Why Chinatown Produce Is Cheap (2016) • Hacker News Board

Re: Why Chinatown Produce Is Cheap (2016)

#411

Post by thefringthing » Thu, May 04, 2017, 11:03 PM UTC

merrua wrote: post #379

digitalzombie wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Interestingly the Vietnamese, by contrast, are very much in to rare meats. I blame the French. Indochina happened. The biggest evidence for this is Vietnamese word for beef is Bo. Which is a borrowed French word. http://www.asian-central.com/stuffasianpeoplelike/2010/05/21...

Ah this came up recently. bo in Vietnamese, bó in Gaeilge. The origin is likely from Latin. http://www.latin-dictionary.net/search/latin/Bo

Wiktionary gives the etymology of "bó" as coming straight from Proto-Celtic and Proto-Indo-European. In any case, sometimes Irish has both a word of Celtic origin and a loanword for animals. "Chicken" is "cearc" but also "sicín".

Re: Why Chinatown Produce Is Cheap (2016)

#412

Post by meric » Thu, May 04, 2017, 11:54 PM UTC

SilverCurve wrote: post #408

meric wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because two thousand plus years ago the area that is now called Guangdong, and the area that is now Vietnam, was inhabited by the same people; And then the Guangdong area was conquered by China. The people who lived in Guangdong inter-married with the Chinese migrating south and also had a lot of influence on Cantonese. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southward_expansion_of_the_Han... Vietnam is "Yue-nam" in C…

Vietnamese here. I don't think your explanation is correct. First, most of the Viet-Cantonese words are likely brought by Chinese migration since the 15th century. When the Ming dynasty fell, many Chinese fled to South Vietnam and helped Viet people annex that land from the Cambodians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hoa_people Second, tt's true that we "might" have lots of connections with the ancient Yue people, but t…

You're right a lot of the loanwords and similarities between the languages could and likely happened later on.

I think there's no way Cantonese and Vietnamese don't have lots of connections with the ancient Yue people; A whole people don't just fall off the face of the Earth, unless there was a most serious kind of genocide. Almost certainly Cantonese and Vietnamese can trace some of their ancestors to the Yue one way or another. It's true Chinese at the time called everyone south of them Yue, but it didn't mean they were that much fragmented into tribes. The kingdom of Nanyue has borders pretty much exactly matching Guangdong + Vietnam. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nanyue. Nan = south, and so does the "nam" in Vietnam. I don't think that's a coincidence.

But your larger point is very much correct now that I think about it - the history of vocabularies can be very much complicated.

Re: Why Chinatown Produce Is Cheap (2016)

#413

Post by mwfunk » Fri, May 05, 2017, 2:27 PM UTC

euyyn wrote: post #364

mwfunk wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I bet if I went to India and complained about how pathetic the local hamburger places were, you might wonder about my maturity/worldliness/naivete/etc. You might also rightfully wonder why I was so intent on looking for hamburgers (or Chinese-American food, or Texas barbecue, or whatever) in India, when there are so many other food choices to explore. Every place you go in the world is going to be lacking in some thi…

Ok, but we're not talking about a specific dish, we're talking about ingredients, so to speak. It's surprising because the US has huge coasts that span climates. I was surprised by it too, and I'm from Spain, whose cuisine is unrelated to India's.

I understand, but it's just a function of what sells and what doesn't. Americans in general aren't nearly as into fish as some other countries, therefore the big supermarket chains don't offer as much variety as some other countries. It's just not a staple in most households.

People who do want more variety go to more specialized stores like Ranch 99 (which is just as American as Safeway, not sure why the poster suggested otherwise), which aren't hard to find.

The poster seemed to blame it on capitalism, but if so I don't see the point in defying capitalism by having the government require the big supermarket chains to stock 100 types of fish that are going to go mostly unsold and get thrown away. That sort of wastefulness sounds a lot worse than requiring the poster to spend 5 minutes Googling for more specialized stores nearby that sells what he wants.

Re: Why Chinatown Produce Is Cheap (2016)

#414

Post by inferiorhuman » Sat, May 06, 2017, 5:48 AM UTC

ithinkinstereo wrote: post #133

mixmastamyk wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Born where? I believe west coast Chinatowns were built by Cantonese and separated by 100+ years. See the recent post about american chinese food.

That's correct. The first influx of Chinese immigrants were mostly from the south. After the CCP took over, immigration from the mainland basically ceased. During the 60s-80s most of the Chinese immigrants that were not from HK were from Taiwan. Immigration from the mainland started picking up after the Cultural Revolution in the late 70s / early 80s through now. "Chinese" food in the US is mostly Cantonese food. Onl…

Chinese food in the US is fairly diverse (and has been for a while). Hunan food is, IIRC, quite common in New York and accounts for most of what New Yorkers think of when they conjure up images of Chinese food. Even in SF, places like Henry's Hunan have been around for a while (early 70s). If you go to the LA area you'll find a large proliferation of Taiwanese restaurants (which are relatively scarce in SF).

Re: Why Chinatown Produce Is Cheap (2016)

#415

Post by ido » Sat, May 06, 2017, 8:29 AM UTC

logfromblammo wrote: post #389

ido wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OT but doesn't learning common household skills like cooking the parents' responsiblity? I've never learned it at school

I can't say how much I learned in the class, but I was taught cooking in a US public school, which included etiquette, dishwashing, and table service. That class was one semester, and it was paired with another one-semester class that taught silkscreening, drafting, welding, wood joinery, and aluminum casting. This was, I think, in 7th or 8th grade. WTF are they teaching in schools these days if not how to make panca…

How to get into university, mostly.