it closer.
posted by Caroline at
8:55 PM
1 Comments:
Caroline, your mom told me about the wreck - I'm so glad no one was hurt and it was just another "adventure"! The Cantonese class sounds really hard but what an interesting way to learn about the culture. I agree that the word for "chocolate" is a MUST KNOW word in any language!
Love, Joy
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Anonymous, at 10:48 PM
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