Tuesday, October 1, 2019

What's Your Name In Chinese? How to Read Accents. (My name's An -Ji La, An for peace)



Flag of Singapore.


Flag of Japan.


The same symbols are used for writing in China, Japan and Singapore.

My name is Angela.

I thought you must be able to translate this phonetically, as An something, because in the centre of Singapore is a buidling called Ng Ann City. A college is called Ng Ann ... after the benefactor.

That gives me Ann or Ann Ng.

I asked a lady in the swimming pool who speaks fluent English as well as Mandarin. She said she would ask the teacher who teaches Mandarin to her grandson.

A few days later she handed me the translation. It started with the symbol for An which means peace. She said that would be a positive and propitious, auspicious or favourable symbol, bringing good fortune or good luck.
The symbol for peace shows the symbol for roof above the symbol for woman.


The whole name is
Angela 安吉拉 (Ān jí lā)

Afterwords is the pinyin or pronounciation of a Chinese word shown in English or Roman alphabet.

The horizontal accent just means no tone. You see this at the start and end of the name Angela.

For a long time I found the accents hard to understand.
 When I learned French I learned the French word for pupil, eleve.
In French with the accents it is

élève
Then I realised that the upward accent in Chinese is the same as French. Ay like Hey!

A dipped or bowl shape accent is down and up, like asking a question in English, such as ending a sentence with your voice going up on the last word, as in a sentence ending with the word 'real-ly?'

Finally, the downward accent is low and emphatic, like saying NO! to a naughty child or dog. Or ending a sentence emphatically, with a low voice.

I later found the an symbol for peace in my Chineasy flashcards.

Now at last I have found a website which translates names.

So how do I remember how to write my name? One commentator says that Chinese parents have to consider both the meaning of the name and how easy it is for their tiny child to write his or her own name. The same goes for adult foreigners. You want a name which is easy to rmember and write.



Websites Translating Names
https://www.chinese-tools.com/names/list.html?n=ana

Angela

Angela 安吉拉 (Ān jí lā)

Angela Lansbury

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