Penang Hokkien Vocabulary Questions (Part 2)

[amhoanna]

博 èngkai sī cèngkhak-e：

http://www.zdic.net/zd/zi/ZdicE5Zdic8DZdic9A.htm

佇美麗島逐个 ná 像攏共 poa̍hpoe 寫做跋杯，其実博杯則是正字。

[aokh1979]

Something stroked me today. I remember someone asked me about why people say 無要緊 as bō-iau-kín and sometimes bō-iang-kín......

Would it be 無用緊 ? Chinese Malaysians often say 不用緊 instead of 不要緊, I suppose it's simply bō-iong-kín...... ^^

[amhoanna]

The Ong Le recording has boē iàukín. This was borne out by every book I flipped through in the Philippines.

A co-worker of mine in Taipak -- a local belle -- always said "bô-ài-kín".

I guess your intuitions are a step ahead of the Hoklo language itself in its adventure in Mandarinization...

[Mark Yong]

My impression is that 不用 for 免/不必 is a Northern trait, not Southern. If Hokkien speakers today did say 無用緊, my first reaction to it would be that it is Mandarin influence - 抗議! 抗議!

[Ah-bin]

Isn't it just assimilation of the -iau final to the following k-, as in be-hiang-kong "cannot say" and be-hiang-khoaN?

When I first heard it in Taiwanese it always sounded like 'boa-kin'

[SimL]

I just re-read Bodman, and in Yap Un Pho's supplementary word list at the back of Volume 2, it says:

puăq: To throw on the floor.
puăq puê: To throw two wooden blocks in divination of one’s luck (Mark Yong: Sounds like 求籖 to me… y’know, shaking the container that contains the wooden reeds till one falls out).
Both entries are listed together, signifying the same morpheme.

I am assuming here that Mr. Yap knew the Chinese character for it, in order to make the above connection. On that basis, would anyone know what the character for puăq, as in “to throw on the floor” would be? And would that therefore be the Chinese character for puaq-kiau?

I always thought it was the same "puah8" as "puah8-to2" (= "to fall over, trip and fall"), as that is what one causes the sticks to do. But Douglas doesn't think this, and lists "puah-pue" (like Bodman) under the same "puah" as "puah-kiau".

poah, to gamble; to play a game of chance (sometimes to divine or draw lots). poah-kiau, to gamble; gambling (v. kiau). [...] poah-toaN, to draw by lot (in presence of idol) which play is to be played. poah-koa, to divine by tortoiseshell (v. koa). poah-poe, to divine by bamboo roots (v. poe).

But then again, Douglas doesn't give a character for the "puah" of "gambling", so perhaps even that is the same character as "falling". After all, most gambling games involve throwing things down (cards, dice, etc).

[niuc]

Thank you, Ah-bin, for info about sandhis in other Chinese languages. I know about Mandarin third tone, however what I was saying is that sandhi is not applied to all tones. Very interesting to read about sandhi in other Sinitic groups, hopefully you, Amhoanna, Sim and others will share more about this next time.

The other place you might have come across it in Penang is "cui2-cEN2" (literally "water well"), which was one of the terms for the large cement receptacle filled with water, in the bathroom, from which one scooped water to "bathe". This topic was covered in detail some time back, but perhaps the term for the object wasn't mentioned. I don't know if it's the proper term, or just "borrowed usage" - what did your family call it, niuc?

Sim, for this cement receptacle that is not a real well [ 古井, 深井(仔) ], we call it tî 池 (i.e. a pool). My impression is that it can be called cuí-tî 水池 also, although 水池 in Bagansiapiapi usually means a much larger cement water storage pool (water tank) under the floor.

Btw, "cebok" in Bahasa Indonesia means "anal washing".

I only heard of 天津 as Thian-cin, including from here http://203.64.42.21/iug/ungian/SoannTeng/chil/chha.asp .

[Mark Yong]

SimL wrote:
I always thought it was the same "puah8" as "puah8-to2" (= "to fall over, trip and fall"), as that is what one causes the sticks to do. But Douglas doesn't think this, and lists "puah-pue" (like Bodman) under the same "puah" as "puah-kiau".

Hi, Sim,

I gave this a bit of thought a moment ago, and tried mumbling both words to myself.

When I recall back, for ‘falling’, I have always heard it either as poat8-to2 or pat-to2 (Penang Hokkien seems to have this penchant for turning diphthongs into monophthongs!), i.e. with a -t ending.

However, in the case of ‘gambling’, I seem to always hear it as poah-kiau or poq-kiau - a weak -k or glottal stop, but never a -t ending (or perhaps I could have been mistaken).

niuc wrote:
..."cebok" in Bahasa Indonesia means "anal washing".

No sh1t... (yes, pun intended)

[SimL]

Hi Mark,

Valid point. You are definitely right that in Penang Hokkien "fall, trip" is pronounced "poat-to". However, I had always thought that the underlying "poah-" in it lost its "-h" (very common in non-final syllables ending in "-h" anyway), and then acquired the "-t" from the "t-" of "to".

But yes, your view of things is probably much more accurate.

[Mark Yong]

Hi, Sim,

A good point on the possible fusion with the t- initial in 倒 tó .

I gave it another acid test: Instead of 跋倒 pŏat tó, this time I tried mumbling 跋落去 pŏat lōq (k)hĭ (which is another common alternative way to say ‘fall down’). Now, this could be a vestige from the afore-mentioned t- fusion, but again, it still comes out as pŏat, not pŏah.

Again, I am not a native speaker, so perhaps one of the others could comment...?