Thanks Pascal; That's the kind of thing I find fascinating. On Thu, 2006-31-08 at 10:05 +0800, Chong Yu Meng wrote: > On Wed, 2006-08-30 at 05:50 +0800, Ed Greshko wrote: [snip] > Actually the Chinese language has a lot more variants than English, and > there isn't even a body of water like the Atlantic to create that > diversity. > > There are two written script systems and one common language -- what you > Westerners would call Mandarin -- and many, many dialects. But even with > Mandarin, there are many variations in usage and terminology similar to > the examples of "lift" and "elevator" given previously. So, even when > someone speaks only Mandarin, you can tell where that person is from, > based on accent and terminology used -- similar to the Southern term > y'all. You can also tell if the person speaking Mandarin is an "overseas > Chinese" (someone whose family has lived outside China for generations) > or someone from PRC, Taiwan or Hong Kong. > Same skills, same problems, same results no matter what the language. It is nice to know. Can I ask, does Mandarin have the equivalent of Tongue Twisters or other word/language (nonsense) games? -- Regards Bill
