Speak Singlish in Singapore, la?

This year, for the first time, the staff on the security check area were chatty and friendly. An official at Singapore's Changi airport's security asked me, 'Where are you travelling?'  

I replied, 'London.'

Hearing my British accent, she asked, 'Going home? Did you have a good holiday?'

I replied, 'Yes, I'm going home to London. But Singapore is also my home, my second home. I am a Singapore Pemanent Resident. I've been here about thirty years.'

We were still waiting for people ahead to get their suitcases and jackets etc through the machine.

She continued, smiling, 'Speak Singlish?'

I tried to think of a reply, using Singlish words.

After a few seconds hesitation, I said, 'No more already, la.'

I could have said, 'Why you ask, Auntie?'

La is a filler word, like um, well. La indicates the end of a sentence.

The verb to be is not used, not needed, in fact verbs are often not needed in Mandarin. The phrase I am a teacher would be I teacher. I am tired would be I tired.  

Singlish - English

already (Direct translation of the Mandarin word already used to indicate past actions ) as in no more already - we have run out, out of stock, discontinued line

because why - because

la - well / um / you see

off day - day off

off the light - turn off the light

over (as in fifty over) - more than (as in more than fifty)

pick you / me at the airport - pick you up at the airport

well come (all syllables have equal emphasis and length with pauses in between) - welcome

I wanted to type, This message is in Singlish, but how would you say that in Singlish. 

Maybe, this message is in Singlish, la. 

Why you should be bilingual - better still a polyglot.

Four language signpost, English, Chinese, Malay.

 "A little learning is a dangerous thing. Drink deep."

So said Alexander Pope, a poet, born in 1688, died 1744. 

I am going to tell you about time, days off, and thank you.

When you hear people trying to speak English, do you sometimes think, how good of them to try so hard. 

Do you ever think foreigners are charming, but crazy, half wits? 

What's worse, if you try to help them and understand them, you can see from the expression on their face,  They think you are a crazy half wits!

I thought of that when I arrived late on holiday, and kept 20 hikers waiting.

German flag

'Wilkommen. Welcome. You are one hour late,' said the German speaking leader of the hikers, on my hiking holiday. 'I told you half nine. Halb neun.'

'Yes,' I said, 'It’s half past nine.' 

'Nein. No! Half nine is eight hours and thirty minutes. A quarter to in English is 15 minutes before. And halb neun is half an hour before nine."

We looked it up. The Germans say half nine, when the English speakers, you and me, would say half past eight.

A little learning is a dangerous thing. Drink deep.

I think the German should learn and speak English, which is the most widely spoken first and second language in the world, closely followed by Chinese and Spanish, both of which I am learning. Spanish is the easiest language for English speakers. Chinese is the most difficult.

UK flag

In Singapore, many people are bilingual. They speak English as a second language.

I am learning German, because once a year I meet up with this hiking group. I am using Duolingo, which claims to be the most widely used language system in the world. I have signed up for a dozen languages, just to read the first page of handy hints and , and .

Benefits Of Being Bilingual

Apart from avoiding mistranslation mishaps, are there any advantages to learning a second language. Yes. Several.

The first is that being bilingual has been found to postpone the onset of Alzheimers by five years. What is the evidence? Studies have been done amongst contained populations, such as amongst nuns in the USA. 

That's a long  term benefit.

To keep you amused, I will tell you about mistakes I made with mistranslations in Singlish, Spanish,  French, 

Pope also said, to err is human, to forgive divine. 

English is a common language in Singapore. But Singlish sounds the same and is slightly different. 

My Indian Singaporean friend, Jaya, wanted to meet me for lunch. He said to me, 

Flag of Singapore

"I want to talk to you. I'm having an off day."

I said, "If you are not feeling well, see  doctor. I can see you tomorrow."

He replied, "Why should I see a doctor?".

I said, "if you are having an off day, you are depressed."

"I'm not depressed. I am not working. It's my off day.'

I said, "you mean your 'day off.' "

"Yes, that's what I said, 'an off day.' "

"No. Where I come from, an off day, means a bad day, like food which has gone off. The day when you are not working is a day off."

"thank you," he said.

He said it in English.

French flag

I speak French fluently. Many people can recognize the French word for thank you, merci. (which is also thank you in Romanian.).

In France my former babysitter Carolyn offered me tea. 

I said, "merci," - "thank you".

She didn't give me any tea.

Half an hour later, she asked me again, 

"Would you like some tea.? 

I replied, "I did not get any the first time."

She replied, you said merci.

It took us ten minutes to work out that in English, thank you, means thank you, or yes thank you. In French you say yes please or no thank you, so thank you is short for no thank you.

Remember that.

Finally, thanks in two languages.

I shall finish by thanking you in German and Chinese.

German flag

Danke.

 Shay shay.

800-1000 words

Useful Websites

Flag of Spain

duolingo - for Spanish, German, Swedish, 

Flag of Sweden

HebrewPod101.com

Flag of Israel

Memrise - for Albanian

https://app.memrise.com/courses/english/albanian/

Flag of Albania

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Studies on Alzheimer's and Bilingualism

A study on on the brains of 79 people in Spain

https://alzres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s13195-020-0581-1

A study of more than 250 (253) in the USA, in LA in 2020

https://www.uclahealth.org/departments/neurology/about-us/brains-neurology/bilingualism-delays-onset-alzheimers-symptoms

Marketing Singlish in Singapore

 

The flag of Singapore, bordered, to show the white of the flag against the white of a computer's or mobile's screen.

Angela Lansbury by the pool in a Singapore condo, November 2022. Photo by Angela Lansbury.

Today a Singaporean friend told me, "I won't be swimming at the weekend, when the pool is crowded. Instead I shall be marketing."

I replied, "You are working? At the weekend? Marketing what?" 

She replied, "Not working. Shopping. At the market."

I relayed this story to my husband. I said, "Singaporeans have shortened the sentence, and changed the meaning of the English."

"No," replied my husband. "Marketing originally meant buying in the market. We in Britain have changed the English word to mean selling."

Angela Lansbury in cap in the colours of the Union Jack flag of UK.

If you want to swim in Singapore, many hotels have pools. When my son and daughter-in-law came to Singapore, they spent a night at the Marina Bay Sands hotel which has an infinity pool on top of Singapore's landmark triple towers. 

Singapore has new underground railway stations which I have written about in my other posts. You hear English and Chinese (Mandarin) as well as Malay and Tamil recorded announcements, in the four official languages of Singapore, on the stations and trains.

I have several posts on Singlish and American English and British English. Please share links to your favourite posts.

This post is

https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2022/11/marketing-singlish.html

Useful Websites

SINGLISH

https://thehoneycombers.com/singapore/singlish-101/

https://expatliving.sg/you-ang-moh-how-to-speak-singlish/

http://www.mysmu.edu/faculty/jacklee/singlish_K.htm

http://www.mysmu.edu/faculty/jacklee/singlish_T.htm

Travel to Singapore

Singapore Tourism Board

https://www.singaporeair.com/en_UK

https://www.stb.gov.sg/content/stb/en.html

Some Singlish Sort Of English - to baffle Brits, amaze Americans and embarrass or enlighten English speakers

When I first arrived in Singapore I was often confused.

A lady on the Singapore airlines plane to Singapore told me, "I live in a house with a garden which is good because of have tree children." 

I wondered how many children she had, and if they were all tomboys who liked climbing trees. 

I asked, "Boys or girls?"

She replied, "Two boys, one girl."

I exclaimed, "Three children."

She agreed, "Yes. Tree children."

Then I understood. Three.

She told me, "My brother is in Australia. He has tree houses. He lives in one, rents out the other two."

For an instant I had visions of her brother building a tree house, very big, like Robinson Crusoe. Must be in construction. Building a tree house as a home or guest house. Then renting out two more. Interesting business developing. Then I realized he was the owner of three houses. He was probably well-to-do, but not the eccentric millionaire, the ecologically minded man I had imagined.

I phoned my other friend in Singapore and asked, "When can we meet?"  

He replied, "I'm having an off day." 

I said, "I'm a bit jet lagged, not feeling too good either, so we would only make each other miserable. Why don't we meet when you are feeling better. Tomorrow?"

I was really worried when he said, "I want to meet you to die."

He meant today.

I eventually heard, "I am not working to die. To die is my off die. I am working tomorrow."

 

Another friend met me at a shopping mall and called a taxi to take us elsewhere. She said to him, "Thank you, uncle."

Afterwards I said to her, "I didn't know your uncle was a taxi driver. Did you call him specially, or was it just luck that your uncle picked us up?"

She looked puzzled, "I don't have an uncle who is a taxi driver."

I said, "But you were chatting away to him and when we out, you said,'Thank you, uncle!"

She told me, "We say auntie or uncle to strangers of an older generation who are friendly."

"Ah," I answered, "In England we do that when we are children. But not from one adult to another."

Here are some phrases you may think you hear, and what the speaker means

Phrases and Pronunciation

Singlish - English

cannot = I can't / you can't / it can't be done / it's not possible/ no/ nope

drop off = drop out (of an online event)

even = even if

kampong = (Singapore) village (primitive - cleared by government upgrading, but friendly, remembered nostalgically by residents now living in modern skyscrapers)

Kiasu - competitive, getting ahead, pushy, fear of being left behind eg getting first into lift, overtaking and pulling ahead into your lane on the near empty motorway, determined to be first

la = (exclamation) yeah/ yup / really/ is that so/ definitely/aren't you/ isn't it/don't you think so/amazing/hilarious

loyal = royal

off day = day off

off the light = turn off the light

team = theme

tree = three

uncle = friendly person of an older generation, not related

English - Singlish

bad hair day = bad day

day off = off day

drop out = drop off

even if = even

I can't = cannot

off day = bad day

one-upmanship = kiasu

royal = loyal

team = theme

turn off the light = off the light

three = tree

uncle = brother of your mother or father

village = kampong

Useful Websites

https://singlishbible.fandom.com/wiki/Genesis_1

About the Author

Angela Lansbury is British and a Singapore Permanent Resident. 

About the Author

Angela Lansbury is Vice President Public Relations of Braddell Heights Advanced, and Tampines Changkat Advanced,  speakers training club which are part of Toastmasters International. The USA has several Spanish speaking as well as the English speaking clubs. You can pick up Spanish from buying or reading online their Spanish clubs welcome pages and manuals. 

In The USA, UK, Singapore and worldwide, there are many clubs which are English speaking, as well as Mandarin, Cantonese, Japanese, French, Tamil, Malay.

The inauguration of Tampines Changkat Advanced was Tuesday 29 2021, online on  zoom. Their meetings are on the fourth Tuesday evening of the month. They hope to hold meetings with a few people meeting physically, the others online, as soon as the Covid-19 conditions allow.

You can find the club through their facebook page as well as through Toastmasters International find a club. 

https://www.facebook.com/tampineschangkatadvTMC

The meetings are free for visitors. Visitors can watch, and join in speaking by introducing themselves and volunteering to do a 2 minutes impromptu  speech in table topics.

If you wish to join for a year, it costs about 190 US dollars, to have monthly meetings online, a mentor, a magazine, and one of the 11  Pathways, consisting of 14 projects. Each project starts with 3 speeches of your choice of subject, lasting 4 to 6 minutes, then 5 to 7 minutes. The Pathways include the most popular Presentation Mastery. I chose  humorous speaking as my second Pathway, costing 20 dollars. Then my third was a leadership course. Come and see for free.

The club also has meetings in person in Singapore

You can also contact my other club, smaller Braddell Heights Advanced, which is a cosy little club with more chances to speak.

Login through bha.learncool.sg/meet/bha 

That will link you through to Zoom or googlemeet. 2 pm to 5 pm.

BHA meets the first Wednesday evening each month, starting at 7 pm Singapore time. 

Then an extra meeting on the 3rd Saturday afternoon, starting at 2 pm Singapore time.

To check your time zone,  

https://24timezones.com/difference/singapore/ 

Meetings will be on Wed July 7th and  Saturday July 17th.

Contact either of these or other clubs through Toastmasters International Find a Club.

English and Singlish and Five Languages To Learn While Travelling

Hello. Ni Hao. (Hello in Mandarin - pronounced knee how, meaning you good? The reply is 'how' meaning good.)

 When I arrived in Singapore I wanted to learn the local language. Chinese? Yes, the official local Chinese is Mandarin. Also spoken in China. Good news.  

But in Hong Kong the Chinese people speak Cantonese. Bad news. 

However, the Chinese writing, symbols, is similar in both Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese - and also used by the Japanese. Good news.

But Singapore has not one, but four official languages. One of them is English. Good news.

And an encouragement to learn three other languages. You can hear all four on the MRT (underground train in the city centre, overground on the outskirts). Good news. 

Wikipedia has free information and word lists of easy to recognize and remember words. Good news.

But the local slang which now even appears on your box of Kleenex tissues, not translated, is Singlish. d

Singlish sounds like English but adds words from other languages, and drops what English speakers regard as essentials, such as the verb. Bad news.

However, I can explain the commonest one. Off the light. On the light.

That means turn off the light. Turn on the light.

In Singapore you can learn about four languages on the MRT trains. And attend Toastmasters bilingual clubs such as Eunos, English advanced clubs such as braddell Heights Advanced - and currently (May 2021) in addition to the hybrid club at the Sheraton hotel, you can attend online from anywhere in the world, clubs such as Eunos bilingual, English speakingbs, Mandarin Speaking clubs, Malay clubs, Tamil clubs and a French seaking club. 

If you are looking for a subject for a humorous speech, you can write about your trouble understanding local dialects.

Useful Websites

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Singlish

about the author

About the Author

About Angela The Author

The Author - Quick Quotations

Angela Lansbury B A Hons  is the author of ten books by regular publishers plus another ten self-published books. 

About Angela The Speaker & Trainer

Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages to Toastmasters clubs and businesses.

Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Speakers Vice President  Public Relations, Immediate Past President.

Former Area Director S3. Club Coach for Nee Soon South Toastmasters Club.

Also Member of: TCA Toastmasters Club; Singapore Online Dynamic; Harrovians UK

The recent meeting of BHA included Garen Tee on using story telling in business, on bha.learncool.sg . Also an educational on using Powerpoint for posters.

Next BHA meetings, (subject to revision)

1 (Saturday, May 15th, was 2 pm Singapore time, postponed because of national speaking contest.) 

After Vesak day and Hari Raya: 

Postponed to Saturday May 29th, 2021, at 2pm. Login to bha.learncool.sg earlier.

2 Next June meetings 1st Wednesday evening June 2nd at 7 pm Singapore time. 

3 Third Saturday afternoon, June 19th, Singapore time.  Thanks to the old team and Inauguration of New Team. 

Special speech with slides about teamwork in sport and Toastmasters International and life, by the President of West Coast Toastmasters Club who often help BHA with workshops and invite us to give speeches at their club.

Inauguration of new committee by incoming Area Director of S

About Angela The Blogger 

Angela has several blogs on speeches, comedy and song writing and organizing, writing intermittently, but writes almost daily on these three:

travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com

dressofthedayangela.blogspot.com

translateforfun.blogspot.com

See next post on sculptor Tom Harvey.

Please share links to your favourite posts. 

The information on Toastmasters is updated regularly on Facebook.

American English, British English, Scottish English and Singlish

With Covid19 affecting travel worldwide, we are all going online and reading about events in other countries so we are increasingly exposed to the varied vocabulary and different dialects or excruciating errors and misunderstandings and puzzlement resulting from translations from one language to another. Here are some of the language differences I have noticed, after living in the UK, USA and Singapore.
                                                       
American English - British English
bell hop - porter
broil -  grilling from the top (unlike grilling from underneath and BBQ from underneath)
diaper - nappy
Dish soap - washing up liquid (I though this was soap in dishes in bathrooms for months until I read about using dish soap to wash dishes.)
Garbage/trash/trash can - rubbish/rubbish bin/waste paper basket (even when it's a bin not a basket)
High guys - hello everybody
main street - high street
make a right - turn right
over easy - fried both sides
truck - lorry
movie - film
Plus (as in fifty plus) - more than (as in more than fifty) (Singaporeans say over as in fifty over)

 American food and drink - English equivalent
grits (from Southern USA)
Hershey bar - Cadbury's chocolate bar/dark chocolate
hot dog - sausage in a bun, frankfurter in a bun

British English - American English
film - movie
fried both sides - over easy
high street - main street
hello everybody - hi guys (In the USA guys includes both sexes, in the UK only men)
lorry - truck
nappy - diaper
porter - bell hop
turn right - make a right
washing up liquid - dish soap (for washing dishes, not in a dish)


 

Scottish - English
bairn - child
bonny - beautiful (and loved one as in the song My bonny lies over the Ocian
kirk - church
loch - lake (Scottish loch pronounced not a voiced ch with front of tongue coming up as in church but like clearing your throat with back of tongue and tongue in a U shape)
nae - no
nicht - night
wee - small

English - Scottish
beautiful - bonny
child - bairn
church - kirk
lake - loch
night - nicht
no - nae
small - wee

Useful Websites
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot_dog

Menti.com
Zoom
Toastmasters International Find a Club
https://www.toastmasters.org/find-a-club
learncool.sg

About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. (Not related to the actress.)
Author of twenty books including: Quick Quotations; Who Said What When.
See books and profiles on Lulu.com and Amazon, such as Wedding Speeches & Toasts. Also watch videos on YouTube.

If you want to learn to speak the Queen's English, or Received Pronunciation. join me at my online toastmasters club,
Braddell Heights Advanced. Wednesdays, 7-9 Singapore time which is seven hours ahead of London, England.
I am also a member of
Singapore Online.9-12 pm, Singapore time, Fridays. I am also a member of
Tampines Changkat Advanced.
Harrovians, London.

See other posts on speaking, singers, statues, languages and destinations.
Please share links to your favourite posts.

Learn colourful words and colourful place names in Chinese and Malay

Chinese (Mandarin) is spoken in China and Singapore.

Flag of China. 

Flag of Singapore.

Chinese - English
ang - red
ang mo - red hair = Caucasian (Singlish or slang, could be affectionate or insulting depending on tone and context)
mo - hair

English - Chinese
caucasian - ang mo
hair - mo
red - ang

Flag of Indonesia


Malay - English
bukit - hill
bukit merah - Red hill (Bukit Merah and Redhill are two different nearby MRT mass rapid transit railway station names)
merah - red

English - Malay
hill - bukit
red - merah
red hill - bukit merah

Useful Websites
LANGUAGES
google translate
translate.google.com
duolingo
duolingo.com
memrise
memrise.com

TRAVEL
Singapore Airlines
singaporeair.com

About the Author
Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages. Please bookmark and share links to your favourite posts.

Start Learning Singapore's Five Languages - Celebrate On National Day and all year

Happy Birthday Singapore. Photo by Angela Lansbury. Copyright.

Singapore's National Day is August 9th every year and in 2019 it falls on a Friday. The whole weekend, Friday to Monday, is a holiday in Singapore, and it coincides with a Muslim festival so there's lots going on in the centre and all over the city, carnivals and kiosks, free fun and food to buy.

Although I cannot be there on National day, I have been busy taking photos of the flags around the city. I am also preparing a presentation on the five languages for Braddell Heights Advanced Toastmasters Club which meets two days before National Day, on the Wednesday.

Four Official Languages
Singapore's four official languages are 1 English!

UK flag. The Union Jack.

(British) English.

Hello. How do you do? Welcome.
Hello and welcome. 
Hi (informal and USA). 
Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Good night. Goodbye.


Flag of China

2 Chinese (Mandarin), (spoken in China and Singapore)
Chinese greeting:
Ni how (pronounced knee how? Literally you good?)
(Reply:) How (meaning good).


Flag of Malaysia.

3 Malay (spoken in Malaysia, only a bus ride away from Singapore across the bridge, a language similar to Indonesian with slight difference in vocabulary, like British English and American English)


Flag of Indonesia.
 (I reproduced a photo of it flying because the white does not show up against a white background.)

You will see Malay signs in Singapore. On the outside of Community Clubs you can identify the word Kelab which is Malay for club. On construction works you will see the sign for danger, keep out.

Bahaya - caution, care, danger, warning

Tamil (spoken in Southern India and Sri Lanka).
Two words I picked up from memrise:
amma - mother (like mama)
appa - father. (like papa)

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=mobi.steps.fiftylanguages&rdid=mobi.steps.fiftylanguages


Flag of Singapore.

Singlish
In addition Singapore has Singlish, a hybrid language, lots of expressive vocabulary, interjections and abbreviated sentences. For example:
Cannot. (Short for: I can't, you can't, it can't be done, impossible.)
No more already. (A shop assistant's version of: We are out of stock.)
Shiok! (Delicious, for food.)
La! (Added at the end of sentence, no real meaning but you could translate it as well, yeah, so, okay.)

If you want to learn languages at home, online, or on the train, try Duolingo.

Duolingo has several million users.

So does Memrise, another free language learning website.
Memrise helps you remember by creating memory aids, or using those created by other people. You record your own memory aid, keep it private (if it is personal or rude or you want to create a course and sell it) or share it, and can also pick one of those memory aids previously created and shared by others.



If you are in Singapore and free on Wednesday 7th August 2019 come along to Braddell Heights Advanced toastmasters Club at Braddell Heights Community Club, 7 pm to 9.30 pm and if possible wear red and white, such as a white skirt or trousers and a red blouse or tee-shirt. Or any tee shirt or cap with the word Singapore or SG. I bought a great hat with SG on it for only S$5 in the YWCA shop.

Toastmasters Cost And What You Get
The cost of the meeting including Singapore food is $10 for guests, but free for members of Toastmasters.


To join BHA costs only $180 per year to renew or transfer membership. That entitles you to attend meetings for free and receive a mentor from the club and the right to enter contests if you are eligible (after a few speeches); and a $40 one off joining fee to get on the Toastmasters International programme on the web and receive the monthly Toastmasters magazine full of tips on speaking and leadership.

Singapore has about 250 Toastmasters clubs, usually two or three every evening. Most are in English.

But there are several all Mandarin speaking clubs, a couple of bilingual Mandarin and English clubs where you are likely to hear speeches in both languages.  A Malay speaking club, Jauhari which mets late afternoon on the 3rd Saturday of each month. Several Tamil speaking clubs, are mostly around the Little India area.

You can also visit Toastmasters English speaking and local language clubs all over the world, in China. (I went to clubs in Shanghai and Beijing).

If you go to a Toastmasters meeting you can hear native speakers speaking their language and become accustomed to the intonation.

Learning Languages Online
To learn English, Chinese, or Malay you can use Duolingo or Memrise or many other free online resources.

English
English is the most widely studied language on Duolingo, along with Spanish. Maybe the numbers of Americans online has something to do with it.

USEFUL WEBSITES

Flag of UK. Union Jack.

ENGLISH
duolingo.com
(English courses for speakers of several other languages including Vietnamese.)
English for Chinese speakers who can also learn Japanese and Korean and French, Spanish, Italian and German.
https://www.duolingo.com/courses/zh


Flag of China.

CHINESE Language Learning Websites
Duolingo
HelloChinese
Memrise
Pleco
The Chairman's Bao
https://www.alllanguageresources.com/chinese/
https://www.alllanguageresources.com/chinese-resources/
YouTube
Chineasy

MALAY
https://www.memrise.com/course/193830/beginners-malay/

TAMIL
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=mobi.steps.fiftylanguages&rdid=mobi.steps.fiftylanguages
https://www.memrise.com/course/505488/a1-tamil-course/

TOASTMASTERS
ENGLISH
Braddell Heights Advanced (English speaking) club
https://www.facebook.com/bhatmsg/
1st Wed evening and 3rd Saturday afternoon every month except on National Holidays when the Community Club is closed.
Braddell Heights has two more English speaking clubs meeting on different Saturday afternoons, BH1 and BH2.


Flag of China.
MANDARIN
Braddell Heights also has a Mandarin speaking club.
All are at Braddell Heights Community Club, exit F from Serangoon MRT, two escaltors up. (The other 4 escalators go to busy Nex shopping mall.)
Braddell Heights Mandarin Club
Meets 2nd and 4th Tuesday at 7 pm.
https://www.toastmasters.org/Find-a-Club/00005815-braddell-heights-mandarin-club

ENGLISH
Cairnhill Community Club has nine Toastmasters clubs mostly English-speaking, Including Star Millennium (American president in 2019-2020) and
Cairnhill (big and busy).

MANDARIN
Cairnhill Community Club, near Newton MRT station, also has a Mandarin-speaking club.


Indonesian flag.

MALAY & INDONESIAN
Malay language is available at the Jauhari club (bilingual English and Malay) at Carnhill CC on the third Saturday each month.
Jauhari means jeweller or expert.
The Indonesian Professional club is in English but an opportunity to meet people who speak Indonesian to practise your Indonesian or if you are Indonesian to compare resources for learning English.

https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2019/08/how-to-learn-indonesia-and-malay.html

Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, blogger, polyglot, teacher of English advanced, French intermediate and how to start other languages such as Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, German, Chinese (Mandarin), Indonesian, Malay and Esperanto. Please see my other posts on Singapore and languages and share links to your favourite posts with family and friends and colleagues.

About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and speaker. I have many more posts on Singapore, Singlish, Mandarin, Tamil, Malay, Indonesian and American English. Please bookmark and share links to your favourite posts.

English words which confuse foreigners - how do you explain them? Owing to and due to

Owing To and Due To
I wrote this on the polyglot page in Facebook in reply to a query about which words people find confusing.
Owing to and due to are confusing. Owing to means because of. Due to is caused by. You start a sentence with Owing to. Owing to bad weather, the trains will be late. The lateness of the trains is due to bad weather.

Several times a week I visit Toastmasters Speakers' Clubs in Singapore and the UK and worldwide. I am often invited to be the Grammarian or Language Evaluator because I am a native English speaker.

I present a word of the day. Here is one I presented recently.

American - British English

automobile - car

hood of car - bonnet

cookie - biscuit

fall - autumn

cookie - biscuit

faucet - tap

pants - trousers

sidewalk - pavement

truck  -  lorry

trunk of automobile  - boot of car 

underpants - pants

British English - American

autumn - fall

biscuit - cookie

bonnet of car - hood

car - automobile

Lorry - truck

pants - underpants

pavement - roadway

tap - faucet

trousers - pants

boot of car - trunk of car

Taboo word – Actually!

*Please tap/clap if you hear the word of the day

or the taboo word!

LANGUAGE EVALUATION

COMPLIMENTS I shall be back to compliment those who used the word of the day. J

DELIGHTS I shall listen for delightful words and phrases:

alliteration; assonance; similes; metaphors; repetition, triads.

TIPS I shall offer free tips on:

Americanisms. British English. Singlish. Accents and Vocabulary.

Practising Perfect Pronunciation: l, r, s, t. Intonation and rhythm.

Good Grammar. Tenses; present and past. Articles 'a' and 'the'.

Come and visit one of Singapore's Toastmasters clubs.

Useful Websites
visitbritain.com
visitbritainshop.com
visitlondon.com
visitsingapore.com
https://travelwithangelalansbury.blogspot.com/2019/07/flags-and-food-for-singapores-national.html

About the Author

Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and language teacher to individuals and companies.

Angela Lansbury, the author, - not related to Angela Lansbury the actress nor any of the other dozen people named Angela Lansbury or Lansbury.

I have many more posts on Americanisms and language. I teach English and other languages. I am a polyglot. Please share links to your favourite posts.