Being a Hainanese.
February 29, 2008
I am Hainan ren, Hoinam Yan, Hainam Lang. Contrary to unpopular belief, we got nothing to do with Mee Hailam. As far as I can remember, I don’t recall having this specific dish in the Hainanese cuisine. Think about hainan, you will think of hainanese chicken lice. Although I can safely tell you that, hainanese chefs are not only good at making chicken lice, they are good at making other dishes too.
My lao ah mah (granny) makes the best chicken rice in the world. She is my granny, so I am entitled to be bias. Even when I say I am bias, she used to sell chicken rice at some foreign country but she had retired ever since. She cannot make chicken rice any more because of her old age. It’s time for her to enjoy life because she has made chicken rice all her life.
Yes, I am Hainam lang. A Hainam lang who cannot speak the Hainanese language. Yes I can’t speak the dialect. If a Chinese can’t speak Chinese, you call them banana. What do you normally say if you can’t speak your own dialect group language? Do You call them Durian? Green from the outside, yellow from the inside? My lao ah mah (granny) speaks Hainanese to my lao pey but ironically she spoke to me in Cantonese ever since I was born.
Although every one in my dad’s family speaks hainanese but most of them speak Cantonese to me anyway. I don’t think it’s surprising when I am half Cantonese myself. When communicating with cousins, we spoke in English. Like me, I don’t think they speak much of the hainanese dialect either. Dad on the other hand, is very good with dialects. Due to the nature of his job, he can speak almost every chinese dialect.
He speaks good mandarin, cantonese, hainanese, teochew, hokkien, foochow, hakka and etc. Me leh? Stuck with 3 chinese dialect so far. That’s not too bad for a ‘banana’ eh? I don’t know if I can call myself banana because I speak Chinese. I dunno how to write and not proficient at reading Chinese characters only.
Technorati Tags: Languages. chinese, hainanese, cantonese, mother tongue, dialect
Posted in 
