Now that the China boy (haha, his new name!) is talking nineteen to the dozen, we have been enjoying a lot of laughs from what he says. Besides being incredibly innocent and downright accurate, his language patterns are hilarious because they are a mix of English, Hokkien (known as minnanhua) and Mandarin Chinese!
Back home, my [...]

Ni hao! Yes, we’re hoping to join one-fifth of the global population who can speak chongwen or hanyu. Since we’re living in China now, it seems a good opportunity to learn Chinese, right? Moreoever, I found a Chinese teacher living nearby!
We’ve only started two classes because we’ve been cancelling either because someone fell sick or [...]

While shopping for clothes, the first thing I asked was, “You kou ma?” (Any discounts?)
Chinese: Kou? Kou shen me? (Reduce? Reduce what? Looks at me like I’m the Moron from Malaysia, which I am obviously)
Me: Err…jian jia? (Cut price?)
Chinese: mutter…mutter…you da jer. Da liu jer. (Translation: Sale on. You pay 60% of price.)
That’s my introduction [...]

I know that most foreign languages e.g. Spanish and German have their own alphabets but Chinese? No, I’m not talking about the Chinese ABC but the way the mailand Chinese prononce the English ABC.
I was horror-stricken at my first shopping expedition when a salesgirl and I struggled with each other as I enquired about [...]