# Cantonese: How are you?



## yuechu

大家好！

I was wondering how to say "How are you?" in Cantonese to people I play badminton with (who are probably from Hong Kong or 广东 province).
I know that there is 你好嗎?. Would it sound odd to say this? (I know that it's less commonly used in Chinese than in English)
A Cantonese speaker years ago told me about "Dim a"? (點啊? I'm not sure if the characters are right), but I think that it's only used if you know the person really well, right?

Would anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks!


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## henter

我只认识几个粤语词汇. 广东人好像喜欢说雷猴啊-粤语发音的谐音-意思就是你好. 点解的意思是为什么. 唔紧要的意思是没关系.  其他的记不清了.


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## Billy Zhong

I don't know much about Cantonese,but people usually say “最近怎么样？” or "最近还好吗？” as a greeting to each other,which means "How's it going?" in English.Don't Say“你好吗”to greet people.It just sounds so weird!!!


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## AquisM

yuechu said:


> I know that there is 你好嗎?. Would it sound odd to say this?


It doesn't sound very conversational. You'd sound more natural saying "How've you been?", "How are things?", "What have you been up to?" or something similar, like: 你幾好嗎？/你最近點啊？/最近幾好嗎？/最近忙啲咩啊？ etc. etc.

As Billy Zhong notes above, 你好嗎？ isn't really used in conversational Mandarin either.



yuechu said:


> A Cantonese speakers years ago told me about "Dim a"? (點啊? I'm not sure if the characters are right), but I think that it's only used if you know the person really well, right?


1. Characters are right (as in, that is indeed how most people would write it; as you know, Cantonese has no standardised orthography.)
2. I think it's OK to use in any casual situation. You don't have to be best pals. See above.

Let me know if you need any of the phrases above romanised.


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## yuechu

Thanks for your comments and translations! 



AquisM said:


> You'd sound more natural saying "How've you been?", "How are things?", "What have you been up to?" or something similar, like: 你幾好嗎？/你最近點啊？/最近幾好嗎？/最近忙啲咩啊？ etc. etc.


Oh, those are great. Thanks, AquisM!



AquisM said:


> Let me know if you need any of the phrases above romanised.


I just looked the characters up in an online Cantonese dictionary. Are these romanized correctly? (just in case there are 多音字！)
你幾好嗎？nei5gei1hou2maa1?
你最近點啊？nei5zeoi3gan6dim2aa1?
最近幾好嗎？zeoi3gan6gei1hou2maa1?
最近忙啲咩啊？zeoi3gan6mong4di1me1aa1?

唔該晒!


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## 切克闹

Haha, as a Cantonese, I seldom say or hear 你好吗 in daily life. It's a little bit formal. And we usually use "呢排" or “近排” instead of “最近”。

So, if I meet a friend long time no see, I will say “好耐冇见，呢排点样。”


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## yuechu

Thanks for including the informal Cantonese pronunciations, 切克闹!  I am most interested in them!

Just a few questions about the pronunciation:
 呢排 Is it "ne1paai4" or "ne1paai2"? (The dictionary says ne1paai4/4*2 but I forget what the * means...)
 点样 Is this one "dim2joeng6" or "dim2joeng2"? (The dictionary says dim2joeng6*2, but once again, I'm not sure what the * means. Does it mean that both pronunciations are possible, do you think?)

(typo: jeung changed to joeng)


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## 切克闹

yuechu said:


> Thanks for including the informal Cantonese pronunciations, 切克闹!  I am most interested in them!
> 
> Just a few questions about the pronunciation:
> 呢排 Is it "ne1paai4" or "ne1paai2"? (The dictionary says ne1paai4/4*2 but I forget what the * means...)
> 点样 Is this one "dim2jeung6" or "dim2jeung2"? (The dictionary says dim2jeung6*2, but once again, I'm not sure what the * means. Does it mean that both pronunciations are possible, do you think?)


Well, it depends.
The single character 样 is pronounced as joeng6. And it is also pronounced as joeng6 in 样貌。
But in 点样，it's not dim2jeung6. And sorry, I don't know the meaning of the notion＊. So I record my pronunciation


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## yuechu

Great! Thanks so much, 切克闹!



切克闹 said:


> But in 点样，it's not dim2jeung6.


Do you mean that the pronunciation of 样 changes from joeng6 to joeng2 in this expression? (点样)


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## 切克闹

yuechu said:


> Great! Thanks so much, 切克闹!
> 
> 
> Do you mean that the pronunciation of 样 changes from joeng6 to joeng2 in this expression? (点样)


Yes. And 样 joeng6 is seldom pronounced. Except when it's a single character or in 样貌。And in Cantonese, we seldom say the phrase 样貌。 We use 样 to refer to 样貌。When 样 is refered to 样貌，it isn't pronounced as joeng6. For example, "你个样＂（your appearance）“样衰”（ugly）

By the way, I fail to upload my pronunciation because it seems the audio is not allowed to upload.


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## yuechu

Oh, I see. That's ok. Thanks for your help, 切克闹 ! I really appreciate it!


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## 切克闹

yuechu said:


> Oh, I see. That's ok. Thanks for your help, 切克闹 ! I really appreciate it!


粤语发音字典-粤语翻译 粤语发音字典-粤语翻译
Here is a website of Cantonese pronunciation and you can listen to the pronunciation of 样 and 点样in the sentence


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## yuechu

Wow! The sound files for the character pronunciation are much better than the ones I was using on a different website--and the sentence pronunciations are even better! I can't even tell if that's a text-to-speech robot speaking or a real person. (Is it a robot?) Anyway, it sounds very realistic.
Thanks!


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## 切克闹

Haha, it's a robot


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## AquisM

yuechu said:


> (just in case there are 多音字！)


There are a few indeed!
幾 here should be gei2 (Mandarin ji3); gei1 (Mandarin ji1) is very rare. In fact, the only commonly used word in which 幾 is pronounced gei1/ji1 is 幾乎.
啊 and 嗎 as a question particle are usually aa3 and maa3 respectively.



yuechu said:


> but once again, I'm not sure what the * means.


The asterisk represents a changed tone - the character is usually pronounced in the tone before the asterisk, but in this word, it changes to the tone after the asterisk. For example, 話 is usually pronounced waa6 (e.g., 說話 syut3waa6), but it changes to the 2nd tone in 廣東話, so we transliterate it as gwong2dung1waa6*2.

This means 呢排 can be either ni1paai4 or ni1paai2 (as you probably know, we merge initial /n/ and /l/ in Hong Kong Cantonese, so I say li1paai2/4), and 點樣 is dim2yoeng2.


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## radagasty

切克闹 said:


> Yes. And 样 joeng6 is seldom pronounced. Except when it's a single character or in 样貌。


Hmm... I disagree. There are many compounds in which 樣 is pronounced joeng6, an obvious one being 一樣.



AquisM said:


> This means 呢排 can be either ni1paai4 or ni1paai2 (as you probably know, we merge initial /n/ and /l/ in Hong Kong Cantonese, so I say li1paai2/4), and 點樣 is dim2yoeng2.


I always say ni1paai4, but, interestingly, 點樣 I pronounce dim2joeng1, a highly irregular pronunciation that is standard in Malaysia (I think), for I can't call to mind any other compound wherein 樣 is pronounced joeng1.


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## yuechu

Thanks for your help too, AquisM and Radagasty! It's good to know about the meaning of *!


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