Newsgroups: soc.culture.china,soc.culture.hongkong,soc.culture.taiwan,sci.lang
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!howland.reston.ans.net!news.sprintlink.net!sunserver.insinc.net!cuugnet!fungk
From: fungk@cuug.ab.ca (Kwok Fung 268-1854)
Subject: Re: Original Chinese Language
Message-ID: <D0yqoJ.6Au@cuug.ab.ca>
Followup-To: soc.culture.china,soc.culture.hongkong,soc.culture.taiwan,sci.lang
Organization: Calgary UNIX User's Group
X-Newsreader: TIN [version 1.2 PL2]
References: <3c3dgu$fba@agate.berkeley.edu> <3cggb9$817@usenet.rpi.edu> <3cjbl8$33g@zip.eecs.umich.edu> <3cqq8o$2li@irisa.irisa.fr> <D0wCrM.2o2@inter.NL.net>
Date: Sat, 17 Dec 1994 16:16:57 GMT
Lines: 21

Miguel Carrasquer (mcv@inter.NL.net) wrote:

: Unlike the other Western European languages, the Portuguese word 
: for tea is cha'.  Somewhat surprising, considering that Macao
: is in the Southern Chinese area.

I am from Macau and I pronounce it 'cha'.  Now, why would you be
surprised if the Portuguese pronounce it 'cha' too ?

BTW, some people in Kwangtung province pronounce it as 'tae' or 'dae', and
some pronounce it as 'cha'.  Macau is in the region where it is pronounced
as 'cha'.

I wonder how Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Laotian, Cambodian, Miaos,
Yeaos, Mongs, and various other people in Asia pronounce the word, though.

As to how Europeans get their pronounciation, I wonder when did they
get the word, is it during the Silk Road period, when merchants went
from Europe to China over land, or later.  Did the French learnt about
tea from the Russians or the Portuguese, or the Italians ?

