Grandpa Kai

When I was a child in Maaubou, I caught shrimps from the village pond and carried home fish when it was drained for harvest. When I returned to my village, I strolled by the pond and sought the space in front of the Chan Ancestral Hall where I had played as a child. By the benches there under the banyan tree I saw a gathering of elderly residents. As I made my way to them, I was warmly greeted as they recognised me. We had a lively conversation in our Aawu dialect. One elder laughed and asked how a man who left at age four could still speak the dialect. Another asked whether my siblings and cousins in Canada still spoke it. To their amusement, I even got my wife to sing in the local dialect a childhood nursery rhyme that I taught her. All were pleasantly surprised that I proudly retained the dialect after almost fifty years. I explained that I spoke with my parents exclusively in dialect growing up. However, their astonishment is not without merit. Over the years, standard Cantonese and then Mandarin have overtaken the area as the village urbanised and migrants from other parts of…

Tomorrow 50 years later

As I sat with my wife on the stone bench in front of my childhood home in the village of 𝐴𝑎𝑤𝑢 (鸦湖 = “Crow Lake”), an elderly lady walked by us and without pausing asked if I was the boy from that house who left nearly fifty years ago. She finally stopped 15 metres away below the arch at the front of the laneway to rest by the entryway shrine. I followed her there and confirmed that I am indeed that boy and we quickly slipped into conversation in our 𝐴𝑎𝑤𝑢 dialect (countryside Cantonese), which instantly gave us a connection. As we spoke, an elderly gentleman walked by and he too without stopping remarked as he strode past us, “I remember Kai. He would always say ‘tomorrow’ whenever we asked him when he would be moving to Canada.” Over the years, several other residents of 𝑀𝑎𝑎𝑢𝑏𝑜𝑢 (茅㘵 = “Reed Field”; a neighbourhood within 𝐴𝑎𝑤𝑢), have told me the same story. Apparently, as a child I was quite loquacious and would go around greeting all the households in the laneways connected to 𝑀𝑎𝑎𝑢𝑏𝑜𝑢 Street. When news came about that my family would be moving to Canada, all the people of 𝑀𝑎𝑎𝑢𝑏𝑜𝑢…

Ancestral village

I was born in Guangdong Province, China near the city of Guangzhou (previously known as Canton) in 1975. The region, which goes by the name of "Renhe" (人和) in Mandarin (Jan4wo4 in Cantonese (Jyutping transliteration)), lies only 30 minutes by car (or metro) from downtown Guangzhou. Back in the 1970s, however, the only option was a full-day’s trip by bicycle (or an infrequent local bus). Renhe has its own dialect of Cantonese. The difference in our version is mostly a “lazy” tone and pronunciation. However, we also have a rich portfolio of words (and word usages) distinct to us. When people from my village speak our dialect in the city (i.e. Guangzhou), most just assume (and somewhat correctly) that we are farmers. Or in the case of Hong Kong for me, the assumption often is that I am an overseas Chinese who speaks poorly and/or with a strong accent. At one point in my life I did speak Cantonese poorly. I left my childhood village at an early age and grew up in Toronto. For fear of not being able to learn English, my father forbade me from speaking in Chinese with my siblings. Therefore, growing up I spoke (dialect)…