I’ve posted before about gendered language, and how I’m generally in favor of moving towards gender-neutral occupations and supporting a gender-neutral third-person pronoun in English. In Khmer for the most part this is already reality…but there are a few funny quirks in the language which still don’t make sense to me.
Happy Lunar New Year!
Sua sdei jo chhnam chin, 新年快乐, and happy lunar new year!
In Cambodia, the big new year’s celebration is not on January 1st (“international new year” in Khmer), nor is it the same as the Vietnamese, Korean, and Chinese lunar calendar (“Chinese new year”). Rather, it’s in April…which means I’m going to miss it! And it’s also a lunar calendar (shared with Thailand and I think Laos as well), so saying “lunar new year” is no longer specific enough.
Thirdhand English and Chinese Writing Rooms
PIO’s a great organization. They’re not perfect, of course, but they’ve got a lot of really great things that makes them stand out from other orphanages and private schools in Phnom Penh. One of my favorites is how they bribe families to let kids come to school by offering rice at wholesale prices (in addition to giving the kids lunch).
Older Posts
- 2011-11-15 Khmer Syntax
- 2011-10-23 Khmer Morphology
- 2011-10-13 "At spoon!"
- 2011-10-01 Khmer Phonetics