The “B” and the “P” are so similar anyways that it hardly matters.[/quote]
Not the point. We don’t write “Amerika” just because the “C” and “K” are so similar (unless, of couse, we are trying to piss Tainan Cowboy off).[/quote]
True, but it’s not very important to them since English is not their official language. I’m sure you would care less if the chinese character for “mei” in Meiguo (The U.S) was changed to another Chinese character with the same sound.
True, but it’s not very important to them since English is not their official language. I’m sure you would care less if the Chinese character for “mei” in Meiguo (The U.S) was changed to another Chinese character with the same sound.[/quote]
Oh fer chrissakes! The world spells it as “Taipei”. As they do for “Russia”, “Mexico”, etc. We don’t go around spelling them “Rushiaa”, “Meyico” do we?
True, but it’s not very important to them since English is not their official language. I’m sure you would care less if the Chinese character for “mei” in Meiguo (The U.S) was changed to another Chinese character with the same sound.[/quote]
Oh fer chrissakes! The world spells it as “Taipei”. As they do for “Russia”, “Mexico”, etc. We don’t go around spelling them “Rushiaa”, “Meyico” do we?[/quote]
Are you shitting me that you care about this? In Elizabethan England a word could be spelled in 10 or 12 different ways. Arabic speakers can write their own names in a variety of different ways. Yoo shud bee abal too spel Tiepay howeva yoo choos. Oppressor.
Hanyu is the one currently used to teached chinese to foreigners. Wades gilles was the one used before, at the time city names were romanized. So while Taipei is the historically correct name, Taibei is the current pronunciation correct word. Same goes for Keelung/Keelong, Taichung/Taizhong, and so on…
Hanyu is the one currently used to teached Chinese to foreigners. Wades gilles was the one used before, at the time city names were romanized. So while Taipei is the historically correct name, Taibei is the current pronunciation correct word. Same goes for Keelung (Jilong)/Keelong (Jilong), Taichung/Taizhong, and so on…[/quote]
Taipei is the official name of the city, so while pinyin dictates that it’s pronounced “taibei” and logically should be spelled as such, officially you shouldn’t. There are a ton of cities in the States that have Spanish pronunciations or are named after objects in Spanish, and you don’t see people correcting those names in writing.
“Oh, since La Jolla is pronounced LA HOYA, I’m going to spell it like that instead.”
“Los Gatos means cats in Spanish, so I’m going to call and write Cats because that’s more politically correct”
How many of you like it when somebody butchers your name, either verbally or in writing? I’m sure some of you have had pleasant moments trying to correct people like your “Melisa” has only one s instead of two, your “Amandah” has an extra h, or you absolutely hate being called Dick when your name is Richard.
Wades Gilles is Taipei
Hanyu is Taibei[/quote]
Apparently that Wade Giles dude is the one who makes maps, cos I’ve looked at 124 world maps and they all spell it “Taipei”. Perhaps the cartographers are unsound, or maybe people who spell it “Taibei” are a bunch of pretentious wankers.
True, but it’s not very important to them since English is not their official language. I’m sure you would care less if the Chinese character for “mei” in Meiguo (The U.S) was changed to another Chinese character with the same sound.[/quote]
Oh fer chrissakes! The world spells it as “Taipei”. As they do for “Russia”, “Mexico”, etc. We don’t go around spelling them “Rushiaa”, “Meyico” do we?[/quote]
But we do spell Vienna with a “V” even though the residents of that region spell the city as “Wien”… I am sure there are countless other examples where this happens when people of one language try to adapt a word from another language so that it is more appealing to the ear or to the eye.
Wade Giles was replaced by PINYIN. Taipei was the spelling used in Wade Giles.
You can:
Go through the rigamorole of explaining that it is spelled taipei but pronounced taIbei
Spell it taIbei, the way it is pronounced, and explain that the common spelling derives from a system that was rejected and that the taIbei spelling comes from a system that won’t be standard for another fifteen years.
Hope that the pronunciation taIpei becomes the standard form, in line with the spelling that hasn’t been adopted yet.
Go for a swim in Barfage Stink. You can read about it here…
[quote=“jimipresley”]
Oh fer chrissakes! The [color=#BF0040]world[/color] spells it as “Taipei”. As they do for “Russia”, “Mexico”, etc. We don’t go around spelling them “Rushiaa”, “Meyico” do we?[/quote]
Who’s this “they” you speak of? Russians spell Russia like this: Россия. They spell Taibei like this: Тайбэй. In Arabic, Taibei is written
تايبيه
.So lets not get presumtuous about other peoples languages. Mr. Wade and Mr Giles may bot have invented the best Romanization system, but lets not mangle Chinese because of their mistakes.