When to borrow into Penang Hokkien

In compiling the Penang Hokkien Dictionary, I often arrive at decision points. In particular, this deals with Hokkien words that are not commonly used. Do I include it, or do I leave it out. But if I leave it out, then our Hokkien will be so much poorer because we cannot express what we want to express. If I put it in, is this still a Penang Hokkien Dictionary?

I look to English for guidance. Even though it has an extensive vocabulary, English borrows unabashedly from French, Latin, and many other languages. Languages, I observe, are like living organisms. If you want them to stay alive, you need to allow them to grow. The decision I am making is, yes, I shall add it in. If the word comes from Taiwanese Hokkien, I will mention it too. The good thing is that my dictionary is not just a word list, I have space to provide as much elaboration as needed. I want people who speak Penang Hokkien to have exposure to words used in other Hokkien dialects, and so, if I come across words I feel are essential to know, I will add them in.

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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While I try my best to provide you information as accurate as I can get it to be, I do apologize for any errors and for outdated information which I am unaware.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.