Multi - 中文/粵語

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Multiturquoise
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Multi - 中文/粵語

Postby Multiturquoise » 2014-08-05, 12:33

This is my personal Chinese and Cantonese thread. I'll share my progress here, my Chinese is A2 and Cantonese is A0, and that's not good enough to communicate.

CHINESE
这是一条鱼。 This is a fish.
那是一套房子。 That is a house.
我在听音乐。 I'm listening to music.
凯蒂是在哪里? Where is Katie.
凯蒂在画一张图片。 Katie is drawing a picture.
您要喝水吗? Would you like to drink water?

CANTONESE
I'll study Cantonese soon...
Last edited by Multiturquoise on 2021-06-19, 17:35, edited 2 times in total.
native: (tr)
advanced: (en) (el)
intermediate: (fr) (ka)
focus: (de) (sl) (hr)

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Pangu
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Re: Caitlín - 中文/粵語

Postby Pangu » 2014-08-05, 15:19

Caitlín wrote:那是一套房子。 That is a house.

套 is used to refer to "suites". If you are referring to a house as a separate building, you would need to use 栋.

Caitlín wrote:凯蒂是在哪里? Where is Katie.

No need for the 是 here. "凯蒂在哪里?" is correct.

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Re: Elaine - 中文/粵語

Postby lingoman » 2017-05-19, 5:07

It's not correct to say "Chinese and Cantonese"...

Mandarin & Catnonese are two SPOKEN styles/dialects of Chinese language. As an official spoken “dialect”, Mandarin is widely used in Mainland China, Taiwan area and Singapore. Cantonese is specifically for Hong Kong and some overseas Chinese communities.

One of the most important questions that many new potential Chinese learners may ask themselves is: Should I learn Mandarin or Cantonese?

If your goal is to be widely understood, you should learn Mandarin because Mandarin can be understood even in Hong Kong, Macau and Canton (the main regions who still speak Cantonese), and more and more Cantonese speakers are learning Mandarin nowadays. If you really want to be able to connect with people from Hong Kong, Macau, and Canton, you can still consider learning Cantonese. But you should still know that Cantonese is often seen as more difficult. Its use of “tones” can be even more challenging to western speakers than Mandarin.

    It’s easier to find people to teach you Mandarin, including some of your Chinese friends who have learned “proper Mandarin”, and who may be able to teach you the language step-by-step;
    More Mandarin learning materials are available from all sorts of sources and at a variety of levels;
    With the current economic growth of China, it’s likely that Mandarin will be a key language of the future.`

So here comes the suggestion (from a Chinese Cantonese linguist): learn your Mandarin and reach to a certain level, before you decide to take up the Cantonese...

cherry000
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Re: Elaine - 中文/粵語

Postby cherry000 » 2021-03-10, 16:54

Hi, a native Cantonese speaker here. Let me provide you a little bit of translation here.

CHINESE
这是一条鱼。 This is a fish.
那是一套房子。 That is a house.
我在听音乐。 I'm listening to music.
凯蒂是在哪里? Where is Katie.
凯蒂在画一张图片。 Katie is drawing a picture.
您要喝水吗? Would you like to drink water?

Cantonese
呢條魚 this fish
嗰間房 that house
我聽緊音樂 im listening to music
Katie喺邊度? Where is Katie?
Katie喺度畫緊幅畫 Katie is drawing a picture.
你洗唔洗飲水? Would you like to drink water?

notes:
-quantifier expressions like 條 and 間 are compulsory for cantonese nouns so it is a bit weird to literally translate 'this' in 'this is a fish' into cantonese; native speakers will be confused what 'this' is referring to
-'緊' refers to a action that is currently in progress (almost like continuous tense in English)
-its very common for Cantonese speakers to code mix cantonese and English, so it will be totally ok to directly use Katie instead of its Chinese translated version
-'洗唔洗' is a more verbal way of saying '要唔要'
-when a noun is singular and indefinite like 'a picture', the numeral 'a/ one' '一' can be omitted (usually omitted in natural conversations)

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Re: Elaine - 中文/粵語

Postby vijayjohn » 2022-02-09, 3:15

cherry000 wrote:its very common for Cantonese speakers to code mix cantonese and English, so it will be totally ok to directly use Katie instead of its Chinese translated version

Isn't this acceptable in Mandarin, too? I'm pretty sure I've seen it being done very often in Mandarin as well.


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