26May

Cantonese.

Cantonese is perhaps my greatest current challenge. The pressure is mounting with my daughter Eliana reaching those early years where vocabulary has begun creeping into her mind. My wife's first language is Cantonese. My mother–in–law currently resides with us and near–exclusively communicates in Cantonese. And naturally we wish to preserve the language in the vessel of our sweet daughter, Eliana. Especially with its gradual fading away in mainland China as Mandarin forcibly reigns supreme in early education.

Now it is not as if I have simply not set aside time to learn the language. Oh to the contrary I have spent years practicing. I have gone through textbooks and grammars and have assembled flashcards via Anki that I practice daily. I have watched children's shows (Peppa Pig!) and read children's books (Hahm Baahng Laahng). The language is spoken everday at home. And I overhear it thrice a week when I venture into San Gabriel Valley to play badminton. A popular pastime among the Cantonese diaspora.

I can more or less understand the Cantonese spoken in the household. My mother–in–law and I have settled in an equilibrium wherein she will speak in Cantonese to me and I will respond primarily in English, and vice versa. Our comprehension of each other's native languages is sufficient that this state of relations is stable. Eliana, my daughter, mainly understands Cantonese words, and so it is in Cantonese that I will communicate commands or remarks with her. I will also use Chinglish, a mishmash of Chinese and English. In a sense: this is progress!

But here is where my limits expose themselves. Of course there is the written aspect: I have made no attempt to learn the written language as my intention is verbal communication. Writing and reading constitute a whole gargantuation task of their own. For verbal communication my two greatest weaknesses are: listening comprehension, and the mustering of courage to use the language.

Despite hearing Cantonese daily (spoken in my vicinity and through audio flashcards) my ability to accurately distinguish tones is poor. I would not say the skill is null: occassionally I surprise myself. But I rely heavily on context. If a series of words were spoken to me in succession but without any particular meaning, I would falter with identifying their tones. Compare this with my wife who in an instant can identify a tone that is off, perhaps when I mistakenly use a mid–level tone instead of a mid–rising. I fear this skill will be the most difficult to master as I was never required to call upon it in my developmental years. For Eliana, she will certainly receive a leg up here! Nonetheless I do not intend to give up. This summer I plan to schedule more concentrated viewings of Cantonese (children's) television. The dedicated exposure I hope will make a difference.

The part of my mind that allows me to excel in the deep–thinking required of abstract mathematics faces a counter in spoken languages. My thinking is highly detail–oriented and slow–paced. I am the one who fails to see the forest for the trees. In mathematics this has advantages as I can catch connections that evade others. In spoken language, however, there is no time (at least for me) to reflect and consider carefully each word I hear or intend to say. But my brain is stubborn and tries to grab details. Invariably this leads to a missing of the core of what was said, or to fail to compose a sentence due to a focused uncertainty about the correctness of a particular aspect of its form. In the end what needs to be done is to let go. An allowance of the language to wash over me without an obsession with catching each particle. My wife is skilled at seeing the forest despite the trees. And I believe most who are able to learn languages flently later in life fall into this category too.

And my greatest flaw: fear. Yes. So much about mastering language is finding the courage to actually use it. In my work life: I love planning and coming in prepared. But conversation is improvisational. And when you improvise you will make mistakes. There will be instances when your conversation partner's face scrunches up as they struggle to understand what you just said. For some (my mother first into his category and is quite successful with foreign languages as a result) it is easy to ignore this moment of awkwardness and power through or try again. For me that moment triggers a fear response. Totally irrational and honestly silly but this is my body's default. This is only made more ridiculous by the fact that Cantonese people are so kind and supportive when you try to speak their language. I suspect some of them realize the difficulty their language poses and so are generous with giving grace. So it is my personal mindset which punishes me here. My obsession with perfection on the first attempt. No external factor is to blame. I know what to do though. You don't have to say it. I just have to use the language more, have more of these mini–failures, get comfortable with them, see them as the harmless components of social interaction that they are. Perhaps writing this blog post will instill me with greater motivation to put myself out there.

So yes Cantonese is an incredible challenge for me. But it is also a joyful challenge. It is a beautiful language which is incredibly sensible: unlike English, it is a fundamentally pure language, so the rules of its grammar are simple and sensible. It is purer in the historical sense than Mandarin even. But it is also expressive. Do not even get me started on the sentence–ending particles, which endow phrases with texture, and which I have the barest comfort level with—their mastery is another task whose completion is distant. I truly enjoy the language and am thrilled that Eliana will learn it alongside me.

date: 2026 Tue May 12