Prosperous Corner? Rainbow? Extremely Ancient? Grade One City? Lost in Mong Kok blog has attempted to translate the meaning of all MTR station names. The fellow blogger, who is learning Cantonese, explains that these are direct translations as the Cantonese meaning does not always carry over neatly. Click the image below for the full version.
via lostinmongkok.wordpress.com
Looks like ?? got the wrong transcription and translation though. Inspired by a map of the London Underground with modern translations of ancient placenames, I’ve wanted to do something like this for some time.
Looks like 古洞 got the wrong transcription and translation though. Inspired by a map of the London Underground with modern translations of ancient placenames, I’ve wanted to do something like this for some time.
The original goal was to figure out what place names meant, and I know some of them are wrong. I also appreciate the old British names have been translated literally and like having “Shatin” written phonetically in English makes no sense I think Kennedy and Disney also have the same effect when written in Cantonese! However, I was trying to learn the characters so I could use them elsewhere and not take for granted that Kowloon Tong is called Kowloon Tong but it means 9 dragon lake and refers to the 8 hills and the 1 emperor (I think that’s the right story) and then “tong” means lake and then looking across HK you see it used elsewhere like Kwun Tong.
I did have Chinese friends laugh and say it makes no sense and to just accept it, but these are the same friends who constantly as “what does XXXX mean” when watching English TV programs and if I took the same attitude they’d never learn anything!
The original goal was to figure out what place names meant, and I know some of them are wrong. I also appreciate the old British names have been translated literally and like having “Shatin” written phonetically in English makes no sense I think Kennedy and Disney also have the same effect when written in Cantonese! However, I was trying to learn the characters so I could use them elsewhere and not take for granted that Kowloon Tong is called Kowloon Tong but it means 9 dragon lake and refers to the 8 hills and the 1 emperor (I think that’s the right story) and then “tong” means lake and then looking across HK you see it used elsewhere like Kwun Tong.
I did have Chinese friends laugh and say it makes no sense and to just accept it, but these are the same friends who constantly as “what does XXXX mean” when watching English TV programs and if I took the same attitude they’d never learn anything!