Mandarin & Han yu pin yin

I dislike it when people refer me by my Chinese name & try to disregard my English name.
First of all, my English name was finalized at birth far before my Chinese name. Hence, my Chinese name was 'created' for the sake of pleasing the older generation (my grandparents). My parents both were true Chinese illiterate & gave me weird name for my 1st Chinese name, Yen. I have always been addressed by my English name. My 1st name.

So, when people do that, I strictly feel that it's a disrespect toward me.
So much so that I condemned it by suggesting that I should really omit my Chinese name.

When my hubby found out that my friend recently named her baby without a Chinese name, he said it would be difficult in Chinese class, presuming that the baby would finally be receiving her education in Singapore. (Chinese is a compulsory 2nd language). That would be so sad for her. Not because she had to learn Mandarin/Chinese, but because there would be no condusive environment for her to learn Chinese. Both parents Chinese illiterate. So are all the four grandparents. So, what mother tongue are we exactly talking about?

I have always been against Mandarin education as I was brought up to believe such. Today I realized how Chinese education lead to so many auspicious believes: how they played with number 8, certain characters, numbers, births, dates etc. Because I remember how my poor aunty was rejected at birth because she's believed to bring terrible disaster to her family. Even her foster family returned her to my grandmother after few years believing that all the 'disasters' were brought upon them by her. Having no where to give her to, my grandmother had to keep her. She was always 'verbally' tortured, brought up to believed that she's not meant to be.
All that lead to low-self esteem.

She became someone's else's 2nd wife. Not legally. You know what Malaysia in the older days are like..

I may be exaggerating by bringing this into the picture. As I read the recent books I bought about Chinese culture & literature, I understand why Chinese believed the way they do.

Only surprisingly, they still believed in 'auspicious' & 'omen' after thousands of years.

Even as the society progress, when they have no answer to their misgiving, they turned to this for excuse. Without sometimes looking at their own behaviour & up-bringing.

Okay, culture aside.
I seriously dislike Mandarin because (I found that many people who learned Chinese/Mandarin as their primary language) I have difficulty understanding them when they speak English. They either speak with direct translation from Chinese (which is pure insult to either language) or they can't pronouce many words properly.

It takes few seconds to translate their pronounciations,.. as
b & p,
d & t,
g & k,
z & c are used totally confused from the master creator of the alphabets.
Besides, they somehow believe they can't roll their tongue to say R. Mostly the same 'species'.
Oh, it does drive me up the wall. (ANd now, they're affecting me TOO!)

German, Dutch, French, English, Portugese & Spanish may have use them differently, but the basics will stay. Only a few letters will change. Even with my Malay education background, English isn't a problem to me.

So who says anyone can't master two languages or more????

I have laid the rule that my children shall not receive Mandarin as their primary education for the fear of this problem.

So what(?!) that I'm of Chinese heritage? As far as I know, when my grandparents sailed out of China, they knew there was no turning back. Besides, both of them (sorry, all four of them) DO NOT SPEAK A SINGLE WORD OF MANDARIN.

Yes, with China booming, Every 'Chinese' all over the world are swarming in to learn Mandarin. But with Taiwan having a major influence, some may get caught in between as to which Mandarin to master (namely HongKonger). And with both China & Taiwan being loggerheads with each other, I doubt they'll unify the Mandarin usage. Imagine, American English, British English, Australian English & New Zealander English. All four English language countries, sometimes you can barely understand the other if you're familiar with one (excuse frequent travelers please). I'm not just talking about accents, but Pronounciations & grammer usage.

Well,.. back to people "Swarming In" to learn Mandarin. With so many people trying to enter the market, they'd be extremely proud. And when the society or market matures.. They'd be very judgemental.
Remember when people were so keen to learn Japanese?
People stop not because Japan became less popular. But because they are so proud of their language, if you can't speak it well, pls do no insult the language by speaking you menial Japanese.
Eventually, they learn English too.
The same is already happening for the Chinese.

Many Chinese are learning English. Their population is so huge, their society is advancing fast. Thinking about entering Chinese market? Now is your chance. DO it late, you''ll be scorned. For your lousy Mandarin. Remember, for you to be up to par with them, no matter how, your mandarin will never be up to their standard.
They will see you as 'hua-ren', but you are no 'Chong-kuo ren".

Call me stubborn. But I don't care. I can learn Mandarin for public's sake. But don't condemn me just because I'm have yellow skin. That is how 'English' students in Singapore gave up learning Mandarin. That is not challenging, that is oppressing. This leads to discourage.

My mother tongue is Hokkien.
My husband's mother tongue is Cantonese.
Mandarin IS THE national language of China.

You can never accused me of neglecting mother tongue.
Truthfully, I think people who can't speak their own dialect are the one neglecting their mother tongue.

I only neglect my ancester's national language. But they had decided that China is long past them anyway. I'm not migrating back to China. THey would never accept me anyway. Why bother?