People (and yes, that means you) tell me that I write funny things. I was never really sure what that meant, but anyway. To give you a flavour of what they say and to establish my credentials I guess – here’s one of the comments on my blog from That Weird Brown Girl (thatweirdbrowngirl.wordpress.com): “You are funny! Not in the ‘he-gets-me-laughing’ kinda way, more like ‘he-gets-me-laughing-but-also-gets-me-thinking’ way.” So this, and the other 104 comment like it, got me wondering – what is humour all about?
Here’s what humour is all about:
- Secks. I read somewhere that some sounds are funny and some are not. For example, this is funny: ‘Killer queen guns gang and gets ging-gang-gooly going again.’ It seems that it is all about the guttural noises that the g and the k make in words. If you do find that sentence to be funny then please leave a comment – I can refer you to a very good shrink – and their rates are quite reasonable, considering. Yeah, considering how much commission I get paid for each referral. Oh, sorry – I forgot to explain the ‘secks’. Well, it’s the title for this section because it has a k in it, which automatically makes it funny. If you could see me now, staring at the screen, trying to think of something remotely funny about secks. Hmm. All I’m coming up with is condoms with little smiley faces drawn on the end in permanent marker. And you’re probably thinking ‘What! Are you trying to make her ovaries laugh?’ and I’m like, ‘No – it’d be waaay too dark in there for those ovaries to see anything’ and then ‘if you really want to make ovaries laugh you’d be better to make the condom say “boo” every time it reached the top of its, erm, arc – you know, like those birthday cards that play a song when you open them, except that this would be just “boo!”, you know?’ (And it was at this point that I realised that I could record this blog on Soundcloud so that you don’t have to read it all. You probably saw the link at the top.) Hmm – I wonder if it wouldn’t be easier to just fit a torch on the end of the condom. I mean – talking condoms – that’s not going to work, is it? Not really. Maybe I should do some market research. I could stand on a street corner, stop women and ask them ‘would you be more or less likely to buy a condom if it could talk to you?’ I wonder how long it would be before I got arrested.
- Threesomes. See if you can work out why the following is (supposed to be) funny: I watched a movie on my own last night and there were three things that I particularly liked about it. The first thing was that it had a lovely, mellow soundtrack – you know, like the kind of stuff you can not-listen-to while you’re reading because it doesn’t grab your attention with all those annoyingly addictive hooks and catchy lyrics that burrow into your ears like worms and then sing to you all day long no matter what you do. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about – earworms! Anyway, the second thing I liked about the movie was that it didn’t need me to actually think. I mean, there’s nothing worse than coming home from a hard day at the office and then having to work out the deep philosophical implications of humanity’s origins and why HAL really went bonkers. Are you with me? And the third great thing about this movie was that it didn’t complain when I fell asleep half way through. Did you get what was funny about that? Yes – correct – it was the third item in the list that was so out of joint with the other two that it prompted you to laugh out loud with delight and merriment – yay for you!
- Comparisons. I know, I know – to say this article is about comedy is stretching the vest a little (and you know it would have fitted fine if you hadn’t eaten those last three cream buns! Just because something is going to go off if you don’t eat it, does not make you into a garbage truck!). In fact, this article is about as funny as a call at three am telling you that you have won a year’s subscription to sleeping tablets. See – rubbish! Comparing as a route to humour is like trying to find metaphors that just happen to be funny. For example – select any subject – let’s say ‘writing an article’, then pick something you want to say about the subject – let’s choose ‘is easy’. Then finally, brainstorm a list of things that are really easy, and just decide on the funniest. Examples might be: ending a sentence with a full stop, or keeping cool in Alaska, or losing your sense of humour whilst trying to figure out what humour means. Then – bring it all together and you’ll have them laughing in the aisles (whatever that means!)
- Clichés. I think that this may well be the kind of sense of humour that I attempt. It involves starting off a sentence with something familiar and well-known, then ending it with something spaceship. As you just noticed – it doesn’t always work. The last part of the sentence still has to kind of fit in with the rest, in the same way that ‘spaceship’ did not. The final part has to be some kind of subtle twist on the expected ending, not something totally unrelated. Here’s an example. Hold on – I’m just trying to think of one as I type this sentence, but I won’t be able to because my multi-tasking only extends as far a breathing and eating at the same time, and even then I get mixed up sometimes and breathe in a lump of mashed potato resulting in a coughing fit of epic proportions. And judging by the amount of wind that comes out of my body, sometimes from both ends simultaneously, I can’t even stop myself from eating air! And after all of that, I still haven’t thought up a good example. In fact, I can’t actually remember what I’m supposed to be finding an example of. So I’ll stop and re-read. Hang on there a sec. Ah yes – re-routing clichés. Here’s one: That vegetarian magician I saw on TV last night (yeah, before the movie) was so good that he pulled a rabbit out of a cat! Yeah, okay, enough said.
- Anecdotes. This is all about telling funny little stories. They can either be real ones, or made-up ones – so long as they are a little bit funny. Oh, and they need to be kind of short too, otherwise they end up becoming shaggy dog stories, and that’s a whole different kettle of dog-biscuits. This is actually the other type of humour that I seem to use a lot. I make up stuff. I can think of at least 2 examples from the above – the stuff about talking condoms just about makes the cut, and the story about the movie I watched last night just about qualifies too. You want me to make up another one to illustrate further? No? Okay. Oh – I just noticed – this post clocks in at 1,163 words so far – wow! I have ridden your patience just about as far as it will take me, so let’s proceed to the closing statement and cheery farewell.
So there you have it – a detailed breakdown of how to make words funny.
I read somewhere that a lot of comedians are actually quite depressed in ‘real life’ and that they just put on a funny persona when they hit the stage. I used to think that they were depressed first and that they wrote and performed jokes just to try to cheer themselves up. I now know that this is not the case – it’s actually the other way around. It’s the process of writing jokes that makes a normally cheerful guy (or gal) into a miserable depressive.
I don’t really know why learning about how humour works is so drear-making, but I guess it has something to do with having a joke explained to you. It’s funny if you get the joke the first time around, but if someone has to spell it out for you, then that seems to suck all the humour right out of it.
Having said that – I’m all good. Life is funny enough on its own, without having to recourse to made-up humour. Plus – I learned loads by doing this, and I hope you did too.
You are very entertaining. I don’t know how you managed to hypnotize me into reading all this when I have a deadline to meet… j/k 😉 gotta submit my papers this weekend. Ugh! School is a killer! 😦
Anyway, I have yet to find a link to your vlog… I bet it’s entertaining x 100 😉
Kidding aside, I really enjoyed your post. You really have a knack for this.
Have a Fab day!
❤ BP
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Thanks, Beautiful!
Now, you see – I don’t know whether you are a girl or a woman, an Indian or a French national. But that don’t matter none at the end of the day. You are my friend – and all is right with the world. 🙂
Yeah – not got around to the vlog yet.
Sorry to drag you away from your studies – if only I wasn’t so interesting. 😉
Have yourself a beautiful day too.
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I was wondering what made you think that I may be Indian then I thought the “namaste”.
Rob, how can I be a girl with an 18 y/o daughter? You forgot Queen Mary… I forgive you… too many fans, huh.
But I guess, I’m still a young girl at heart. So naive. (someone said that about me).
Anyways, the butterfly flag RWB, as I explained to my friend, Imani tm, stands for American + with Cuban culture and + French heart — I left my heart in Paris last year. 😉
What’s the hold up on the vlog? Don’t tell me you’re camera shy coz nobody in this room will believe you one bit… haha I’m so looking forward to that.
Don’t apologize. I needed a break and you needn’t be humble…lol
I should say, you have quite an interesting group of friends here, too. I enjoy reading their witty remarks.
❤ BP
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Ah – now I’m getting a picture of you, Beautiful (you don’t mind if I call you that do you?)
That vlog is actually going to be just a sound recording. I’m growing a beard and it is still too nascent for me to be showing it to the world. And yeah, actually more introvert than shy. I love people, but only in small doses. I can stand up and sing in front of an audience and so I can’t be much less than a show off – I guess.
Thanks for all the information and for being an integral part of the interesting group of friends I have.
Kindness – Robert.
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well, Robert, you did it again!! you explained humor in a humorous way!! Didn’t know I was at the end until the end hit… really hypnotized …
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Wow! You are a very nice person, Chitra – so sweet of you to say this. 🙂
Kindness – Robert.
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🙂 its the truth…
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Thankee kindly ma’am. (tips hat)
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🙂
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You really got me laughing but in a thinking kind of way. Wait, what?
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What what?! W’happen?
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Just being silly. Apparently I’m not as funny as I think 🙂
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Sometimes, only sometimes, I’m a little behind the door. 😦
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Is that like being a little slow on the uptake?
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Yup.
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Well, I doubt that! 🙂
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I still don’t know what you meant by ‘what’ and I’d be purely delighted if you could explain? 😉
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Well, it’s sort of I said I was with you at the beginning, that you were humorous in a teaching way, then I stopped paying attention cause it was so many words and Im easily distracted and I said wait, what? I remember the condom examples, tho 😉
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Ah! Well when you put it like that – that’s really funny and I appreciate your beautiful sense of humour and amazing skills for putting your point of view and personality over. 🙂
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Sometimes I get a little carried away with my sense of humor — I rarely intend to further anyone’s feelings. And if I did, I’d like to be really subtle so they wouldn’t see it coming 🙂 shouldn’t you be writing, BTW?
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But I am writing. I am writing this reply to you. But yes – there is a project that I need to do more work on – you’re right, Dee.
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I don’t mean to brag😊but I usually am…
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Hahaha – you’re right about that too! 🙂
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I find it thoroughly enjoyable when people write like they’d talk. It gets a little long, a little rambling, back tracking and losing track of subject matter. This, for me, is so fun to read. Not to mention the fact that you really are funny and silly and clever.
Spaceship made me laugh out loud. 😄
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Yay! At least I got one laugh out of my admiring audience! That’s very kind of you to give me feedback, Victoria. I was worried that it was so long that people would not have been able to read it. Do you think I should attempt to record it to make it easier on people?
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Well, I think you should record it because I want to hear your voice. 😀
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What is it about this fascination with the English accent? Can we just say that I sound like Hugh Grant and be done with it? 😉
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No we can not. You asked! You can hear my voice on soundcloud. Give me a sec and I’ll link the latest poem I read.
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Ah – that sounds interesting! Send, send!!
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https://victoryintrouble.wordpress.com/2016/07/06/wet-poem/
It’s, um, not safe for work.
Now it’s your turn! 😉
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Okay – thanks for the heads-up (so to speak) switching to smartphone.
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Hm. Cathing up on reading again, not all your posts are funny 😉
God, don’t believe in, if someone made me chose a God, I would go for Buddha.
The only thing you can trust for me is nature, the sun will rise, even you can’t see that golden globe.
Music, a matter of taste and keep your hands of my favorite oldies and newbies 😛
I like a good laugh, so I keep coming back to your blog 🙂
Have a great weekend Robert,
XxX
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Ah, Patty – you are a wonderful woman. You arrive on my blog, read the longest post you can find, comment like you have more that enough time in the world to spend with me here and then you are off like a fairy with a mission.
I love what you say about your preference of Buddha over God. You’re in good company there – even Buddha did not believe in God. 🙂
Okay, okay – I’ll keep my hands off you oldies and newbies – we are all entitled to our own taste in music.
Thanks for keeping coming back – I enjoy our little chats.
What do you have planned for the weekend? 🙂
Kindness – Robert.
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I read more posts dear neighbor, just didn’t ‘liked’ them all 😉
Making time to keep exchanging thoughts its important and I like our little chats too 🙂
We are starting to re-build our kitchen and the weather is going to be sunnier again, so I will also be outside attending the garden.
We have 2 weeks left from our annual 3 weeks vacation, hopefully the last week the kitchen is ready and we can drive to the coast and enjoy the waves and see with our dogs.
And you, a relaxing weekend or big plans?
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I have no big plans at all other than to enjoy myself in whatever ways I can. I may write, walk, read, eat – that sort of thing. I may even go out for pizza soon and then catch a movie. Everything is going to be good. 🙂
Good luck on the kitchen rebuilding – I really hope you make it to the coast. Will it be the south coast. Maybe a little warmer down there – yes? 🙂
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Always nice to have a relaxing weekend ahead. 🙂
Thank you for the good luck wishes;we need it, since we are still dealing with moist issues and have dry-machines running all day long…the noise is almost killing me 😦
The coast will be at the south of the Netherlands and it’s normally colder there, but that’s ok. I like the more rough waves 😉
Have a wonderful weekend dear Robert.
XxX
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You too, Patty – enjoy yourself as much as you can, my dear. 🙂
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All right you do have a lovely accent. Why don’t you just read all your posts? 😀 But really do I have to choose one over the other? I can’t just have both?
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Well being as you said ‘hush now’ I assumed you’d be using the gag as well as the handcuffs, and it goes without question that I’ll be blindfolded. 😉
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See, that was before I heard you speak. That changes everything… Ok, no it changes only the gag part. 😀
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Can you give me a heads up on what you’re going to do to me then? Just so that I can gird my loins – so to speak. Or perhaps quite literally! 😉
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Really now! To forgo the element of surprise? That’s no fun at all!
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Ah! Then in that case – the anticipation is killin’ me!
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Oh, that reading was perfect! Like seriously! You oughtta read bedtime books but I suspect you’d make everyone laugh themselves awake just as they were drifting off. Not that you are boring at all. Your voice is really soothing, deep and soft, and your accent is amazing. You have to do more. Pretty please?
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Howdy and i enjoyed this very much and I do like that you keep it real and have fun just being you and it’s okay if you are not funny and like the accent of yours too
well have a wonderful day!!! 🙂
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Here is Saturday already. 🙂
I’m totally glad you enjoyed it, and I appreciate that you like it when I keep it real. Yeah – you hit the nail on the head – I am just having fun! 🙂
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Yes i did enjoy it and it’s saturday there already cool and here in Alabama still friday 7:45 pm and yes you are doing fine job and keep having fun 🙂 🙂
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I’ve always found Alabama to be intriguing – because of the music and the accents and the laid back smiles and all of that. Wasn’t there a song about Alabama?
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Yes Alabama is a good place to live at the people here are nice and all and yes it was by Lynyrd Skynyrd-Sweet Home Alabama!! And that is a kick ass song btw!!😀
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Nah, nah, nah – I remember what it was – it was Kid Rock – All Summer Long (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwIGZLjugKA). And yeah – that Lynyrd Skynyrd (copy and paste – can’t trust myself to spell it right) song was cool too. 😉
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Yes that’s a good song to by kid rock-all summer long
And him referring to life up in Michigan…
🙂
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North Michigan even. 😉
Maybe he was there on holiday – but (Sweet) Alabama was still home.
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Yes I guess you can say that
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I just had to listen to the song again just to check. 😦
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Well let me know alrighty aww why so sad 😉 Robert?
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Because I should have known already.
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I guess so and don’t always be so hard on yourself because we only have one life to live and all the while being us and being happy too 🐒🐒🐒🐵🐵
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That’s really nice advice, Tina – thanks for that. I’m going to get some dinner soon – getting hungry. 🙂
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You’re welcome Robert and have a nice dinner and that you won’t be hungry😃
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Chips and mushy peas and bread and butter with half a melon to follow. It was FAB!! 🙂
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Well that does sound good and I am glad you enjoyed your dinner!! 🙂
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What did you have? 🙂
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Well I had Chicken Parm Sub with chips and it was delicious! 😃
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But I hope you are having a good day Robert!
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I’ve finally managed to listen to this, and I must say I’m rather impressed. No, I’m not being kind. It’s the truth, I assure you! Your voice is quiet pleasant to listen to, with the quality of a certain famous wildlife documentarian, and with wall-to-wall gentle, dry humour and just slightly under-the-radar insight. Without even really knowing you, it feels very YOU. It feels authentic and unique, and I kinda hope you do more. I’ll listen. 🙂
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Cor blimey – thanks, Tony – that’s very valuable insight. I can tell that you are insightful by the way you say ‘ Your voice is quiet pleasant to listen to’ – that kind of gave it away immediately. 😉
I tell you one thing that really shocked me – that when I looked at the recording after I had finished it clocked up at 10m13s. For one, I was amazed that those few words took so long to record, and for two – it seemed to pass in a flash!
Yes – I really want to do this again. Maybe I’ll just do it on the long post, though.
It almost makes me wish I still got drunk – oh what fun I would have then! 🙂
Thanks for listening, Tony!
Kindness – Robert.
But really? That Attenborough chappie? Wow! 😀
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Oh yes. Really! 😉
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Hahaha – I’ll take that. 🙂
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* quite pleasant to listen to…
Yeesh. My spelling sometimes. Just call me Tony “Blockhead” Single. 😛
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Didn’t even notice. If it annoys you too much, let me know and I’ll edit the original and delete these afterthoughts. 😉
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Nah, it’s all good. Reminds me that I’m still human and therefore quite fallible. Gotta keep me humble somehow! (Yeah, right. Like I’d ever know what that is! Ha ha!) 😛
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You’re a man after my own heart, Tony. 🙂
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You’re a multi talented man Robert. You really have sense of humor. I’m entertained!
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I’m so happy to hear that, Ariel. Did you manage to listen to any of the audio?
(to self: I’m multitalented – yay! 🙂 )
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Have only just listened to this (actually I’m still listening to it as I type). What fun. You have a nice, mellow, calming voice Squire Robert, conducive to bedtime reading. 🙂
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This is good advice! I’m working on my particular bland of humour in writing, but it is much more perverse, honestly. My latest interview: Rookie, Little Nasty Boy, and King Midget from the EXTREME MIDGET WRESTLING TOUR might have you laughing . . . or you might find it distasteful. It’s a slice of life though, and it is a very real one. Bring the perverse back into lit!
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Thanks, I’m glad you like it. I wish you massive success with your … hey, that’s weird – I can hear a Southern States car horn and Big Ben downstairs. And I ain’t got no TV.
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Not going to lie, this made my day! I need you to write me something like this everyday! Or a quote a day? I pay with food 😀
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I just listened to the audio of this and it actually made me want to write something like this for myself every day too! I do write and post something every day, but some of it is flim-flam – sorry about that. 🙂
I’ll try to be more entertaining in future.
Kindness – Robert.
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Just be you, keep doing you. Whatever you’re doing is working. 🙂
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Will do. 🙂
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Great stuff. Glad I stumbled across you!
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Glad you liked it. Trouble is, it put me off comedy for ages.
How’s your comedy going? 🙂
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Well it’s early days. After years of posting overlong status on Facebook I decided to try and start doing things properly and set them up on here. If nothing else I love writing it, I’m sure you’re the same in that it offers some escape from the craziness of everyday!
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Great post. I started reading and was immediately sucked in. Very entertaining!
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Charming accent you’ve got there. Can’t quite get over your pronunciation of “cliché” thought…I know, I know, it’s not just you who pronounces it that way, but anyone who speaks French knows that the stress should be on the second syllable. Yes, I am being pedantic. 😛
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How was the pronunciation of the other 1,439 words? 😀
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Nice and articulate. 😊 I was surprised by your pronunciation of “laughing”, with a ‘æ’ rather than an ‘a’ sound.
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I’m not sure what the different pronunciations are. Glad I was articulate (and nice) though. 🙂 (or did you intend nice as a modifier for articulate?)
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Nice was meant as a modifier for articulate. 😊
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Excellent. 🙂
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Gotta prepare for your interview tomorrow?
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I’ll do that tomorrow morning. It’s a standardised interview so it’s just a question of getting a story or two into my head to tell the interviewers (who happen to be my bosses and so will already know any stories I have). It’s all good. 🙂
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Dobre! 🙂
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I don’t understand. I don’t speak any Polish at all. 😉
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You don’t speak any Slavic languages?!
That’s okay, me neither. 🙂
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Apart from the odd word or two – nothing. I visited Bulgaria and learned a few key phrases, but I think I’ve forgotten most of them now. 🙂
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We’re in the same boat in terms of Slavic languages. 🙂
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Seems so. 🙂
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Can I stop rowing for a bit? My arms are tired. 😉
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Yes. For sure. If you look in that box under your seat you’ll find a sail. 🙂
Let me know if that works for you, otherwise I’ll start this outboard motor. 😉
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Great, thanks. Wait…how come the girl has to do all the work while Robert is sitting back, sunbathing? 😋
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Well, erm … ’cause it’s my boat? Check what it says on the Masthead if you distrust my words. 😉
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Aye aye, Captain Day! 😁
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Regarding the different pronunciations of ‘laugh’ that I was mentioning before, I thought you would say it more like the first than the second video, but I was wrong:
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The first is more upper/middle class and if you’re not that then when you say it like that it sounds like you’re taking the piss.
I was trying to find an example of this but I couldn’t find the one I had in mind so you’ll have to make do with the last track on this instead (go straight to 43:54):
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Ah, okay. Thanks for the explanation. I will listen to the track later (this time, I’ve written down the URL so that I won’t lose it). 😊
I was in a chorus of a (supposedly) British musical production once, and remember being told repeatedly to pronounce the ‘a’ in ‘bath’ and ‘laugh’ as it’s done in the first link above.
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They might well pronounce fings differently dahn sahf. 😉
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Listened to the track last night. I get what you mean about them taking the piss. I think I get it, at least. 😃
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Yeah, they are rather an acquired taste are Derek and Clive. 😀
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Oh yes, like Robert C Day. 😋
Our office mascot came in yesterday with a pink tail. The owner’s kids had fun on the weekend, it seems.
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Hmm. I think we went through this. Non salty arms and all of that.
So does the mascot live in the office, or is the owner just dog-sitting? 🙂
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I think you’re also an acquired taste in a non-literal sense. You are quite strange after all (I mean that in the nicest possible way, of course).
The pink-tailed puppy ‘lives’ in the office. The owner adopted him recently, and brings him to work every day. He (the dog, not the owner) whines whenever his daddy is out of sight. You wouldn’t like the puppy…too dependent.
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Yeah – leave it to starve for a few weeks and see how … oh, wait – we’re still talking about the puppy, right? 🙂
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You’re a bad, bad boy. On another note, a creepy salesman was hovering outside our office for an hour after having talked to me twice today. He still hasn’t sent any quote by e-mail, so I don’t know what his problem is. He wanted to talk to me again for a third time, but I kept my office door shut, and the guys told him I wasn’t here. Weirdo.
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Prolly just after your body. I wouldn’t worry too much about it. You can run, right? 🙂
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Nah, I doubt it. He was some Eastern European/Russian dude who was probably new at his job and couldn’t understand English too well. I suppose I could’ve run out the back door if he didn’t leave. 😁
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P’raps he was.
Fuh sure you could get out the back. That’d be where I’d be waiting for you if I was like that. 🙂
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Nah, don’t think so. 😋
Ah yes, it’s important to get into the mind of creepy crawlers to figure out what they would do.
I better run out the front, break into his car and drive it away while he’s out back!
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Don’t you got no powleece there? 🙂
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They ride around in horses. https://m.shutterstock.com/images/120822817
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When you said ‘in’ horses, I was thinking of the Trojan variety and then I remembered (and then saw) the Mounties and figured that you meant ‘on’ horses. Typo? 🙂
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I just laughed out loud, imagining that scenario. Fortunately, nobody heard me. Yes, a typo. 😁
Requesting permission to send pic of Pinky (office mascot) by email. Just don’t want to share it publicly. If no, then no. 😊
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Sure. Not really into cute pups, but if you must, just use the email attached to this website. 🙂
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Not just ANY cute pup, but one with a pink tail.
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Hmm.
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Uh huh.
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Yup.
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Oh, this is so intellectually titillating. 😉
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Sarcasm? 🙂
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Ya think? 😋
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I think. 🙂
Anyhow – zou tau for now – it’s time for me to sleep. I’m gifting myself with a rare early night – yay! 😀
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…therefore you are?
Zou tau to you too! Impressive. 😁
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😉
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Konnichiwa! Nei hou ma?
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Wha? You’ve gone all Japanese on me now!
Ni chi guo le ma? 🙂
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Gotta leave for work now. What was that last phrase? Is that an attempt to say I’ve gone crazy? 😁
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I was just giving a more traditional Chinese greeting than ‘Hello’. It’s something like ‘Have you eaten yet’. 🙂
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Oh, it’s Mandarin. I get it now. Mandarin and Cantonese are referred to as different ‘dialects’, but they’re mutually unintelligible. I do speak some Mandarin though, so you’re in luck. 😁
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I like that phrase ‘mutually unintelligible’ – can I have it? 🙂
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No, but you can borrow it. 😊 Actually, I didn’t coin it; it’s a common enough linguistic phrase.
Just gave Pinktail a belly rub (he was standing on his hind legs to greet me), and need to wash my hands now. And make coffee, of course. Chotto matte kudasai. Oops, I mean m goi nei dung dung ah. 😊
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Okay, for one – that is one unnatural looking creature, and for two – I have absolutely no idea what you just said, but dung doesn’t sound so nice. 🙂
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You saw the pic? 😊
I told you Cantonese sounds horrible. 😋
Dung = wait. In a certain context, it has to be said twice in a row, with an interjection (ah) at the end. Interjections are obligatory to make the speech sound normal.
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Like pause at the end of a line of poetry – to keep it all in rhythm?
The pic. Yes – I saw it. And now I’ll never be able to unsee it!
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Hmm…maybe. Never thought about it that way.
Oh come on, Pinky isn’t such a eyesore. The owner is going to wash his tail soon.😊
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Phew! I thought it was permanent and the dog was some sort of genetic aberration. 🙂
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I was very puzzled by your comment, until I figured out that you probably meant “I thought it was permanent”. 😁
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Teehee – yes – another one of those pesky typos. You know – they’re not so important to me. I just put them down to laziness rather than a lack of innate talent/sense/skill etc. 🙂 Must be more annoying/puzzling from your side I guess.
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I don’t mind the typos, actually. 😊 They add flavour to the conversation.
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o. wel in thay caase, thus shuld hekp. 😉
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Wyzguy. 😉
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Hnm.
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I wrote a short story a couple of months ago about a ‘redneck’ going out with a Chinese-American girl. https://detoutetderien2015.wordpress.com/2017/01/30/appearances/
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He seems like a pretty stand up sort of a guy. 🙂
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Did you read the story? 😊
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Yeah – that was my comment on the story. Comments are closed there so I commented here instead. 🙂
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Oh, okay. So, to reiterate: Mandarin and Cantonese are not mutually intelligible. They do, however, share the same writing system.
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Seems odd to have 2 languages for a country, but then again the UK has several too. 🙂
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I didn’t mean to imply there were only two languages sharing the Chinese writing system; in fact, there are several, and I don’t even know the names of most of them. Another major Chinese language is Hokkien.
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I read somewhere that Mandarin is spoken by more people than English. Imagine that! 🙂
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I knew that. 😃 This is going to sound nonsensical and silly, but I have an inferiority complex around being a member of the biggest people group on the planet. I’m getting over it though. I know we are all individuals.
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From one member of the human race to another – I extend compassion.
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Merci, mon ami. 😊
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😀 It’s almost as if we’re related. In one, big, happy family!
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Zhen de! 😁
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這個故事是真的
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你真有趣! = Du bist ganz lustig. (I used my Chinese phonetic keyboard to write that. Works a treat! 😊)
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Ah – funny! I thought for a moment you were back on unicorns. 🙂
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You think I have a one-track mind?? 😉
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No. You have many tracks and many interests. 🙂
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As do you. 🙂
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True that. 🙂
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This (non-hunky) guy speaks Cantonese without a foreign accent (he switches from Cantonese to Mandarin at 0:26, so listen for the difference, which should be quite obvious): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8MZ9yib33fw
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Mandarin seems to be more sibilant – more schwa-schwa than Cantonese. I’m not sure if he’s more fluent in M, or that M is less contingent on the pauses you mentioned earlier, but he seems to speak M quicker than C.
I wonder how he got to be so good.
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Yes, there are a lot of ‘sh’ words in M, and lots of rolling of the tongue. That’s why native Mandarin speakers tend to exaggerate the ‘r’ when speaking English (i.e. they speak with a slur). Cantonese, on the other hand, has no rolling of the tongue, so many native C speakers have trouble with the ‘r’ in English. My Mandarin is weak, so I can’t tell how well this bloke (love that word 😊) is speaking it, but the accent sounds good. I can tell you, however, that his Cantonese sounds like that of a native speaker. If I listened to him with my eyes closed, I would not know he was a so-called foreigner.
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You know, that makes me wonder about your accent. Do you have a Canadian accent when you speak Cantonese, and a Cantonese accent when you speak English. You did say something about it before, but I didn’t know what you were referring to when you said ‘it’, if you know what I mean. 🙂
Do you think of yourself as a ‘foreigner’?
Fancy you liking the word ‘bloke’. Odd. Decidedly odd. 😉
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Eating peanut butter with toast. ☺
Remember me telling you that I rarely tell people where I’m from? They usually don’t ask me anyway, because I speak English with a Canadian accent (it’s more like a generic American accent, as I stopped doing “Canadian raising” – the “out and about” phenomenon with the dipthongs – some time ago. I speak Cantonese with a Hong Kong accent, but it’s extremely rusty. When I came back to Canada from the UK, a couple of people commented that I’d adopted a bit of an English accent (bloody English influence 😉). I don’t think I have, but I’m not exactly the best judge of my own speech, perhaps? When I was in France, a few French people told me that I hardly had a foreign accent at all. At a restaurant in Strasbourg a few years ago, the waiter asked me which region of France I was from.
Why would I think of myself as a foreigner? I’m just me wherever I am. 😊
‘Bloke’ sounds wonderful when spoken with the English ‘o’ sound. It doesn’t sound so good with a generic North American ‘o’, but that word isn’t used here anyway.
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I probably say bloke with quite a flat accent – we do that in Yorkshire. If I was taking the mick, I would say it with more of an ‘English’ (middle class) accent. It’s a bit like ‘laugh’.
Yeah, you ought to be doing something good (or at least lucrative) with your linguistic abilities. And that’s all he wrote.
Peanut butter with toast. That sounds like your lunch. 🙂
Just realised that I am a narcissist. 😦
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Hi Narcissist, can I call you Narci? 😋 I don’t think you’re narcissistic.
I’ve done freelance translation before in various languages, and it wasn’t lucrative.
Skyping with parents tomorrow evening. Will avoid speaking English as much as I can. Maybe I can get it down to 50%.
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You can call me Narci if you like, but I’m unlikely to answer to it. 🙂
So where’s the big money in translation and linguistics?
I do think that I love myself far more than I should. I regard myself as being talented and good looking and all sorts of things like that. It must get (it does seem to get) rather wearing for those around me. I also suspect that I might be a bigot. I don’t like the idea of that either.
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As far as I know, there’s no big money in linguistics and translation. In the UK, every place I worked at hired me for the combination of my accounting experience and language skills (I dealt with European customers). Years ago, I got a small part in a TV series speaking Mandarin, and THAT was lucrative. A few thousand bucks for two days of filming. But I don’t ever want to go for auditions again. Too fickle of an industry.
Regarding the last part of your comment, are you taking the mick? Can’t tell.
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There are several sides to me that I recognise and that I don’t like. Narcissism and bigotry are … hold on, let me just check something. Ah, yeah – scrap that, I’m not a bigot. I thought it meant something else. Whew! 🙂
A movie star, huh. Well don’t that just take the biscuit! 🙂 You should milk it if you can.
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Would you consider yourself narcissistic, or rather self-centred? What did you think bigotrr meant?
No, not a movie star. A girl who took a couple of acting courses, signed up with an agency, and landed a few itsy bitsy parts. 🙂
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Hmm – that’s a choice? Can’t I choose both? I thought bigot meant that the race that I am part of is the best in the whole world. See – not such a good thing.
There are aspiring professional actresses that don’t even get that far! 🙂
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All narcissists are self-centred, but NOT all self-centred people are narcissistic. I think I’m self-centred but not narcissistic. Are you sure you’re both? 🙂
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/fixing-families/201509/narcissist-or-just-self-centered-4-ways-tell
Is your comment about aspiring professional actresses meant to be a compliment? Thanks. 🙂 I really didn’t ‘go all out’; I just dabbled in it for two or three years. I just remembered another language-related gigue did; it was a Cantonese voiceover. That one didn’t pay that well because it was non-union.
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Oh. Well when you put it like that (as in the article) I’m actually border-line neither of those. I just love myself because I’m fab. 🙂 Not better than others – just good at the things I’m good at.
Yeah, it was a compliment. 🙂
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Loving yourself is a very good thing. 🙂 I love myself too, but probably not enough. I need to learn from you. 🙂
I asked my dad yesterday if I spoke Cantonese with a foreign accent (I can rely on him to be honest). He said that I spoke it slowly and awkwardly, but didn’t have an accent. Phew!
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Hahaha – good old Pops! 😀
Yes. I do love myself. Yes – I would recommend it for you. Stick around, kid – some of it might rub off. 😉
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Yep, I adore my dad. 🙂 Even though my mom is the chatterbox and my dad tends to be speak very little, I prefer speaking to my dad than my mom. My mom is so sweet and good-natured, but frankly, I can’t have any deep discussions with her (not for lack of trying). We’re just on completely different wavelengths.
She is going to Maui with my sister and nephew next month (my sister got married there). Unfortunately, I can’t go with them, because there’s a good chance we’ll be moving across the country in the new few weeks. Oh boy.
I think some of your self-love has already rubbed off on me. 🙂
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You’re moving east then? That should be better, right? More civilisation?
Good to know about your self-love. The book I’m reading at the mo (Self Compassion) is really helping me to cope with some parts of me that are not as positive as they could be.
I wonder if people that don’t have (or don’t want) deep conversations actually have any deep thoughts. I guess we’ll never know (because they won’t talk about it). Hey-ho.
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We’ve only been here in this city for about a year and a half, so it’s a little too soon for my taste. I’m not keen on moving to a bustling urban metropolis. Oh well, it’s good to shake up one’s comfort zone once in a while, right? 😊
I’m very glad that the book you’re reading is helping you. Self development seems to be a high priority for you; it is for me too.
I’ve tried countless times over the years to have deep conversations with my mom, and have never succeeded. I used to get frustrated over this ‘failure’, but I don’t anymore. After a very very long time, I finally learned to accept her the way she was. It’s incredible how long it took.
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So you both like to move, or is it work that takes y’all to different places?
Yeah, I like to develop. I change my mind like you change your city. 🙂
Good that you accept your mom just the way she is. Very evolved.
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Yes and yes. Both of us want to live in a different place every few years (the UK was the longest), and it’s his work that takes us to different places.
Being willing and able to change your mind is a great quality. People tend to get stuck in their ways.
Are you making fun of me? (About my acceptance my mom.)
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Now it all comes clear. 🙂
No. I definitely wasn’t making fun. For sure not.
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Hen hao. 😊
Okay, thanks.
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This other guy (okay but not so hunky either) speaks Cantonese pretty well, with only a few tones off and a little weird pronunciation here and there, but his vocabulary is impressive. Considering that he never lived in Hong Kong or another Cantonese-speaking environment, his language skills are outstanding.
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I think that you maybe omitted to add a link onto this one. 🙂
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Google “white guy speaks Cantonese in one year” and you’ll find it. His name os Olly or something similar. 😃
Zou sun! Nei hou ma?
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I’m going to guess at – good morning, how are you? (how did I do?) 🙂
I’m pretty good, thanks. It’s lunch time now so looking forward to taming the rumble in my belly.
Found him. Is there no word for ‘Video’ in Cantonese. Or is that the Cantonese word and we’ve all been talking foreign since it was invented!! 😀
Olly sounds good to me. So how do you feel after that exercise? If Olly chatted you up, would you be tempted? 😉
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好嘢! (Hou ye = yay) You got it right. 😁
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Ha! 😀 I’m a multiculturalarised marvel.
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I wouldn’t go that far. 😁
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I have a Chinese input program installed on my phone, so I can ‘draw’ the characters on the screen – like magic! 😊
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That sounds … totally useless for me. I’d be, like, drawing a smiley face and the programme (note English spelling) would be, like, WTF! 🙂
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I’m sure the programme would still make some character suggestions.
P.S. The programme doesn’t speak (or think, as far as I know).
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Ha – you don’t know that for sure. Actually, perhaps you do. I’m not even sure whether I think or not. 🙂
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你瘋了嗎?(Ni feng le ma?) 😋
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Copied for later. 😁
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What’s that?
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I was referring to one of the links you sent me yesterday. Either the ‘ni feng le’ one or the Little Miss S one. 😊
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Okay. 🙂
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I like being called Little Miss S. 😊
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There is a Cantonese term for video – 影片(ying pin) – but the English word video has crept into the language and taken over. Colonisation? 😉
It felt really weird listening to Olly. I have the better accent (of course, considering that I learned it as a baby), but would struggle a lot more to find the words to express myself. If he chatted me up in person, I would insist on speaking to him in English. Tempted? To do what? 😉 He’s okay, but doesn’t really do it for me. But then again, I could potentially be wildly attracted to him if I met him in person. Can’t really say for sure.
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What? Hong Kong as a colony of England? Hmm – I guess it was. Kinda.
You know – that’s really interesting. Why would you insist on English? Would you still do it if you were super-confident about your vocab?
I notice it a lot. People insist on speaking English to English speakers. We had a Chinese guy in our writing group last night and he wrote a story in English and then read it out to the group. It was awful. The best we could say is that he should continue to do that because his English would get stronger. We also had a Nigerian in the group. He wrote and read too. His story was better, but focused on concerns I hear again and again from people in that part of the world – food and ill treatment. I would love to hear about something wider. I need to read more literature from that continent.
Poor old Olly, turned down by Little Miss S. 😦
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Hong Kong was so much better off when leased to the UK. But I don’t like talking about politics.
Don’t get me wrong – I would only insist on speaking English with Olly because my Cantonese is so bad. I prefer speaking English with other English speakers because it’s my strongest language.
You keep calling me little -an observation, not a complaint. 😊
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Politics – no thanks. 🙂
Yeah, your English is relatively good. 😉
Little Miss S refers to a video I sent you earlier. One that I think maybe you didn’t find.
For your delectation:
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Oh, good. Politics bore me. ☺
I referred to a video I haven’t watched yet? Prescient? Saving the link for later.
You like my tuque? ☺
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🙂 Do you have the gift of foresight?
I don’t like hats much. I’ve never worn one. I think they are an insult to hair and make it go away.
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I’m not conscious of having any psychic abilities. I was wearing the tuque to keep my head warm, not to insult my hair. So you saw my tuque? 🙂
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I did.
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Did I surprise you, or did you predict my action with your psychic powers? 😉
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I suppose I was surprised. I thought you were bent on being all mysterious and hidden.
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“I suppose I was surprised” has a nice ring to it. 🙂 I was humming and ha-ing about it (to send or not to send) for a while before deciding to go for it. Tre is the only other person on WordPress who knows what I look like. Plus, I wanted to make sure you knew that I wasn’t one of the the Orientals blocking the streets in York. 😉
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Actually, the Street Blockers are mostly Japanese. The Chinese tend to come here to study and so get to know how to behave better. 😉
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Okay then, at least you’ll be able to distinguish me from one of the Chinese students there…or not. 😉
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Yes. This is true. It’ll definitely not be the hat (or the tuque) that gives you up. 😉
Going to sleep now. Mañana mañana. 🙂
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Oh, I thought you’d only recognise my tuque. 😉
Zou tao! 🙂
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Zou san, S. 🙂
I’m going to assume that when you said zou tao you meant good night, rather than drop dead, shut up or go away. 😉
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Zou san, Robert. Yes, good night is what I meant. If I were to say something rude, I would’ve picked a language you understood. Nei hou ma? 😊
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Yeah, I know. I was just trying to be clever by illustrating that I have looked into the other meanings of the phrase. It’s probably to do with tones. 🙂
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You can’t resist displaying your clever
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Oops, sent that by mistake. Meant to say: you can’t resist displaying your cleverness at every turn, can you? Just teasing – I enjoy your displays. 😁
I noticed that I’d typed ‘zou tao’ rather than ‘zou tau’; I’m not used to writing Cantonese with the Roman alphabet. 😜
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Oops. Not as clever as I thought I was then. 🙂
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Did I say you weren’t clever??
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Me. It was me that thought I was clever. Right – I have to get some work done now. I have an assignment to write. Laters. 🙂
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Laters!
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This 21-year-old also speaks Cantonese reasonably well (not as well as Olly). He’s cute. https://www.google.ca/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://m.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DzM0gk8-c8HI&ved=0ahUKEwiGlMz0xe_SAhUs64MKHSpWCO8Qo7QBCCAwAw&usg=AFQjCNH5vtcFQKP7zAVMocRDVCrNIAgvnA&sig2=DqMty13ftvnywkPvBD2ZkQ
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But he looks exactly like Olly! But then again, all these English people look the same. 😉 He doesn’t sound as strident as he should. He is speaking from/in his throat, whereas native speakers sound more like they are speaking through their nose. More nasal. He sounds quintessentially English to me in terms of his tone a timbre. How do you feel about what I just said?
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They look nothing alike! Open your eyes, mate. 😋 Alex is much cuter. A bit young, though. I think he sounds okay; I’m not sure about the nasal part. As a native speaker, I was mostly listening for the tones, and he gets most of the right.
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Well it sounds nasal to my untutored ears. 🙂
Watching Mr Holmes – a movie starring Ian McKellen. Rather good, actually.
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Almost done with invoicing. Then, I gotta do the employee expenses. Still watchin’?
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Just finished watching. It’s about time you did a proper day’s work – well done. 🙂
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Xie xie. 😁
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You’re welcome. How do you pronounce xiexie by the way?
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I speak to you in Chinese and you respond in English?! Oh wait, I do that with my parents too. The ‘x’ in the Mandarin phonetic system is pronounced ‘sh’. The ‘i’ is pronounced like the ‘ee’ in ‘need’, but it’s very short and clipped (i.e. not drawn out). The ‘e’ is like the vowel sound when you say the letter ‘z’. If you could hear me say it, it would be much easier. 😊
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Hmm. Like saying sheshe when you’re in a hurry? 🙂
Yeah, hearing is much easier for sounds.
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Yeah! You’re a good student. 😊
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😀
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Gotta do some ironing now.
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Such fun!
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Haha. 🙂
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There were only a handful of videos to choose from! I mistakenly said that there are 9 tones in Cantonese, but apparently there are only 7. Mandarin is MUCH easier to learn and to be able to speak comprehensibly, with only 4 tones (piece of cake!) and a well-established phonetic system (called pinyin). Also, spoken Mandarin is virtually the same as its written form, while spoken Cantonese does not correspond to the offical written language. Sorry if I’m not explaining this very well; it’s quite complicated. 🙂
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No, you explained that very well. Either that or I’m quite smart. 🙂 You seem to understand both C & M (and probably speak both too) – how come?
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You’re smart (though you are sometimes a smartass 😋). I’ll give you the simplest possible example of written Chinese vs. spoken Cantonese. If you introduce yourself in writing, you’d read it out phonetically (in Cantonese):”ngo see Robert”. In spoken form, it would be “ngo hai Robert”.
I don’t know when I first started learning M. My dad speaks it fluently, but he never gave me lessons. I used to like singing both C and M songs (karaoke), and picked up some M that way. I also took a weekly summer course once in my teenage years.
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‘written Chinese vs. spoken Cantonese’? I don’t understand what you mean (see, I can’t be that smart). Why are they different?
I can’t imagine you singing C or M. Although the talking can be melodious, the singing sound (to me) like cats and foxes being strangled. Sorry and all that. 😀
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I just need to explain in more detail, and then you’ll get it. There’s a single Chinese written system (disregard the simplified vs. traditional characters for now) for all Chinese spoken languages. This system is taught in school, and each of the spoken languages assigns a certain sound to each character so that the written language can be read out loud. Spoken Mandarin corresponds much more closely to the written Chinese system in terms of syntax and word usage, but spoken Cantonese is considerably different than the written Chinese system. Does that make more sense? 😊
No offense taken (re: singing in Chinese). A language is a language, nothing more or less. 😊
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Ah – the light penetrates. 🙂 Thanks for persevering with the explanation, S – I appreciate that. So how come there are ways of pronouncing. Wouldn’t one have been simpler?
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My pleasure! 😊 Brilliant question – I don’t have an answer to that. Maybe it’s the same reason why there are so many frickin’ languages and currencies on this planet? 😋
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You mean to say that there is more than one China?
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You can ask people from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Tibet how they feel about China being one big happy country.
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Hmm. Good point.
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Hey Narci, how has Mother’s Day been for you? Called your Mama?
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Huh? I can hear someone saying something in the background, but they must me talking to someone else. 😉
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Okay, let’s try that again. Hi Robert, how has your day been? Did you lose a sleeping or waking hour?
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Hiya, S – nice to hear from you. 🙂 I’ve had a wonderful day, thanks – and I hope yours has been good too. The clock just changed automatically on my phone and so … well, I’m not even sure which way it went. I just got up when I’d finished sleeping – it’s Sunday after all. 🙂
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Happy to hear that. 🙂 Mine has been great too. No headache! 😀 (I had one yesterday, but I’ll leave the past in the past.) The clock sprung forward, so you slept one hour less than usual.
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I assure you that I didn’t sleep less. I prolly got up later. 😉
Good to know you are headache free today. What do you put that down to?
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If I knew why I didn’t end up with a headache today, I would be able to prevent them, wouldn’t I? 😉
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Possibly. 🙂 Let’s just be happy for that and not worry about next Sunday. Maybe that in itself will help. 😉
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Yep, I won’t worry about next Sunday. 😊 Heading out the door now. Gonna wear a jacket with a hood today (still too cold sans head cover), so hopefully my hair won’t be as offended. 😉
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Hahaha – I’m sure your hair is accustomed to your head coverings. Grass doesn’t like being covered. It goes yellow and dies. I have this theory that hair (men’s hair) does the same. Many bald men wear hats. Or is it that many men that wear hats go bald!
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You’re right! How do you know me so well already? 😜I wear a tuque in the winter and a hat in the spring and summer to protect my face from UV rays. Uh-oh…does that mean I could end up with a wrinkle-free face and no hair? Ahhh! What a dilemma. 😉
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No. You’re not a bloke. You’ll be fine. 🙂
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Phew! Glad I don’t have to get wrinkles in order to keep my hair. 😁
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This seems quite important to you, S. 🙂
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Vanity. It may not seem like it from an outsider’s point of view, but I’m getting better and better at not identifying with my physical appearance. 😊
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Yeah, that stuff go fade down to nuttin – careful you is not dependin’ on it. 🙂
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Did you say it with a Southern accent in your head? 😁
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You ever watch ‘The Wire’? Like that.
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You asked me that once already. What’s with the repetition? 😜
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Because that’s where the accent is from. Baltimore. Not the south. 😉
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I’m not so good with accents. 😜
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😀 … or with me repeating stuff that I’ve said before. 😉
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I’m just trying to impress you with my excellent memory. 😉 It’s not as if I ever repeat phrases I’ve written before…😉
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Oh, that’s okay then. 🙂 It never came over as pedantic and picky at all. 😉
And I think you used the word ‘you’ in that sentence – I’m sure I remember you saying that yesterday too. 😀
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I’m never pedantic and picky. *nose getting longer by the minute*
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Okay – two words that you should never put close together – nose and picky. Unless, that is, you have your finger inside a nostril up to the first joint. 😀
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Hahahaha! A faux pas on my part. Nothing gets by you. 😉 And no, that’s dégeuelasse! I’m no savage. 😲
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Oh, I wouldn’t presume for a moment that you would sink to such savagery. I’m sure you would just delicately insert a single nail into the nostril on question. 😉
Do I write like an old person?
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No, no. Gotta use a small piece of tissue along with the nail. 😉
Nope, you write like you. 😊
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I’m going to write like a sleeping person now. 🙂
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Du gehst jetzt ins Bett? 😊
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Well, I was. But now I’m not. I’m in the bureau. 🙂
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De acuerdo. 😊
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🙂
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You stopped guessing my mother tongue. Just an observation, not a complaint. 😊
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I did. Okay here are my next four guesses: French, Italian, German and Lispy Spanish. 🙂
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How do I say this nicely? Nope, wrong, wrong, wrong and wrong. 😁
Alright, a hint: not European. I don’t look European, do I? Not that I need to look a certain way to have a European mother tongue, of course.
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What’s wrong with just telling me?
Is there anywhere else in the world but Europe? Hmm – it seems there must be. 🙂
Erm. Eyes. Some kind of Asian (not Oriental). So not Arab or South American.
Prolly a mainly Christian place.
So, not Chinese, Korean or Japanese.
So that leaves either Filipino, South Asian, Southeast Asian or West Asian.
Being as ‘Asian’ does not seem like a motherland, I’m going to plump for Filipino as a partial ethnic origin for you (like Sharon Gamboa Cuneta-Pangilinan) and Tagalog as your mother-tongue (although both Filipino and English are the official languages).
Can I get a doggie-treat now?
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You want me just to tell you straight out? Did you think I was easy? *gasp*
Okay, here’s a doggie treat for your efforts. I’m impressed! But no, that still ain’t right. 😢
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Ah well, in that case – I officially give up. 🙂
TBH I’m not that concerned about what nationality a person is. Ditto for mother-tongues and religions. I’m just an easy-going type of a guy like that. 😉
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I somehow knew you wouldn’t be concerned about that. It’s my own – um – hang-up.
Cantonese.
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S’funny how you never used that one on me. 🙂 Is it an easy language to speak?
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I don’t like the way it sounds, that’s why. No, it’s ridiculously difficult to learn.
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You don’t use it much, then?
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My parents speak it with me (peppered with English), and I respond in English. It’s just so much easier. I don’t have a foreign accent when speaking it, but I struggle like crazy with vocabulary. For the first nine years of life, it was my only language. It’s weird to think that if I went back in time to talk to myself as a little girl, I would be struggling to communicate.
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That’s such a fascinating observation, S! I wonder what the little girl you were would think of the grown up person you are now, speaking English with such assurance and skill. 🙂 You must have a remarkable brain to be able to pick up so many languages and attain a working knowledge and, in some cases, fluency. Well done, my friend – well done. 🙂
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Thank you for the compliment, but you have quite the amazing brain (and mind, of course, as that’s the real you) yourself, Robert. 😃
My mom started teaching me English since I was four, but I didn’t start speaking it regularly until the age of nine, when we moved to Canada. I devoured books during my first year here, and never had a Cantonese accent.
‘Bon courage’ for your OU work tonight. Or are you planning to hit the sack early? 😊
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I put a bit of work in and finished a piece a few minutes ago (By My Hand). I seem to be hooked on grue at the moment; I wonder what that’s about!
You grew up in Hong Kong?
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Très bien. ☺As long as it’s fiction, it’s all good.
Yep, but I usually don’t tell people that.
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Hong Kong looks like a fascinating place. I thought it would be like downtown Shanghai but it’s more like uptown … I don’t know – pick some clean, modern city in the US. Actually, when I think about it – there are prolly uptown and downtown places in Hong Kong too. There usually are in each city. Hmm.
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Far, far too crowded. Never been back, even for a visit.
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Have you ever seen Bladerunner? Set in LA in 2019 (only 2 years to go and we still ain’t got flying cars!) It reminds me of how I imagine Hong Kong (or Shanghai) to look.
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Yes, I have. Great movie. The android girl (the dark-haired one) is so pretty – love her eyes. Not disappointed about flying cars not being around, but am hoping to get one of those hover boards from Back to the Future.
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Hahaha – yes! A hover board would be soooo cool!
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You sound like a twelve-year-old. 😊
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Yeah, man. I was channelling my inner 12-year-old. 😀
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(Mandarin) Hen hao! 😁
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What? Who told you about my hen house? 🙂
Bu cuo – right?
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“Bu cuo” as in “not bad” in Mandarin?
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Yep. As in an alternative way of saying hen hao. 😉
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In Cantonese, ‘hao’ in a certain tone means horny. Got to have the correct time though. 😉
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Horny as a unicorn?
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Nope. http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/dictionary/words/1485/
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Ah-ha! Libidinous. Well why didn’t you just say! 🙂
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Saying it straight out would’ve been like rushing to third base without stopping at the first and second. Also, as your language teacher, it’s my duty to send you the link showing the tone in which the word needs to be pronounced. 😀
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Hahaha – I like your line of logic, S. Immaculate. 🙂
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Glad you like it, Robert. 🙂
I was, of course, referring to baseball, just in case there’s any confusion. 😉
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Ah yes – baseball – of course. 🙂
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當然啦! (dang ran la = of course) 😀
(Mandarin)
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So, I understand the dāng rán part of that, but what does the la at the end signify?
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You’re using the tonal accents – bravo! (One doggy treat coming up 😁). Mandarin also uses interjections, albeit not as often as Cantonese. That’s what the ‘la’ is. If you just say the phrase without an interjection, it sounds incomplete.
Heard anything yet about last Monday’s interview? 😊
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Wood! 🙂
No, not yet. But they are ramping the work up, so that must be a good sign!
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Wood?? Is this a game of throwing out random words? Okay then. Morning! 😜 Oops, that wasn’t so random.
Ramping up the work? If you say it’s a good sign, it probably is a good sign. 😁
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Huh? Darned word correcting wotsit stole my woof!
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That’s hilarious! 😁😁
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Do you personally know anyone who speaks it?
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I know people that could speak it, but there’s little point in them doing so around me – I just wouldn’t understand.
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Good point. The language sounds like dissonant chaos. It grates on my ears.
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Prolly because of your (self confessed) hang-up about it. To some it sounds melodic and charming. 🙂
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A guy chatting me up in Cantonese, or in another language with a strong Cantonese accent, would never get anywhere with me. Yes, I am so unfair. ☺
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What about a hunky guy with Caucasian eyes chatting you up in Cantonese? Is it the eyes, the build, the language or just the associations with some male someone or other that you know or knew. 🙂
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Caucasian eyes = eyes typical of those from the Caucasus? 😋 I’ve prolly caused you to use the word Caucasian more often in the past few weeks than you have in the past decade. 😁
I digress. Hmm…you’ve made me think. In general, Oriental guys just don’t appeal to me. There are exceptions, of course. It’s even less attractive to me if they speak to me in Cantonese, because I associate that language with my parents and childhood. It would be like dating a brother! Years ago, I went out with a tall Cantonese-speaking guy with a nice body, but I got really turned off after a while and ran away.
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Actually, if you look back you’ll find that it was you who introduced the word Caucasian. I actually originally said Occidental. 😉
But what about it? Look up some videos of ‘Western’ guys speaking Cantonese and see if they grab your heart. Not now, obviously. Later will do. It can be your project for the evening. 🙂
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True that. I know I’m the one who introduced the word. 😊 I find it funny that I got you started on using it. 😁 My mom is always careful not to use the Cantonese colloquial term for referring to white people, ‘gwai lo’ (literal translation: ghost/devil guy) around me or my sister, using the term ‘sai yun’ (Western person) instead. I find her tip-toeing around us quite amusing. 😊
I’ve never had an Occidental dude trying to pick me up by speaking Cantonese before. It’s such a tough language to get right (mostly because of the 9 different tones and the weird interjections) that people sound ridiculous when they don’t speak it right. The token white guys used in Cantonese movies sound…funny, and not in a good way.
Okay, I’m make that a project for tonight. 😁
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😀 You have a lot to say about this language – much more than any other. I’m interested. Keep telling me stuff. I used the term you mentioned out of politeness only. I’m a polite kind of a guy (mostly). Your mom sounds cute. I take it that your partner is one of the those people she is tip-toeing around too. And prolly your sister’s partner as well. 🙂
Yeah – find me a white guy on YouTube that does a passable Cantonese. 😀
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Okay, will do. 😊 My mom is cute, but I’ve never been close to her. Actually, I couldn’t stand her and wasn’t nice to her at all, but that has changed. I’m a daddy’s girl. Actually, she gets along famously with my partner because they both love to cook. Speaking of moms, it’s Mother’s Day in the UK this weekend, innit? And you’ll lose an hour.
Okay, I’ll find you a non-ridiculous-sounding-Cantonese-speaking white guy. 😁
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Good. Why? Why? Nice (and normal). That’s good. It is (and I’ve sent a card already). Someone in the office just said the same thing.
You’ll find one for me? Hmm.
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I’m not entirely sure why I never bonded with my mother. Maybe it’s partly because she went back to work full-time only two or three months after I was born, and I was raised mostly by live-in nannies. As for why I wasn’t nice to her before, I suspect it has something to do with watching my dad belittle her repeatedly when I was a child. Instead of feeling sorry for her and taking her side, my sister and I sided with my dad and ganged up against her. Horrible, I know, but that’s the truth. Now that I hardly ever see her (she and my dad live hundreds of km away), I get along with her fine, but every once in a while, my old way of interacting with her would surface.
Okay, enough of that.
Yes, I’ll find one for you, i.e. I’ll find one as per your request. I didn’t mean I would hunt the guy down and bring his head to you on a platter. 😋
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Your mom perhaps worked full time partly because it gave her the financial resources needed to provide the advantages in life she wanted for you. And even it that isn’t true, the heart of it is true. She loved and loves you and wants the best for you. You also love her and want the best for her. Right, let’s all join hands and have a rousing chorus of kumbaya. 😉
Compassion – that’s the key – both for yourself and for others.
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I never said I didn’t love my mom. I just didn’t like her while I was growing up. Neither of my parents ever told me they loved me, but I know they do. That’s just the Chinese way, and I don’t follow it. I always tell my nephew I love him.
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Good. Love is a precious cargo. We should carry it with care from shore to shore. 🙂
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Metaphorically speaking. 😊
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Yes – that too. 🙂
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Hola, Robert! Qué tal? Just returned from running. The hot bath is calling for me. Okay, okay, j’arrive!
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Estoy muy bien, gracias, S.
That sounds weird – from running to a hot bath. Aren’t you hot enough already?
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Yes, I’m hot and sweaty, but I gotta induce an artificial fever to sweat some more. Cleansing my body and mind. 😊
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And on that note, I’m going to do some dusting and vacuuming. 🙂 You work on keeping your mind clean and I’ll work on keeping the house clean. 😉
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Okay, then I better stop imagining a man doing housework. 😋
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Hmm – not just imagination – it’s real! 😀
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Just in Speedos? 😋
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Impractical.
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C’est vrai.
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You still send your mom a card for Mother’s Day? Wow!
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Well, yeah! 🙂
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Good boy. (One doggie treat coming up.)
I generally don’t send cards in the mail, except for a few Christmas ones (in Spanish, German and French).
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Woof! *pants*
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Roleplaying…now THAT’S fun. 😋
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Hahaha – really? You might have to qualify that statement. Either that or tell me what you mean. 🙂
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Hold that thought…gotta get these huge invoices out in the next half an hour or so. 😊
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Mum’s the word. 🙂 I trust you are familiar with the euphemism. Mr Holmes has affected my speech patterns it seems.
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You can ‘talk’ while I’m working. Doesn’t bother me. 😁
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What? You’re still working!
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I was. So apparently, I have to run the bath myself because nobody did it for me. C’est incroyable, n’est-ce pas? 😉
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Well, yeah. Erm – no – not really. I’m a firm believer in running your own bath! 🙂
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Okay, it’s ready and I’m going in. Not gonna type in the bath. Hasta pronto!
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🙂 Good call.
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Claro! 😁
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Dress-up and acting, of course. In private. ’nuff said? 😋
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I still don’t quite understand, no. Could you be more explicit? Maybe draw a diagram?
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You’re putting me on. 🙂 The PG-13 rating of this site precludes me from being more explicit. Plus, I’m no good at drawing. 🙂
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Yes – I’m having you on. 🙂 I shall desist from this line of questioning, forthwith.
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Thou art wise. 😋
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Wise, and with grit. 😉
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With grit, huh? Grit is mighty important. 😊
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I was watching a Ted Talk about it. Let me see if I can dig the link out for you …
Here it is (only 6 minutes short):
(You’re welcome 🙂 )
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Xie xie ni. 🙂
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🙂
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I just watched the Ted Talk about grit. Highly interesting!
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That whole list of most listened to Ted Talks is quite interesting and informative. I’m working my way through them whilst cooking, cleaning etc. It makes the time pass more profitably. 🙂
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Excellent use of time. ☺
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Agreed. 🙂
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Nǐ zài jiā lǐ ma? 😊
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Erm – yes – but can I have mine to take away? 🙂
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Nein. 😜 Ich habe Dich gefragt, ob Du zuhause bist. 😊
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Erm – yes – and sprinkles too? 🙂
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I give up. 😜
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Wǒ zài shàngbān. 😉
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D’accord. 😁 Comment ça va aujourd’hui?
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Je suis pretty good thanks. Et tu? 🙂
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Très bien, merci! Hey, you’re stealing my ‘mix up idiomas in einmen Satz’ trick!
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Sehr true. And now I have to do beaucoup work on my assignment. Laters. 🙂
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After a while, crocodile! 🐊
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Hey – cute croc! 🙂
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Gehst Du bald ins Bett? 😊
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Ha! Yeah – I just said that. 😀
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Jinx. 😜 Hope you made good progress on your assignment.
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Yeah, good progress thanks – I just need to edit the final death scene and shed 149 words, which is not bad considering that I was 624 words over the limit before I started the edits.
Once that’s done, I just have to do the 700 word commentary.
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Happy for you. 😊 Bon courage für the home stretch!
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When you’re as insanely talented as I am, you don’t need no ‘courage’. Actually, I take it back – I need every luck I can get – thanks very much. 🙂
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Always so modest. 😉
Bú kè qi. 😁
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What a fascinating phrase bú kè qi is. It can mean so many things depending on the circumstances. This is a very subtle language. 🙂
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Yep! Literally, it means ‘don’t stand on ceremony’. That’s very rarely said in English. The Chinese culture revolves around ‘ceremony’ and ‘face’.
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Really? How much face is involved when one holds an extended conversation with a ‘gwai lo’ on a WordPress blog? 😉 I kind of knew about the face part, but not the ceremony. What do you dream of?
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I think you know by now that I don’t care about ‘face’. And your labelling of yourself as ‘gwai lo’ is beyond weird to me. You’re my friend, not some ‘foreign demon’. 😜
‘Ceremony’ is closely connected to ‘face’.
What do you mean by what do I dream of?
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REM sleep. What images come into your mind during it. 🙂
Yeah – I don’t thibknof myself like that. Hence why I used quotes. I was a making a tha joke! (what do you think of a my a Spanish accent?)
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Oh, you were referring to the Rapid Eye Movement stage of sleep. 🙂 Before I get into that, your Spanish accent sounds a little…exaggerated. 😉 Appreciate the effort though. 🙂
I could take hours to answer the question of what I dream of, but I’ll keep it concise. I tend to have very elaborate, colourful backgrounds and landscapes in my dreams, and I often become lucid while dreaming. Because I’m not particularly good at visualising while awake, I look around when I become aware of my dream state, and marvel at the vivid scenes my subconscious is capable of creating. The people I dream about regularly are my parents and sister, a boy I was infatuated with at the age of twelve (he was in show biz for a while), and an ex-lover I particularly fancied in my twenties. Recurrent themes include not being able to lock or secure the front door, escaping from villains by flying, moving to a new place, etc. (can’t think of any more at this very moment). I occasionally have sexual dreams, but they tend to be the exception rather than the rule. From time to time (not recently), I have nightmares of not being able to wake up within a nightmare. Those tend to leave me drenched in sweat.
Et toi, mon ami? What do you dream of? 🙂
On that note, 我要睡覺了. Zou san à toi. 🙂
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Et zou san to toi mon ami. 🙂
Dreams?
Hmm.
I process in the day. Writing does a lot of it. Consequently I don’t dream so much. The facet I remember the most is travelling. I tend to have normal dreams about normal things – people, places and things I can mostly identify from life.
If I come to the edge of a tall place, I jump off. I always fly.
No nightmares.
No sex.
Hmm.
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Hola, Robert! Wie geht’s? Maybe you dream more than you think, but don’t remember? Only maybe. 😊
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What’s the value of a meal you don’t eat, a book you don’t read or a dream you don’t remember? 🙂
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Hmm…thought provoking. There are many things we can’t recall consciously that shape who we are. Someone reminded me of that recently. 😜
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Still, there’s always scope for change. That’s the beauty of life – we don’t have to be stuck. I’m going to sleep now – it’s minutes to midnight. A manyana. 😉
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Ming tian jian! 😊
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Unlikely. But you will see my words if that’s any consolation. 😉
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You’re so literal. 😜 Comment vas-tu heute? 今大是星期五!😁
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Things is what they is – what can I say! 🙂
Really – all that to say that Friday is big? Bonkers!
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Oops, I meant to say today is Friday. I missed a stroke in the word 天 (day),so it became 大 (big). See what one little stroke does? 😜
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Hahaha – yes – I see what you mean. 🙂
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This is the comment I thought I was responding to earlier. 😉
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And yes, I agree that there’s always scope for change. 😊
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My fascinating dreams are one of the main reasons why I look forward to going to bed. 😊
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Actually, that’s really cool! 🙂
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Far out! 😁
You must be knackered after such a long day. Your Bett must be llamandote. 😊
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Yeah – it called to me, and I answered. I said ‘I’m coming’ and I came. Er, went, that is. 🙂
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It satisfies me to know that you… erm …
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… went. 😜
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😉
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Guess what? They got someone to help me out part-time. Yippee! 😁
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Hey! You got staff! Well done. 🙂
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She’s doing the grunt work. 😁
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Oh no! Not a grunter! 🙂
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Glad I don’t have to do the grunting anymore. 😜
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Hahaha! Quite! 🙂
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Gets tiring, the grunting. And the screaming. 😉
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Yeah – once it gets to the stage of screaming, it’s time to quit your job and move to the other side of the country. 🙂
Oh, wait …
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Haha! Good one. The latest news is that it may not be within the country after all. Still up in the air. 😊
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Well, I hope it turns out to be a place you can get used to, S.
For your delectation – here’s a list of the Top 10 Hardest Languages For Translators to Learn:
•Mandarin.
•Arabic.
•Hungarian.
•Korean.
•Finnish.
•Basque.
•Navajo.
•Icelandic.
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Xie xie ní! Mandarin is above Arabic? No way. I’ve been learning the Arabic alphabet recently. 😊
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Well there you go then – Arabia is the obvious choice. 🙂
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Just as I was just getting the hang of the Cyrillic alphabet. 😉
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I’m pretty sure you’ll get the hang of them all by the time you lose interest and take up embroidery and knitting. 🙂
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You say that as if I were some kind of genius. Embroidery and knitting don’t interest me in the slightest. I would, however, like to improve my pitiful drawing skills. 😊
Done your assignment?
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I’ve done the story. I just have to write the commentary now. 750 words before midnight. Should be doable. 🙂
Genius? Dunno. You’re good at languages and teaching – does that help?
And the rest of it? Yeah, just some kind of wit. 😀
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Last minute type of guy, are ya? Nice adrenaline rush.
Yeah, I’m not bad at those things. 😊
It occurred to me yesterday that your last name can be represented easily by a single Chinese character: 日. Hello, 日先生!😁
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Really? Then what does my name translate to? In English it’s Bright Shining Star (or something like that). 🙂
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You mean your first name? Don’t look it up. I’ll find out for you. 😊
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Yeah, you try looking up a single character! All I get for my troubles is a page of incomprehensibility. 😦
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At the risk of sounding like a smarty pants, I look up single characters all the time, and don’t find the corresponding pages incomprehensible. 😜
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What? I thought you knew these characters? 🙂
So, I used Google Translate and, yes – that’s very clever – the character in western characters is Rì and the meaning is Day. Very swish. 🙂
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Chinese equivalent of a typo. One excess or missing stroke can change the whole meaning. Don’t even get me started on the traditional vs. simplified characters (political divide: HK and Taiwan are sticking with the traditional system, and mainland China is using the simplified one). My sis is only two years younger, and can hardly remember any of the characters. She’s not that good at languages.
I know the character 日, thanks. 😊
Just realised after typing all this that I responded to the wrong comment. 😜
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Hahaha. 🙂
I’ll just nod and agree. 😉
Leaving the office now.
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Hasta pronto! 😁
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Check out this guy that just followed me: https://writersclubusa.wordpress.com/
Those are the kind of eyes I mean – can you imagine him speaking fluent Cantonese? 🙂
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Whoa! Yes, please. 😁
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Hahaha – I thought you might say that. 🙂
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Don’t know about the blonde hair though. I’m super vain and picky. 😋
Du bist noch im Büro?
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Super vain and picky. Hmm – that sounds like an interesting conversation you’re having with your inner being there. I’m reading a book called Self Compassion (stop beating yourself up and leave insecurity behind) and it mentions there that identification with the body (and other things that pass away) can lead to unhappiness. Apparently it’s best to take your awareness above these things. Be the awareness of the awareness (or something like that). 🙂
When you sent that message, I was in the pub having dinner (chips and a salad) before departing for another pub to join a Writing Group. But now, as I type this, I’m back in the office – yes.
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I often have fascinating conversations with myself. Thanks for noticing. 😁
I agree completely that identification with the body and anything else that is transient causes unhappiness. There is always a fight between the mind and the body for dominance. Depriving the body of what it craves would, in some cases, strengthen the body’s power over the ‘Self’, wouldn’t it? It’s so much easier to feel peaceful when the body is not suffering in one way or another. We can’t just ignore the fact that we are physical beings.
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I suppose it partly depends on how your mind was constructed by your culture and peers. I that Chinese people generally feel different on the inside to the way I feel about myself on the inside. We have a ‘Chinatown’ here in York. 🙂
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Strangely, I have very few memories of my life before age nine, so I feel as if I grew up in Canada. I wonder which culture has influenced me more.
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They say that the first 7 years are the formative ones. I’m sure you have taken the best from all sources. 🙂
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Do you remember your first seven years of life? I recall an event that occurred when I was seven. It was my second visit in Canada, and while I was having fun in the playground, I fell off the monkey bars. I sprained an arm (the left one, I think) and called out for my dad (not my mom). I remember being a little confused by ‘foreigners’ coming up to me asking if I was okay.
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I’m not sure it’s about what you remember consciously. It’s more about the pathways that are laid down in the brain in those years – the ways we react to things and how we perceive the world and … and stuff like that.
I remember some stuff from then, yes, but nothing that I can pin down to that age specifically. We would have been living in the flats (high-rise) in those years, and I remember scenes in that setting.
What confused you about the foreigners?
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Right, I understand what you mean now about those first few years being formative.
The foreigners confused me by not speaking Cantonese. 😉
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Ah, I see. So foreigners usually speak Cantonese then? 🙂
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No, you need to look into my mind as a 7-year-old. I expected EVERYONE to speak Cantonese. Okay, not really. I was distraught from having fallen and being in pain, so I must’ve been confused in general. 🙂
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I was joking. I knew that already. And now I know it far too well. I’m going to try to be more honest in future. To say what I mean, and mean what I say. 🙂
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That’s okay – I don’t mind you putting me on. It’s kinda fun. 🙂
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Whew. 🙂
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Is the Oriental tidal wave still crashing upon the city of York? Hahaha – just couldn’t resist. Was it mean of me not to have told you of my heritage back then? (What, and miss the fun I’m now having at your expense? Nah! ;-))
Don’t know if you’ll find this funny, but I guffawed while watching this (obviously, the guy is faking the accent, but it’s not bad): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ILcOEKk4zvg
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Oh yes, the Orientals (mainly Japanese as far as I can figure) are blocking the streets at all points. They seem fascinated by the building, stopping randomly at odd locations to take photograph after photograph. The thing is though – they seem oblivious to the people in York. They do not look at them, take photographs of them or even seem to be aware that they exist. It’s quite frustrating trying to get across a sea of them. Fun at my expense? What do you mean? I have no feeling of animosity towards them and I certainly don’t use Oriental as a derogatory term. Just because people get in the way doesn’t mean they’re bad. But I think I protest too much. 😉
And – that video – seriously? All I need is a hokey accent to be able to pick up cute chicks? Gah, if only I had known this when I was a kid!
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You need a flying car to get past them! 😁 I know you didn’t mean it in a derogatory manner; I just found it amusing that you mentioned the sea of Orientals out of the blue without knowing (consciously) that I was one.
The French accent is the most charming one. 😊
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Or, like, a hover board, dude! 😀
I’m strange like that. I come out with stuff that’s almost prescient. Every now and again.
May wee – the French are tray sharmon. 😉
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Far out! 😁 Let’s go hover-boarding!
These ‘incidents’ give you a glimpse into your subconscious knowledge.
French-Canadians, on the other hand…
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Okay – when I have to read back through the last 5 comments to understand what you’re saying (and meaning) then we’re in the realm of semantic confusion. More clues, please! 🙂
I have no subconscious knowledge. It only becomes knowledge (as in ‘known’) when I bring it into the conscious. And yeah, I just made that up. 😉
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Hahaha. I was referring to your subconscious sense of my Orientalism before you became consciously aware of it. 😁
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I know that now (that you were referring to my subconscious sense of your ‘Orientalism’ before I became consciously aware of it) – ’cause I read back. I was referring to the fact that I had to read back. 😉
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