"No Smoking" in Cantonese?

[naus888]

How do you say the following in Cantonese?

No Smoking

You cannot smoke here

Don't smoke here

Thanks!

[Quest]

禁止/不准吸烟/唔准食烟

呢度唔畀食烟

唔该唔好喺度食烟

[Ian_Lee]

Official sign posted in HK (i.e elevator) uses 不准吸烟.

The main difference between Cantonese and Mandarin is 吸 vs 抽. Of course, if you say 抽烟 in Cantonese, people still understand what you mean. But probably they can guess that you are a non-native.

IMHO 吸 (suck) is more accurate than 抽 (draw) to describe the action of smoking cigarettes.

P.S. 不准吸煙 is more often used than 不准吸烟 in HK.

[naus888]

Interesting that Cantonese uses 食 (to eat) in the vernacular.

In Shanghaihua, we use a similar verb: 喫 (吃) (to eat, drink).

Also since SHH is not very literary, we never say 吸煙 or 抽煙 in SHH, but only just 喫香煙 for "to smoke." 煙 is also never used by itself for tobacco, so 喫煙 would mean "eat smoke" rather than "to smoke."

So, in SHH:

No smoking

勿准喫香煙

You cannot smoke here.

儂搿搭勿可以喫香煙個

Do not smoke here.

覅勒勒搿搭喫香煙

[Guest Roderic]

For questions about cantonese,

I think you can post it here.

A UK-based cantonese forum which gives a rapid response on cantonese learners. The answer usually comes with Cantonese pinyin (either Jyutyin or Yale Romanization system) .

http://www.cantonese.sheik.co.uk/phorum/

---------------------------------

Omnipotent Big Brother in Charge

http://chinese-forums.com/viewtopic.php?t=2894&start=20