traveler: I should write fortune cookie sayings…
February 2nd, 2010
I was riding on a double decker bus on a grey, rainy Tuesday, feeling a little down. We stopped at a light by Chinatown, and it made me feel homesick for New York’s Chinatown. I’m happy to be having this adventure in a new city, but I do miss my friends (and truly cheap Chinese food) and don’t feel as if I quite fit in anywhere yet.
Then we passed this restaurant, and it made me smile. The Chinese love puns, partly because Cantonese and Mandarin are so tonal, I think. For instance, the number 4 is considered unlucky because in both Cantonese and Mandarin, it sounds somewhat like the word for “death”. (In Mandarin, it also sounds like the word for shit, but not in Cantonese.) Anyway, I realized that the words for “Golden Day” in Cantonese, gum yut, are a homonym for “today” and well, it’s cheesy but I’m reminded that today and each day is golden, even if it’s grey.
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