Extinction

My dad knows 9 different dialects and languages. Can u imagine???
He speaks Foochow, Hokkien, Cantonese, Teochew, Hakka, Hainan, PLUS Mandarin, English and Malay!!! And i suspect he knows more than just that... There could be a little Tamil and who knows wat else in him somewhere.

And wat dialect do i know???
Nothing. Tiada. Mei you. Nada. Nichts!!
Compared to him, gosh... i'm such a disappointment!!! This is a tragedy...

I'm a Foochow [Fuzhou is the capital and the largest prefecture-level city of Fujian (福建) province in China. It is also referred to as Rongcheng (榕城) which means "city of banyan trees"] but i don't even know my own dialect! How terribly embarrassing is that? None of my bro n sis knows it. And among my multitudinous cousins (my dad has 14 siblings! Don't ask me what's my grandpa's secret... Anyway, i lost count of how many cousins i actually have...) only 2 i think can speak fluent Foochow. So, can u imagine what's gonna happen to the next generation??!!! None of us (except that 2 freakish cousins of mine) will be able to teach our offspring what i think is the hardest dialect among the many dialects. The Foochow dialect is going to extinct!!!

I'm thinkin, 20 years down the road from now, when my children (if i'm blessed enough) get bloody annoyingly inquisitive and asks me "What is your dialect mum? Can you say something in it??" I shall be well prepared by then and shall just reply blankly "Oh, my dear, it's a dialect which sounds like singing while quarreling (seriously!) that i myself don't know how to speak. Maybe you should ask your grandpa." Hopefully, my dad will still be alive then, to prove to my child that Foochow is never an easy language to master and that it's not my fault that i can't pass it down to them. hahaha... =P

Now that i'm staying most of the time in Penang, i shall try my best to learn Hokkien! Cos i think Hokkien is kinda easy? =D This is my aim before i graduate. hahaha... After that, i shall spend an eternity mastering Foochow. But chances of me speaking fluent Foochow in the near future is like asking a dog to bite its tail - IMPOSSIBLE...

Well, i believe everything is possible if you put your heart to it. Oh ya... XiaoHui is also Foochow!! hahaha.. I shall beg her to be my shifu and teach me proper Foochow nex sem! hehehehe....

Till the day i speak Foochow, i shall just stick to learning how to read and write Mandarin. Sigh.. what kind of Chinese am i? Definitely... the highest quality BANANA.