San Francisco Cantonese

From Charles Belov:

While riding the 22 Fillmore bus through the Mission District in San Francisco today, I overheard a conversation in Cantonese. It was nearly 100% in Cantonese, not the Cantlish* that I rarely also hear. What surprised me, though, was when one of the elderly speakers said "Hong Kong" they used the English pronunciation, not the Cantonese one. Aside from those two words, it was all in Cantonese.

And my Cantonese is so minimal that I know nothing of the topic of their conversation aside from the words "faan heui," to return-go, shortly after which the words "Hong Kong" occurred. Not that it would be any of my business – I don't care what people say; I just care how they say it.

Just so you know, the Mission District is mainly known as a Latinx area – I also heard Spanish there on my walk today – although there have been Chinese businesses in the area for many years and it has also seen quite a bit of gentrification in recent years.

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*"Cantlish" is the Cantonese learner’s equivalent to "Chinglish" (e.g., when you use English word order with Cantonese words). (source)

Etymology

From the Cantonese 香港 (hoeng¹ gong², “Fragrant Harbor”), the former name of a settlement in what is now Aberdeen on the southwest side of Hong Kong Island.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˌhɒŋˈkɒŋ/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˌhɔŋˈkɔŋ/
  • (cot–caught merger) IPA^(key): /ˌhɑŋˈkɑŋ/
• (Hong Kong) IPA^(key): [hɔŋ˥ kʰɔŋ˥]
• Rhymes: -ɒŋ
• enPR: hǒngʹ kǒngʹ

(Wiktionary)

Mandarin to IPA Translator

香 /ɕjɑŋ55/ 港 /kɑŋ21˦/, /xʊŋ51/

 

Selected readings

• "Spoken Hong Kong Cantonese and written Cantonese" (8/29/13)
• "Languages of Hong Kong" — Wikipedia