Saturday, November 15, 2008

Chinese Family Relations

I was never good in identifying the complicated Chinese terms for different relatives. Having gotten used to calling all my elders uncles or aunties and my cousins by name, I'm always clueless when caught in a situation when I need to identify the correct Chinese term to address them.

However, in Moonlight Resonance, the evil-turned-good Susanna Kwan taught us a riddle to learn such things, although I think it only works for the Mum-side of the family. And by the way I'm still clueless. And here goes Ah Sa's riddle:

堂呀大過姑,姑呀大過姨,姨呀大過表叔公,表叔公呀大過表叔婆,表叔婆呀大過表伯,表伯娘呀表叔,表嬸,表姑媽,表姑姐,表姑丈,表舅公,表舅婆呀表姨婆,表舅父呀表舅母,表姨媽,表姨丈!

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