Episode 3: Twisted Linguistics

Growing up in our household there were 3 languages: Grandma’s language, our language and English. I would later piece these into the real world with Grandma’s language being Cantonese, our language being “Ngai” (𠊎話) and English of course as English.

We as siblings were always told by Dad growing up, “Chinese people should speak Chinese, be it Grandma’s language or ours, stop speaking English at home!” The naïve child me would agree with Dad, ever the patriot; we are Chinese and we should indeed be speaking our own languages. The adolescent me however, somewhat more cynical having gained the gift of perspective weighed things up differently. Despite having been in the UK since 1980 his grasp of English has remained non existent so the thought of a “foreign” language being spoken under his roof must have irked him. Not to totally explain the real reason for banning English at home but certainly a strong contributing factor I feel.

 

Grandma’s Language

Cantonese to the rest of the world, although this was often the language spoken in Chinese films, TV shows on VHS and pop music that we were exposed to, I wanted no part in learning this as a child. Only Grandma spoke it. Absolutely everyone else in the family spoke ‘our language’ it would surely have been easier for Grandma to just learn to speak ‘our language’ all those years ago. I hated the idea of learning a whole different language just to communicate to Grandma. Resourceful as I was even at that age, it was a waste of my energy and efforts.

I would of course discover in later life that of our 2 Chinese languages it was in fact Grandma’s language that would prove the more useful and more widely used in the real world. Though I always knew through TV and media that beyond our family Cantonese was more widely used, it didn’t become tangible or real until we began to see Mum and Dad switching languages in Chinese restaurants and supermarkets for the message to hammer home. Grandma’s language wasn’t just for communicating with Grandma, it was for everyone.

Despite Grandma living with us, the conversations we had were limited; typically household and day to day related. We didn’t have day trips together, holidays or even eat out so the scope for learning and improving Cantonese was so restricted. Added to this, like many in her generation Grandma was also illiterate so there was never a promise of anything beyond the limited spoken exchanges.

Though I may have accepted the importance and wider use of Cantonese my desire to learn it remained low (in part due to the identity issues covered in episode 2). Mum and Dad would repeatedly tell us to learn it, without teaching it (though I do vaguely remember any attempts to speak to us in Cantonese was often just blanked or met with ‘stop speaking to me in Grandma’s language’). Of our 2 languages Cantonese was by far the lesser spoken of the two which meant I wasn’t very good at it. It was ultimately an almost impossible environment to learn and improve Cantonese at home. Cantonese school at the weekend may have seemed like a solution but it would only further fuel the resentment towards learning it. There’s perhaps another episode in Chinese school alone, but in short I hated being there and hated that it took up what felt a huge portion of my weekend despite being just 3 hours on a Sunday morning.

 

Our Language

There is little written about our “Ngai” (𠊎話) language; my research yielded absolutely nothing at all (possibly a better indicator of my research skills than anything). What I do know is the language is a derivative of the more widely known and spoken Hakka Chinese (客家) so perhaps better described as a Hakka dialect rather than a language. To Mandarin or Cantonese speakers it can sound like a hybrid of the two, whilst also often bearing no resemblance to either!

Its use is far from what you’d describe as wide. The language as we know it was widely used by the ethnic Chinese in north Vietnam and across the border into Guanxi, China. Since the mass migration from the area in the late 1970s and early 1980s knowledge and use of the language will have depleted significantly; firstly by the now overseas Chinese who more often than not will have opted to speak and teach Cantonese exclusively to future generations given its wider use and secondly within China the government’s push for Mandarin to be universal to the exclusion of all other dialects.

Our language was spoken by everyone in our family, both paternal and maternal sides. The closest family friends also spoke it so as a child through language it was very easy to determine who was family (or at least very close to it) and who wasn’t. For my parents there was never a doubt that this would be the spoken language at home. It’s the language my parents spoke to each other, their siblings and their parents (with the exception of paternal Grandma). It was never even a discussion I’m told.

Despite the amount of exposure as a child within the family, it soon dawned on me that no other children my age/generation was speaking it… Even amongst my own cousins. The eldest 5 of Mum’s 7 siblings were married, all of whom to partners who spoke both Cantonese and our Hakka dialect. All but one of those families opted to teach Cantonese exclusively to their children, an approach shared by so many families which has ultimately contributed to the language’s decline. Despite its seeming lack of popularity I always embraced it and revelled in the fact that we had what at times felt like our very own ‘secret language’.

 

English

The outlawed language at home! It doesn’t bother Dad so much these days but once upon a time we’d be having to choose our moments carefully, not just when but also in which tongue we spoke. There was never a punishment per se, but often Dad’s demand that we speak Chinese would just be met with silence. Partly down to him totally killing the vibe but mainly down to us not being able to articulate as well in our own language what we could in English.

So English was learnt at school with next to no exposure to it at home. I would’ve been that kid in nursery speaking Chinese to the teacher for the first few weeks or so. Not your regular Chinese either, as explained above this was some secret backwards hillbilly Hakka Chinese that 99% of Chinese people wouldn’t even understand.

Kids learn fast though and we all grasped English pretty quickly and are all totally fluent as you’d expect of any other person born and raised in the UK. Between us siblings English remains the preferred language which is the case with pretty much all family and friends for whom English is native or fluent.

 

Missed Tricks

Fast forward to 2019 my eldest Ruby is attending Cantonese school herself, now into her second year. We try our best to keep her enthusiasm to learn and motivation levels up (admittedly it often involves cake and bubble tea) which is something I feel was a real struggle for me when I was sent to Chinese school on Sundays as a child.

Being able to help and support children at home as they learn is vital and my own inability to support in this area, through my own poor Chinese literacy, led me to enrolling in evening school myself to learn Mandarin.

Why Mandarin and not Cantonese? I remember once catching a snippet of a debate/discussion/interview on Chinese TV, in mandarin, that Dad was watching. Whilst we never actively learned Mandarin we did have some exposure to it. I have no idea who this person was, how significant a public figure or even the forum was but the key take-out for me was ‘Chinese people must speak Mandarin. The other dialects are not important. The nation’s people, Chinese people must speak Mandarin. Those who can’t or won’t are idiots’ (or words to that effect). Whilst I may not agree with the dismissive attitude towards other dialects (Cantonese is in fact an older language with a far richer history for instance) or the damning of those who can’t speak it, I do agree that as the nation’s language Chinese people should be encouraged to speak it. So for me the hope is that whilst learning to speak what is a new language in Mandarin, the reading and writing elements will benefit my Cantonese also, thus enabling me to continue my ‘super Dad who knows everything’ role.

Thinking back to my very first class, I couldn’t get over the feeling of regret that I didn’t do this sooner. What was stopping me from doing this 10 or 15 years ago? After all I had some very humbling and borderline humiliating experiences in my late teens early 20s when visiting China and Hong Kong; not being able to speak, read or write as well as the expectation might be despite in appearance at least being like everybody else. Not to dwell too much on the past I can’t control, I realise that my thoughts and feelings about learning Mandarin today are totally positive. It has reinforced my view that it’s never too late to learn and the importance of continually investing in and bettering yourself.

 

Soundtrack to this Episode

Songs in A Minor – Alicia Keys (album)

Ashanti – Ashanti (Album)

Great 5000 Secs – Eason Chan (Album)

Victoria – G.E.M.

小問題– AGA

You Don’t Know Me – Dusty Bottle

真的愛你 – Beyond

老少平安 – Packho Chau

13樓的大笨象 – Stephanie Cheng

 

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