If you haven’t noticed it, then either you are hard of hearing or you are one of them. I am referring to those in Hong Kong who say “may I help’choo?” Earlier tonight I called a restaurant in Central to make a dinner reservation. The operator answered in English, “thank you for calling XXX Restaurant, how may I help’choo?” I almost dropped my phone, not because it was my first time hearing the mispronunciation, but because I was fed up with the fact that such a glaring mistake can go uncorrected for so long. Over the centuries, many have attempted to butcher the English language but no attempt is as offensive or nearly as successful as this one. Uptight Englishmen are known to cringe whenever they hear Singaporeans speak Singlish, injecting their local flavors into the language of Chaucer and Shakespeare. Bizarre as the hybrid language may sound, Singlish is by and large just an accent, and so long as everyone still respects the basic rules of grammar and phonics, accents ...
A biweekly column on Hong Kong by Jason Y. Ng