I eat lunch often at a little local chinese shop where the owners speak just a little english. They play a cd of this incredible female vocalist and a nice band. I want this cd, but the cover is in chinese only. I’m hoping one of you incredibly knowledgable individuals may give me a lead.
The cd cover was largely red with a pretty chinese girls face on it. Chinese lettering was overtop of everything else. The owners pronunciation of the band/singer was “Hump I wheee” The Hump and I sounded like the same word maybe “humpai”.
Anyway…if anyone can give me a lead on where I might find the cd I would really appreciate it.
Dalberon, I can probably help you but I need to see the actual characters. If you could get the Chinese people to write the name of the person down and scan the image and email me then I can tell you. Also whether it is cantonese (Hong Kong) or Mainland Chinese music. For fun, you might even try saying “WOA SHYAN YAO TA DUH MIEN DZUH” (each word is 1 syllable) it means I need / want her name. Say it while pointing to the CD and make like you’re holding a pen. If they speak Mandarin they will be enamored with the fact that you are attempting to talk Chinese and they’ll do whatever they can to help. If they only speak speakers they won’t understand.
Slán go fóill,
Paul
BTW, it’s my wife who knows Chinese. I only know a little and I can’t read hardly any. I’ll get her to translate.
Thanks for the help. I’ll see if I can take my camera down and get a picture of the cover.
I made three attempts at saying your chinese statement out loud and have decided to stick with english for now since none of the three attempts sounded the same.
Dalberon, if you’re reasonably close to a city with a decent Chinatown, your best bet may be to copy (or, better, have them copy) the Chinese for you - then show it to a music shop owner in Chinatown. I held off on the suggestion until KCJiang had a chance to answer, but sounds like he’s as in the dark as I am.
Otherwise - well, I asked my wife, but although she’s a Cantonese-speaker she hasn’t kept up with the Cantonese music scene since she moved to the US (and your transliteration rings no bells for her- Cantonese needs 8 or 9 tones.) Don’t feel too bad about it - I’ve been married to her over 20 years, and know a fair amount of Cantonese words when I hear them, but my pronunciation still produces hysterical laughter from my brothers-in-law.
But she agrees with me with the “copy the name and show the music shop owner” idea, if you can get to one.
There is a pop singer, I believe from Taiwan, named Hung Pai Hui. Depending upon the dialect, the name might have been pronounced as you heard. I’ve heard “Hui” pronounce both as “Hway” and “Hweii”. The “ng” at the end of Hung might also have been nearly silent, leading to a sound more like an “m” like you heard.
Anyway, it’s just a thought. As far as a red album cover with a girls face on it, you’ve pretty much described about 30% of all chinese pop album covers, at least when the lead singer is a female
By the way, you didn’t mention what kind of music it was. Was it pop, or more traditional? Personally, I listen to Faye Wong. Can’t go wrong there.
