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Earthquake update

Our thoughts are with those many who have lost loved ones and continue to struggle. Please follow Danwei for ways to help and donate. Much thanks to all of you who have inquired: the extended Beijing Sounds family is fine.

Posted 17 May 2008 † syz § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged:

“Si sain” to Echoes of Manchu

Introducing a new blog on Manchu
For those of us in the “slightly obsessive about Beijing Dialect” category, it’s always a bit of a head-scratcher to think that Mandarin was not the exclusive language of the ruling class here during a good chunk of the last 400 years.
The Manchu, with their mǎnyǔ (满语 = Manchu language) [...]

Posted 05 May 2008 † syz § ‡ Comments (0) ° Tagged: , ,

The road to corruption

Caution: Not a post to be read aloud among small children or grandmothers
Readers & commenters have been more diligent than your haplessly hard-working correspondent recently. There’s some great dialog about how L and N, or P, F & H blend together in different languages.

Posted 21 March 2008 † syz § ‡ Comments (2) ° Tagged:

Beizzhing, Medvedev, Whatever

Can’t resist the French reference in this NYT opinion piece, Medvedev. Mehd-V(y)EHD-yehf. Whatever, (hat tip to Language Hat) that parallels the Beijing Sounds discussion on English’s Beizzhing. Revealing quote:
One of the ways we compensate for the difficulty of foreign names is by adopting our own way of saying them. I once worked with [...]

Posted 14 March 2008 † syz § ‡ Comments (4) °