Deciding to pay a visit to my former colleagues and kitchen manager Sam and Hairul, I went down to California Pizza Kitchen today after I finished school.
As I sat down to have dinner with Indra and Aidil, this China girl came over and looked at me, curious. Knowing what's on her mind without asking, I smiled and explained in fluent mandarin, "I used to work here."
Somehow surprised, she asked, "Are you a Singaporean or (China)Chinese?"
"I'm a Singaporean." I replied.
"How come you can speak mandarin?" the poor girl asked, baffled.
"That's because I'm a Chinese, you can't tell?" I said.
"So all Singaporean Chinese can speak mandarin?" she asked.
The conversation amused me, because this was not the first time a China national asked me these questions. Alamak, you think all Singaporean Chinese *jiak gung dang one meh? We may be an English speaking nation, but for your information we Chinese actually still speak mandarin(although not fluently).
*jiak gung dang - eating potatoes; in hokkien, often used to describe English speaking Chinese
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2 comments:
Max, maybe you'll understand why Chinese think Singaporese can't speak Mandarin AFTER you've heard my speak Mandarin. No wait... After you've heard me ATTEMPT (and fail miserably) to speak Mandarin.
hahahaha....
Why am I amused. I should be ashamed!
hehehehe...
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