Where's the XO?

MISSING! REWARD FOR WHOEVER DISCOVERS WHERE THE XO WENT TO!

Today I had chicken rice at Boon Tong Kee!! hahahaha.

And so when I was eating, there this poster on the wall facing me which was promoting the XO sauce of the store. It looked like


Soon, my relatives noticed the poster as well and they began discussing whether there was XO (the liquor) in XO sauce since it was not included in the list of ingredients on the poster. My mom then pointed out that actually there is no XO liquor in the sauce itself. This made me a little curious because why is the sauce named the way it is then? Besides,having almost no culinary knowledge, I am not exactly familiar with such sauces.

Well, it turns out that she was right. There is no liquor in the sauce after all. After doing a search on Google, I was half amused to find a Wikipedia entry on XO sauce, which is really useful for me actually!

So why isn't there XO liquor in XO sauce although the name makes it sound as though there is?

To quote wikipedia..

"The name XO sauce comes from fine XO (extra-old) cognac, which is a popular Western liquor in Hong Kong and considered by many to be a chic product there. In addition the term XO is often used in the popular culture of Hong Kong to denote high quality, prestige, and luxury. In fact, XO sauce has been marketed in the same manner as the French liquor, using packaging of similar colour schemes."

Wikipedia is always helpful at times like this. ^^

Anyway, the mystery has been solved! The word XO was borrowed and used to name the sauce in order to present some kind of classy image for the sauce. Very interesting indeed. And the term XO sauce seems to be more related to the Chinese culture, since it originated from Hong Kong. Therefore, there is a possibility that non-Chinese might not have heard of it, or know what it means. Then again, not ALL Chinese may know what it means, or its background and origin. Though in multicultural Singapore, I think our fellow Singaporeans from other ethnic groups might have been exposed to XO sauce and even have some knowledge of it.

All this food talk is making me hungry. =/

Uniform group

Even though I may not look like it, I was once an NPCC (National Police Cadet Corps) member. Well, when I was in secondary school, I was trying to decide which co-curricular activity to join. And since a uniform group was something I have never had any experience of, I decided to join NPCC in the end. It turned out to be a rather enjoyable experience, though I must admit it was tough at times.

So here's the phrase to consider in this post. Uniform group! I would think it is a rather local thing. People who are not so aware of this type of CCA in Singapore might probably wonder what is a uniform group all about, or means.

A uniform group may mean to them a group which is uniform, or homogenous. In Singapore though, a uniform group can also be understood as a type of club or group, in which the members wear a uniform which is representative of their group, and carry out activities which cultivate self-discipline, leadership and teamwork, among others. There are many types of uniform groups indeed, and examples include the one I mentioned, plus National Cadet Corps, Boys Brigade, Girl Guides, St John's Ambulance, Red Cross and more.

I think this is a good example of how our understanding of the same phrase can differ due to the different cultural contexts that we are in. The same phrase holds different meanings to us because in the Singapore context, in this case, the term uniform group has been given a new meaning which may be seem natural to us but not something that people new to Singapore may understand when first encountering it. It is true because whenever I try to explain what kind of activities I participated in to my friends from overseas, I find a lot of difficulty in explaining about NPCC, such as what we do or what it means to be part of it. Probably also because there isn't such an activity group existing in their cultural contexts so it makes it more difficult for them to understand.

Just to show some results from Google after I typed uniform group as the search word..

Results from the web:


Filtered results to reflect searches from Singapore sites:


Results from the web show that uniform group seems to generate some kind of apparel related sites, while those from Singapore gave results which reflects our understanding of the term.


Cadets.. fall in!

The wheels of the bus go round and round

I was on the way home one day, and as usual I will have to take the bus (in addition to the train T.T). Along came a double decker bus. As I scanned my ezlink card and proceeded to walk further into the bus, I happened to glance at the sign which indicates the seating capacity of the bus.

The sign used upper saloon and lower saloon to refer to what I would call the upper deck and lower deck of the bus. Pondering about whether it was possible for the word saloon to mean deck, I snapped a shot of this while trying to look less suspicious at the same time. ;D

For me, saloon means car, the four wheeled type. If this is the meaning of saloon, then it would not really seem right to talk about upper 'car' or lower 'car'. So I explored the OALD, Merriam-Webster and OED to investigate the word saloon.

From the OALD,

sal•oon /slun/ noun
1 (also saloon car) (both BrE) (NAmE sedan) a car with four doors and a boot/trunk (= space at the back for carrying things) which is separated from the part where the driver and passengers sit: a five-seater family saloon

This sense of the word does not seem able to account for the meaning of the upper/lower levels of the bus. Instead, it refers more to the entire vehicle as a whole.

Next, from the Merriam-Webster,

sa·loon
3 British a : parlor car b : sedan 2a —called also saloon car

Hmm.. this seems similar to the previous dictionary entry in the OALD. Taking a look at the OED lastly,

saloon
4. a. A large cabin in a passenger-boat for the common use of passengers in general or for those paying first-class fares;thepassenger cabin of an aeroplane. Also quasi-advb. in to go (etc.) saloon.
b. In full saloon car or carriage: A railway carriage without compartments, furnished more or less luxuriously as a drawing-room or for a specific purpose, as dining, sleeping saloon. Also (U.S.) ‘the main room of a compartment-car or a small subdivision of a sleeping-car’ (Funk's Stand. Dict.).
c. A type of motor car with a closed body for four or more passengers. Cf.SEDAN 1c.

Well, the part in sense 4b which says that saloon could be the 'main room of a compartment-car' does kind of describe the upper and lower 'compartments' of a bus. But I could not find anything in the quotations which had similar meaning to the bus situation here.

Then, looking at the word deck this time, the Longman Dictionary showed the following result:

deck noun

2 ON A BUS, PLANE ETC one of the levels on a bus, plane etc

lower/upper etc deck

I managed to find a seat on the upper deck.

Eddie returned to the flight deck (=the part of an aircraft where the pilot sits).

➔ double-decker (1), single-decker

This fits the required meaning for description of the seating capacity. The OALD also displayed similar results.

deck
noun
2 one of the floors of a ship or a bus: the upper / lower / main deck of a ship We sat on the top deck of the bus. My cabin is on deck C.—see also double-decker, flight deck, single-decker

Therefore, I think it would more appropriate to use deck instead of saloon to refer to the upper and lower levels of the bus since saloon does not have any apparent connection to them.

Of mouse and mice

I don't think it's all that clear but it's apparent there's only a single line of words right at the top of the picture. The picture was taken from the NTU's ADM website. Click to enlarge. The keyword is underlined in red.

Well, I think we all know what that means. I would define it to be the action of placing your mouse over the image in order to trigger some kind of effect. It can be considered an IT word because you definitely wouldn't use that word elsewhere. In the first place, the word mouse is an item specifically related to the IT world.

As commonplace as the word mouseover may seem, its meaning is not reflected in dictionaries. Neither the OED, Merriam-Webster or OALD had entries for it. All of them only had a part of the entry on mouse to reflect this sense.

Such as the OALD, which states that a mouse is..
mouse /mas/ noun (pl. mice /mas/)
2 (pl. also mouses) (computing) a small device that is moved by hand across a surface to control the movement of the cursor on a computer screen: Click the left mouse button twice to highlight the program. Use the mouse to drag the icon to a new position. see cat

This got me wondering if it would be good to actually include the verb mouseover (or mouse over) into the sense of the word under the entry mouse. The sense of the word mouse would then not only include the explanation that it is a small device for computers, but also a particular and common way of using the mouse.

The Urban Dictionary has an entry for mouseover.

Mouse over
To use the mouse to move the screen cursor over a spot or area of the computer screen.

If the meaning of mouseover is being reflected in more major dictionaries, it might be helpful to people who have little knowledge about computers, or people who are just starting to learn some computer skills. Basically, to allow people whom the word mouseover does not make sense to to understand the meaning. The common usage of this word has made it no longer some kind of IT jargon, but a rather ordinary word. In that case, it might be useful to codify this usage into dictionaries. Though of course, there might be considerations such as the stability of the word.

A series of eyebrow raising events: Part 3

Part 3 is here!! But sadly, this is the last of the series. And in this post, I bring you the last eyebrow raising event. By the way, if you're confused, this is a series, though you don't exactly have to read them in order. Parts 1 and 2 can be found here and here respectively.

So, as I was scanning through this particular shop's advertisements, I came across another (the 3rd) word whose usage seemed fishy. To me at least.


RELISH this discount too!

The word relish caught my attention. From my understanding, relish has something to do with savoring or appreciating something, which could be the flavor of food, or a particular moment. But are we able to say 'relish a discount'? I'm not too sure.

Checking to see if my intuition was correct, I consulted Google as usual, and a few dictionaries. Google had no results showing relish being used with a discount, though it had 'relish an advantage'. Dictionaries also showed senses and usages which did not really match with the usage here.

For example, a particular sense of the word which seems to be rather close to the meaning that the advertisement wishes to convey as from the OED (I didn't take all the quotations)

relish, v.
4. a. trans. To take pleasure or delight in; to enjoy greatly. Also refl.
1921 J. GALSWORTHY To Let II. xi. 219, I wish I could make you a pink cream, Mr. Soames, like in the old days; you did so relish them.

1932 Theosophical Q. July 7 Satire that so relishes itself as to have lost all thought or memory of moral purpose. 1986 R. ANGELL Once more around Park (1991) 242 He pointed at Gary.., relishing the moment before he threw him out. 2004 Toronto Star (Nexis) 7 May D16, I suspect my friends notice I am relishing the meal a bit too muchnon-free-range chicken has never tasted so good.


It certainly doesn't look like the word relish can be used with discount. Though relish has the meaning of taking pleasure in something, enjoying seems more appropriate in this situation. Perhaps the store felt that using enjoy with discount was too 'common' a word? Still, enjoy would definitely be a better word choice.


I have come to the end of the series! The adventure ends here.. for now.