To view this page in Chinese (Big5) in a non-Chinese OS, you will need to install Chinese software.

Although written Cantonese is supposed to be identical to Standard Mandarin, there are more differences than just using respectively Traditional and Simplified characters.
 

Adverbial modifiers in Cantonese come after the verb, while in Mandarin the opposite is the case:

• Cantonese: 我走先
• Mandarin: 我先走

• Cantonese: 媽媽每日俾十蚊我
• Mandarin: 媽媽每天給我十塊錢

The grammatical words, although phonetically unrelated, generally have the same semantic value. For example, Cantonese 唔 (m4) "not" and Modern Standard Chinese 不 (bu4). The same applies to Cantonese 俾 (bei2) and Mandarin 給 (gei3).
 

Thanks to the more than 150-year British involvement in Hong Kong, there are more borrowed words in Cantonese than in Mandarin: 的士 (dik1 si6) "taxi" and 巴士 (baa1 si6) "bus" being the 2 famous examples a visitor to Hong Kong confronts first. In fact, the slick 巴士 is becoming the word of choice even in Mainland China, replacing the cumbersome Mandarin 公共汽車 (gong1 gong4 qi4 che1). Among others, there are 菲林 (fei1 lam3) "film", 泊車 (bok6 ce1) "to park (a car)" and 貼士 (tip3 si6) "tip".

Many Mandarin compounds go topsy-turvy in Cantonese, for example, the Mandarin 已經 (yi3 jing1) "already" in Cantonese will be 經已(ji5 ging1), the Mandarin 客人 (ke4 ren2) "guest" in Cantonese turns into 人客 (yan4 haak3). Other examples include the Mandarin 要緊 (yao4 jin3)"important" becoming 緊要 (gan2 yiu1), and Standard Chinese 錄取 (lu4 qu3) "to record" 'mirrored' as 取錄 (ceoi2 luk6).

The greater phonetic diversity in some cases allows Cantonese speakers to get away using only one character per word, while Mandarin speakers have to use 2-character compounds for the sake of intelligibility. For example, "eye" in Cantonese is just 眼 (ngaan5), but Mandarin has to use the double-barreled (yan3 qing). The Mandarin 明白 (ming2 bai2) "clear, I see" in Cantonese is simply 明 (ming4). In order to be understood, a Beijinger would have to say 耳朵 (er3 duo) for "ear", but in Cantonese just 耳 (ji5) will make perfect sense. By the same token, the Mandarin 認識 (ren4 shi4) "to know, recognize" in Cantonese is simply 識 (sik1).

Also, Mandarin's 2 favorite word-coining tools -- duplication (as in 老老實實 (lao3 lao3 shi4 shi4) or 沉甸甸 (chen2 dian1 dian1) and "er"-fication (as in 號碼兒 (hao4 mar3) or 花兒 huar2) are non-existent in Cantonese.
 

There are no Cantonese online tutorials that will take you beyond a handful of basic phrases and words. However, there exist a substantial number of offline resources. They can be found at UCLA's Language Materials Project page. Also read about Cantonese cuisine and dim sum from About.com's Chinese Cuisine Guide.

Rae-Arthur Mitski B2B (Industrial) Sales/Marketing and Customer Service; Online Marketing Analysis and Project Management; Asian Import/Export & Trade Fair Planning; Spoken and written Dutch, English, Japanese, Russian, Thai.	Resources Thai-English-Thai Searchable Technical & Business Terms Glossary Recruiting Agencies in the Netherlands Exhibitions, Trade Fairs and Conventions in Bangkok, Thailand 2004-5 Thai Phonetic Transcription Standard Waarom zijn er geen dialecten in moderne Russissch?
CHINESE LANGUAGE HOME PAGE How to read/type Chinese in a non-Chinese OS -- Chinese language support Mandarin & Cantonese Chinese Grammar and Conversation Resources Chinese Humor Page Chinese Tidbits Articles about the Chinese language Chinese Tattoos	B2B online marketing consultancy Website authoring and localization Online marketing and search engine optimization Dutch, English, Japanese, Russian, Thai