Beginner

Before I came to Singapore, I thought singlish was about adding the particles such as ‘lah’, ‘ah’, ‘meh’, ‘lor’ and etc at the end of every sentence. I remember teaching a few Caucasian classmates (ranging from Norway, Australian and America) at uni of how to speak Singlish. (They were very interested and curious about it) So what we taught them was to add different particles at the end of every sentence and it turned out very well. Note: For newbies, you can click here to find out what singlish is.

Intermediate

Now when I am in Singapore, (and after listening to Mr. Brown show), I realised singlish is more than that! So the next level I have learned about singlish was to have direct translation from mandarin to english. For example, Now what time ah? As you can see, it is not just adding the ‘ah’ at the end of sentence, the grammatical structure is a direct translation from mandarin!

Advanced

After started teaching, I have ‘advanced’ myself in singlish through listening to my students. (NO..I DID NOT EAVESDROP ON THEIR CONVERSATION) Singlish now, to me is a combination of dialects (mainly hokkien), malay and mandarin! Unbelievable. See examples below.

1) You win liao lor! (english + hokkien + ‘lor’)

2) I buang my assignments already. (english + malay, buang here means give up)

3) It should be like that de. (english + mandarin – new particle ‘de’)

4) That guy is super ‘katek’ lor! (english + malay + particle ‘lor’)
I didn’t know what ‘katek’ meant until my boss explained to me. It means ‘short’ in malay. Mm..surprisingly I did not come across this word at school.

5) So cute can!! (???!!)

6) He kena caught. (english + malay. It means he was scolded.)

7) Very good sia…(??!! New particle ‘sia’) I still find it very funny when people say ‘sia’ although it is very common here.

You exprain/comprain to me. (evolved spelling of explain/complain)

9) I am sure some of you know ‘walau’ right? But guess what other versions I have learned?
"WAH CHAN!"
"WAH LIEW!"
"WAH LIAO!"
"WAH PIANG EH!"

And a few more which are regarded a little bit more…rude so I shall stop here.

Singlish is a very unique language because it is loaded with substantial influences from British, chinese, malay and some said indian (which I have yet to find out). Although the government is promoting ‘speak good english’ campaign to the people, still I would prefer the culture of speaking singlish stays. That’s what makes singapore unique and colourful. I have started to speak more and more singlish daily. Sometimes hor, I wonder if I can forget english lor… Like that how?

To learn to speak good singlish, visit Mr. Brown’s speaking good singlish lesson here.

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