hum bao and humbao (1990)

[Ben Zimmer]

On Wed, Aug 17, 2011 at 11:28 PM, victor steinbok wrote:
>
> On Wed, Aug 17, 2011 at 11:09 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
>>
>> "Bapao", more frequently spelled "bakpao" (the "k" represents a
>> glottal stop), is popular street food in many Indonesian cities.
>> Anyone who has spent time in places like Jakarta or Bandung will be
>> familiar with the call of "bakpao!" from street vendors, competing
>> with similar calls of "satay!" (meat skewers), "bakso!" (meatballs),
>> etc. On his Indonesia trip, Obama reminisced about the calls of
>> "satay" and "bakso" (though he left out the "bakpao"):
>>
>> http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3D2765
>>
>> The "bak" /ba?/ element in "bakpao" and "bakso" is from the Hokkien
>> version of =E8=82=89 meaning "meat", which Wikipedia tells me may actually
>> be derived from proto-Austronesian "*babuy" ('wild pig').
>>
>> http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E8%82%89#Noun_3
>
> Thanks for the reminder! Bapao is probably even more common as a name than
> Bao. But both are used in Holland. I have never seen "bakpao" there. But I
> haven't been everywhere... ;-)

I'm not surprised the Dutch prefer the "bapao" spelling variant to
"bakpao" (same with "baso" vs. "bakso" and "bami" vs. "bakmi"), since
they wouldn't cotton to the Indonesian use of "k" for the glottal
stop.

--bgz

--
Ben Zimmer
http://benzimmer.com/

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