Foreign Vocabularies in Penang Hokkien

[Andrew Yong]

It is interesting that you say that round coins without holes were called lui. Douglas' dictionary of 1873 has no mention of lui, but Barclay's supplement of 1923 has

鐳 lui (R. id.), a cent. tang5-lui, copper cents. su3-ku2-lui, a small coin = 1/4 of a cent; a farthing.

Unlike Douglas, Barclay was not based in Hokkien, but in Taiwan. Could it be that the word lui was borrowed from Malay to represent the new coins without holes? (Unlike Hong Kong coins, the Straits coins did not have holes).

Also, "suku" for quarter must be a Malay word. su3 is literary for four, but ku2 is 久 韭 舉 and a fourth character meaning a carpenter's square, but none of these make sense.

[Leslie Chong]

I have seen kangkong or Mandarin "weng chai" described in English as "water spinach", "marsh spinach" or even "marsh weed" in different books. In Malaysia, if you are speaking English, it is quite correct to say kangkong when you want to refer to this vegetable. Nobody would know what you want if you say "water spinach"! It is also my favourite green vegetable, although it is a bit messy to prepare it, as I like to break up the stalks by hand in the traditional way rather than to cut them with a knife.