Taiji Romanisation - writing Penang Hokkien with its soul

It is in fact very easy to make Taiji Romanisation perfectly regular. I just have to do a search-and-replace, and change all the "oo" to "u". Repeat that a few more times for other letters, et voila, Taiji Romanisation is now perfectly regular. That would please those who know POJ/Tai-lo, but don't understand my purpose. However, the great damage is that it will kill the soul of the writing system. If Taiji Romanisation is perfectly regular, I don't think I have the energy to continue. The wind has left my sail.

But Hanyu Pinyin is perfectly regular. So is IPA. But people who compare Taiji Romanisation to these have to first understand the difference between orthography and phonetic alphabet, and the purpose of each. There is beauty in the irregularity.

Imagine a world where all leaves are rectangular. Imagine all tree trunks as smooth as poles. Imagine branches emerging at right angles from trunks. The beauty of the natural world lies in the gentle curve of the coasts, the irregular rocks dotting the shore, the birds flapping non-rectangular wings.

Imagine an English language where "way" and "weigh" must be spelled "we", while the pronoun "we" must be spelled "wi". Imagine a Mandarin language where all words of the same pronunciation must be written with the same Chinese character, regardless the meaning. Imagine having only one pronunciation for 行. A perfectly regular world is perfectly boring.

Anybody who writes Penang Hokkien with Chinese characters need to see the broader picture.

Penang Hokkien SHOULD NOT be written using Chinese characters. Penang is a plural society. Using Chinese characters splits the Penang Hokkien-speaking population into two camps - those familiar with Chinese characters, and those who aren't.

Language is an extremely sensitive matter and should always be approached with tact, for it touches on human sentiments. It is unfortunate to see Chinese characters being championed for writing Penang Hokkien, by those who are familiar with Chinese characters, without regard to the feeling of Penang Hokkien speakers who are English educated and Malay educated.

It is extremely insensitive, condescending and hurtful to expect the English and Malay educated to learn Chinese characters in order to write Penang Hokkien. Promoting Penang Hokkien with Chinese characters alienates those who are unfamiliar with them, for it puts them at a disadvantage on the language they knew from birth.

Imagine for a moment Taiji Romanisation doesn't use the alphabet. Instead of romanization, instead of Chinese characters, imagine Taiji Romanisation written in a unique set of symbols called the Timothy Tye Characters. If those who knew POJ/Tai-lo could complain that Taiji Romanisation using the alphabet is difficult, imagine how much more difficult it would be, if it uses characters they have never seen before? The moment they lose their advantage, they complain. But it's an unfair advantage.

Taiji Romanisation is like a brand new sports car. Those who have driven cars before complain that this new sports car is difficult to drive, and prefer their clunky old junk. But those who have never driven before, and are willing to give this new car a try, soon discover that once they got a hang of it, this new sports car outperforms the clunky old junk.

If you go through the comments on this FB Group, you will see that the people who start with a blank canvas have spoken: Taiji Romanisation IS easy to use.

In a plural society, we have to be fair to all. Taiji Romanisation is the fairest system, because nobody has a distinct advantage. Everybody who goes to school in Malaysia is familiar with the alphabet. Continuing to push for the use of Chinese characters to write Penang Hokkien only increases the pent-up resentment of those unfamiliar with Chinese characters, and is not the way to promote solidarity among Penang Hokkien speakers.

I did not come out of nowhere to introduce a writing system for Penang Hokkien. When it comes to knowing Penang, I have few equals. From Penang food to Penang street are, from its history to its streets, buildings, islands, I am Penang's encyclopedia. But more than just having a body of knowledge on Penang, it's also about knowing its heart, To nurture that Penang heart, we have to be fair to all parties.

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About this website

Dear visitor, thank you so much for reading this page. My name is Timothy Tye and my hobby is to find out about places, write about them and share the information with you on this website. I have been writing this site since 5 January 2003. Originally (from 2003 until 2009, the site was called AsiaExplorers. I changed the name to Penang Travel Tips in 2009, even though I describe more than just Penang but everywhere I go (I often need to tell people that "Penang Travel Tips" is not just information about Penang, but information written in Penang), especially places in Malaysia and Singapore, and in all the years since 2003, I have described over 20,000 places.

While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware. Nevertheless, I hope that what I have described here will be useful to you.