Cantonese !!

[trien27]

It's most likely than not that some of the vocabulary of Mainland China were borrowed from Hong Kong Cantonese: Such as 樓盤 / 楼盘 or 買單 / 埋單 . It's not original Mandarin / Putonghua usage.

[skylee]

見牙唔見眼 ~ a description for someone who is laughing very happily.

[studentyoung]

仔大，仔世界；女大，女世界。

When a son has grown up, the world is his own world; when a daughter has grown up, the world is her own world.

Cheers!

[trien27]

見牙唔見眼

=

見牙 = to see [only] the teeth, but 唔見眼 = doesn't see the eyes. The meaning of the phrase is actually the smiley I' ve used.

But the actual phrase is 笑到見牙唔見眼, which is the meaning given by Skylee.

Edited July 25, 2009 at 08:23 PM by trien27
additional information

[skylee]

拉埋天窗 = 結婚

I heard this said in a supermarket (someone said that his brother was getting married soon) today and I could hardly believe people really used this description as it sounded really old-fashioned.

[wushijiao]

Funny, 拉埋天窗 is the Cantonese name of one of the best books for learning Cantonese "Wedding Bells: Cantonese reading material for intermediate and advanced learners" by Yin Ping Cream Lee and Shn Kataoka.

The story is basically about an assertive, independent woman (女强人) falling in love with a Japaenese man. I'm not one for romantic stories per se, but the book is really made (with a 1-2 minutes chapter or story, followed by vocab and grammar, plus CD), and the book is clearly based on the authors' own experience, so its fairly authentic.

I think this book is part of a series, the others being Feng Shui Master, and the story of Minami, which are both good as well.

[skylee]

官仔骨骨 = 帥氣 + 貴氣 + 一表人才

A handsome / well-groomed / well-dressed man can be described as 官仔骨骨.

Met a co-worker this morning and this description came up in my head.

[skylee]

捉伊人 / 伏匿匿 = 捉迷藏

煮飯仔 = 擺家家 / 扮家家酒

[skylee]

落雨濕濕 - "It's raining and it's wet". You use this to express you are (kind of) unhappy about the rain and the wet weather. You can use it as a reason when you want to reschedule a date , decline a meeting, etc. "改期啦，落雨濕濕。“

[xiaocai]

捉伊人

This sounds quite romantic to me.

[trien27]

捉伊人

This sounds quite romantic to me.

Well, in "捉伊人", "伊人" isn't used semantically, but for it's approximate phonetic in spoken / colloquial Cantonese meaning "hide & seek". "伊人" could actually be from "小鳥伊人"/ "小鸟伊人", used to describe a woman who's "gentle/weak, feminine, demure" or "has long hair, & is small/tiny (physical size)."

Edited September 20, 2009 at 03:11 AM by trien27

[skylee]

When someone does not know much about something but thinks/pretends that s/he does, you can describe him/her as 識小小，扮代表.

When someone thinks that s/he deserves a lot of attention/privileged treatment, or when that someone is regarded to be very important or treated with privilege, and you disagree, you can comment / exclaim 懶巴閉.

PS - putting them together and you get - 識小小，扮代表，懶巴閉！.

Edited November 22, 2009 at 02:09 PM by skylee

[skylee]

密探睥死羊, the Chinese name of the film "The Men Who Stare at Goats" in Hong Kong,is IMHO like the cutest film title. Literally it means Secret Agent(s) stare(s) Goat(s)/Sheep to Death.

[skylee]

小貓三四隻 = 很少人 (used to describe a flim screening, a conference, a meeting, etc)

賓虛咁嘅場面 = 很多人，很熱鬧 (literally it means "it is like in Ben Hur") (I suspect only older people in Hong Kong understand it )

[skylee]

I was discussing with a friend about some of our great grand parents being foreigners, when she suddenly used this word, which was a shock to me as the term is so seldom heard these days -

鹹蝦燦 = 混血兒

Another term which is also not used much now is -

半唐番 = 混血兒

[skylee]

About time.

上晝 / 朝頭早 = 上午 / 早上

下晝 / 晏晝 = 下午

點 / 點鐘 = 時 / o'clock

一個字 = five minutes

一個骨 = 一刻鐘 / a quarter of an hour （BTW, a quarter of a pound is also 一個骨, 4 ounces of butter is 一個骨牛油)

三個骨 = three quarters of an hour

七點鐘 = 七點 / 七時

七點兩個字 / 七點二 = 七時十分

七點八個字 / 七點八 = 七時四十分

七點三個字 / 七點三 / 七點一個骨 = 七時十五分 / 七時一刻

七點九個字 / 七點九 / 七點三個骨 = 七時四十五分 / 七時三刻

骨 (quarter) seems to have become old-fashioned.

[wai ming]

I'm not sure how widely this is used, but when I was at HKU a few years ago, I heard a lot of students use 搭 to refer to minutes past the hour. For example 搭三 = quarter past the hour (the minute hand points to 3).

[skylee]

I think it is 踏三 (not sure, but the tones of 搭 and 踏 are different, so I think it is the latter). It is very common.

[wai ming]

Thanks for the correction, skylee It's good to know that it is common usage.

[skylee]

麻麻（地) = not very good / not much ~ 不怎麼

我燒嘢食麻麻 (actually I heard this at a market today) ~ I don't like barbecue much

件衫麻麻 ~ this piece of garment is not so good (I think)

成績麻麻 ~ not very good (academically)