We celebrated the solar New Year a day early, by having some friends over for 打邊爐.  One of our guests is a learned 老師 .  He mentioned a quirk in Chinese languag...

cheat, meet, and see.MP3 - YV-150     How do you say  呃人  in English?   To cheat : must involve unjust enrichment at others expe...

One Foot in the Grave Intuitively, ESL students would guess, correctly, that the expression means a person is dying.  Is there a more imaginative way than 死咗半 or 死咗大...

I am old enough to remember the days, back in the 1950’s, when the terms 老公 and 老婆 were considered crude (粗俗) by 斯文 folks.  By the 1990s, years before I moved back ...

The Riot Act The word “act” here is not related to the performing arts.  In this context, with the capital A, it is a legal term.  Originally, it meant a proposed law...

We’ll Cross that Bridge When We Get to It is   到時先算喇   in Cantonese. For those of us at or near retirement age, and with extensive exposure to Am...

    Q, cue, queue   the /ı℧/ sound    =  蕭 – S  + K   the /ju:/ sound = letter U, or YOU   Q, cue, queue  ...

  Thanks to Bobby Jr., and Thoughts, for their suggestions of the following: Encore  / ’a:ŋkכ:(r) /  Tony =  韜–ny, not 通-ny   Sony = ...

  NOUN              TOWN              GOWN ...

Somebody hold me back.... I am out of control.... I can’t stop...  Maybe I’m letting Broomhead get to me with her exposé of bad English on the part of high l...