22 May 2011

iPhone Cantonese Appli

The best way to improve your foreign language skills is to stay in touch with the language and culture all the time! We live in the age of information technology and there are many helpful and fun tools out there. I think the following iPhone "cha chaan teng menu" application is really cool :)

http://itunes.apple.com/app/hong-kong-style-cafe-food/id324829367?mt=8

As you can see from the photo, it shows both English word and Cantonese word (incl. Pin Yin & Chinese characters) AND how to pronouce the word in Cantonese with sound.

Always try to order in Cantonese when you are in Chinatown!

3 comments:

PuiPui* said...

What a cool app! I like that there's a photo too, it’ll help you to visualise what you're saying. hmm makes me want to eat ball law bau now...

jimsi said...

good app with the cantonese sound . but i am trying to eat less . have to pick the right calorie

Mei said...

true, it helps you visualise what you are saying - and make you hungry too! calorie?? haha forget about it, it's just number! eat well :)

Tones - the little numbers on this blog

Cantonese has six tones, we use numbers after each word to identify them
1 = High Falling - as in King
2 = Mid-rising - you??
3 = Mid-level - boon3 (half)
4 = Low Falling - kingdom
5 = Low-rising - ngoh5 (I, me)
6 = Low-level - ngoh5 dei6 (we) sounds like day

alas they're very important, see: