Taishan/Thai Connection

[Shi Tong]

Wow.. thanks again Hofmann.

The fact that:

I'm sure 零 (zero) is from Arabic.

you think comes from Arabic is really amazing.

[chrix]

What do you mean, amazing? "Zero" comes from Arabic sifr (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_for_the_number_0_in_English)

I guess Hofmann's post is a bit misleading because in Japanese 零 is officially pronounced "rei", which comes from Chinese, but unofficially it can be read "zero" as well, for which the official way to write it would be　ゼロ (it is a loan from English, ultimately from Arabic).

[Hofmann]

Actually "zero" doesn't look very credible to me as the kun-yomi of 零. Nor "maru," as that's just 圓, describing the shape of 〇. I'm inclined to think that if there is no (native) Japanese word that means the numeral 0, then 零 has no kun-yomi.

[chrix]

Yes, you're right. But sometimes you write 零 and pronounce it "zero". This kind of thing (assigning an English reading to a Chinese character or a combination of Chinese characters) especially happens in magazines and comics.

[Shi Tong]

What do you mean, amazing?

Well, not everyone has that knowledge Chrix, and I've not studied anything except Chinese. So to me, it's news, and that means it's amazing.

[Hofmann]

Upon learning about Thai numerals, I searched around neighboring languages and I found that Khmer numerals 30-90 are Sinitic. As they are exclusively used for 30-90, they can omit the "十" so that "三" means thirty.

[Shi Tong]

Wow!! kau4 for 9 is the closest thing to fu-jian hua, being pronounced "gao4", so this would mean that Khmer numerals are also related to middle Chinese.. right?

[Hofmann]

It seems that the general use 30-90 are.

[trien27]

Return to Taishan dialect:

I found this online today: http://asianworld.pftq.com/wiki/

[Hofmann]

There's a definite article, according to that site.

[vbjohnc]

Happy to find this post. I am of taishan (or I would like to say toisan) descent, first generation born in the USA. Was sent to Bangkok a few years ago for a foreign assignment with my company for two years. Wanted to report back that i was shocked to hear the similarities between toisan and thai. I hardly noticed it at first because I was expecting a totally foreign language.

Their numbers have many common sounding words like one (yit), ten (sip). I was pleasantly surprised. The writing however is totally foreign to me, obviously Indian influence. Anyway, I found the language fairly easier to learn than a typical american farang. The locals even commented on how well I was able to speak the local tones.

I was also very happy to see some of their home cooking to be very similar to my mother's toisan dishes. Dishes like bitter melon soup, the bamboo-wrapped rice (doongs), and many more made Thailand feel very much like home. I was in heaven!!

Wandering around in Bangkok Chinatown with my parents (they were visiting) they found some locals that actually spoke toisan. It is a small world indeed!