Foreign Vocabularies in Penang Hokkien

[casey]

As far as I know "lui1" originally refers to copper coins to be distinguished from those with a square hole in the middle. They were called "tang5 lui1" or simply "lui1". Those with square holes in the middle were called "tang5 ci*5" or simply "ci*5". Both "ci*5" and "lui1" were extended to mean money, hence rich is "u7 ci*5" or "u7 lui1". China started to mint copper coins without a square hole only in the late Qing dynasty. However, being aware of all this does solve the problem regarding "lui1" being an original Minnan term or a borrowed one.

[casey]

Sorry, correction of typo-mistake in the last sentence. It should have been:
"However, being aware of all this does NOT solve the problem regarding "lui1" being an original Minnan term or a borrowed one.

[casey]

Water crest is "西洋菜", definitely not kangkong.

[Eng Wai]

Is "空管” pronounced as "khang1 kong2" in Hokkien? I will prononce it as "khang1 kuan2". Hanzi for "ing chai" is 蕹菜 (雍+草?)。I was thinking if the vocab "蕹" is another word coined by Hokkien (Malaysians!?). However, I could type this word using my NJStar word processor. So I guess it is a proper Chinese vocabulary.

Another question, what is "西洋菜“ called in Hokkien? Did we import it from the westerners? It is so incorporated in our (at least me) diet and I never find them on the Uk supermarket shelves (maybe there are a lot but I just missed it).

Eng Wai

[hong]

In research article in chinese.pku.....about teochew in thailand.The scholar writes thai teochew still use lui for money but teochew in china have changed to ciN . So this is a prove that it was chinese who bring the word lui to south east asia but not invented in here.But it is not popular in china because it was just a non chinese zhuang people's word for money.I think most people say in their dialect as 银两 for years in china.
In nihaotw.com minnan story telling ,lui as money is mentioned .

[casey]

管can be pronounced as 1."kuan2" (文读), 2."kng2"(白读) and 3 "kong2”(俗读). As a noun, it is pronounced as "kng2" indicating a hollow cylindrical object, e.g., water pipe "cui2 kng2" or "cui2 kong2", bamboo pipe "tik4 kng2" or "tik4 kong2". It is also used as a numerical, e.g., "cit8 kong2 bi2"一管米. Kong2 may also be written as 共(木边). When used as a verb, 管means to manage, to control or to supervise, and is pronounced as kuan2.

[Eng Wai]

It really seems like my Hokkien knowledge is very limited.

Eng Wai

[casey]

Eng Wai

m7 bian2 khe4 khi3不必客气. Our knowledge is limited, every one of us is the same. Each one of us may know some thing other people do not know. This is why we have this forum for us to share what we know. Through our repeated discussions, arguments and debates, we benefit to improve ourselves and this is the main objective.

[casey]

About water crest西洋菜and its origin.
(Sorry guys! This has nothing to do with Minnan dialect but since it was brought up, we just settle it here for convenience sake.)

I came across this information on the website:
http://food.mty.com.cn/wenhua/zatan/200 ... 91033.html

It was told that during early 20th century, a Cantonese person by the name of Wong Sang (Huang Sheng 黄生) went to Portugal to do business there. He suffered a loss and did not have money to return to Guangdong, and worse, he fell sick. It was diagnosed to be TB, a serious respiratory disease with no cure at that time. The authority isolated him in the country side so that the disease might not spread around. Since he had no money, he ate what he could get from the nature. He ate a lot of a kind of plant abundantly grown wild on the riverside. Result? As all of you could guess he recovered from the disease. So when he finally return to his home town Zhongshan, Guangdong he brought back this wonderful plant, hence its name 西洋菜(the vegetable from the west).
In China, this vegetable is also called 豆瓣菜owing to its appearance. (Please do not mix it up with "dou4 miau2", another popular vegetable.)

[Niuc]

In our usage, 管 kong2 usually is bigger than kng2. We say 水管 cui2-kong2 not cui2-kng2, 竹管 tik4-kong2, but 血管 hui4-kng2 (blood vessel). 一管米 cit8-kong2-bi2 we usually say 一管仔米 cit8-kong2-a8-bi2.

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