Hong Kong English/Cantonese (VIII)
“Why Double May”: It May Be a Disaster for Women If May Gets Double-d and Men Keep Saying “Why”
This time I’d like to talk about Double May.
If you click this article for politics, you may go back because it’s totally not related.
But why? Here are the reasons.
- We aren’t talking about if the current British Prime Minister (who says “Brexit means Brexit”) could get doubled in anything.
- We aren’t talking about whether the fifth month of the year would become 62 days, either.
To be honest, I am not sure if Double May should be regarded as a Cantonese term or a Mandarin term, though I think it originated in Hong Kong.
Its origin is a well-known joke. The version I heard when I was young was related to singers/actors in Hong Kong and I apologise for my bad story-telling skill. Anyway, here it goes.
People all knew that Alex and Steph had been a perfect couple. However, Alex asked for a break up one day.
“Why?” asked Steph, in tears.
Alex’s reply puzzled Steph, as he answered,
“Why Double May.”
It was too strange of Alex to answer this question in English, and to throw a question back at her. Steph thought.
After nights of puzzlement, Steph reached out for her bandmate and frienemy, Theresa. Steph explained Theresa what happened.
“Why did he throw a question back at me?” asked Steph, confused, “And are you related to that ‘Double’ matter?”
“My surname isn’t May,” replied Theresa, “Wait.”
There were seconds of silence. The suspense was becoming awkward.
“What if it’s not English,” suggested Theresa, “It could be Mandarin.”
Steph looked at Theresa in shock, but she became relieved after body-checking her bandmates.
“Huh, men,” said Steph, rolling her eyes.
What happened at the end of the story? We need to think of that sentence and replace the syllables with Chinese words.
“Why Double May” becomes “Wǒ ài dà bō mèi (Chinese: 我愛大波妹; Jyutping: ngo5 oi3 daai6 bo1 mui1; literally: I love big ball girl)”. And it means “I love girls with big boobs”. When we get back to each of the English words here, “Why” becomes “I love”, “Double” becomes “big boobs”, “May” only refers to “girl”.
As the joke became popular, the phrase “Why Double May” started to become more widely used.
However, it isn’t always needed to talk about “Why” because we may see a lot of girls with big boobs around but we don’t need to love them all. Love has a lot more to take care of.
As a result, people started referring those girls with big boobs as Double Mays. “Double May” even pops up on newspapers nowadays!
But hey, why am I so sure that Double May must have originated in Hong Kong?
It is Hong Kong Cantonese which uses 波 (Jyutping: bo1; original meaning: wave) to refer to balls and anything spherical, as a transliteration of the English word ball. Examples are 打波 (playing basketball; Jyutping: daa2 bo1), 踢波 (playing football; Jyutping: tek3 bo1) and 乒乓波 (table tennis / ping pong; Jyutping: bing1 bam1 bo1). Mandarin doesn’t use this Chinese word to refer to balls.
Even “Why Double May” is “made” from Mandarin, only Hong Kong has the sense of using “balls” to refer to female breasts. Other Mandarin speaking places, more often, use “milk” (奶; Pinyin: nai3; Jyutping: naai5) to mean the body part. Therefore, Mandarin speakers may not easily understand what “Double May” is.
Therefore, I can’t think of a reason that this phrase doesn’t come from Hong Kong.
I personally think calling the girls Double May is a kind of body shaming and so I should never have called any of my female friends Double May. Of course, part of the reason is that it’s Asia and very few of them have big breasts. But anyway, when it’s something you like, you won’t care what it looks.
Hope it’s not too early for me to post these two memes. They’re related to May, aren’t they?
And it’s gonna be May anyway.
