Cantonese

While I was pondering on the behavior of our delinquent house officers, we set off to Chengdu (成都) for a conference.

There were eight of us – including our man from Pluto. On our way to the airport, he sighed, “You know, I’m coming to the conclusion that VC is one of the worst jobs you could get. Our students often behave as if they are the boss and I am their servant.”

A few of us giggled and made an inviting grunt.

“That was the University Grant Council visit last week,” he went on to explain, “Two of the visitors were British but, you know what, our student representatives refused to speak to them in English – because they are students of the Chinese U !” (I could imagine how embarrassing the scene was.)

“Inferiority complex,” KL murmured.

“And we are still in the procedure to justify why we have to teach some of the subjects in English …” our future VC continued.

“Do they propose to use Putonghua to teach all subjects in our university ?” I suggested.

“Of course not. Most of them could speak only Cantonese.”

“In that case, shall we propose to change our name to the Cantonese University ?” I said to myself.