Ergo Space Pig
Saturday, December 26th, 2009
Shanghai can be fun sometimes.
Recently I was on the subway at a very light time of the day. Nearby were two tourists or business-folk, Shandong perhaps, with a nice, clean Northern accent. Not far away, in different directions, were two young men, each on their mobiles.
Of course, being Shanghai, both of these young guys were talking loudly into their phones. That’s almost a given.
I like to listen to the accents I hear outside, so I listened to each of them for a bit.
One was speaking his local language, but it was a somewhat recognizable dialect. It was probably not related to Shanghai language at all, but it was within the gambit of the language amalgamation that exists within the center city, that you might come across in some transaction or other. He could have been understandable, if it were necessary, without a doubt, although to say he could speak Mandarin or Shanghaihua proper was unclear. I probably could have a one in four chance of guessing the general area he was from (Subei and Anhui, of course, then Henan and Jiangxi I suppose).
The other guy was speaking something that sounded like it came from the top of a mountain. Nothing he said was the least bit recognizable. It was not Mandarin nor anything else 99% of people in China could understand.
And the one Northerner turned to the other and said, ‘Wow, these Shanghai people sure talk funny, don’t they?’
Buddy, you have no idea.
Tags: shanghai.culture
