Puk Kai
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Puk kai, pok gai or puk gai (Traditional Chinese: 仆街; Jyutping: puk1 gaai1, abbv. PK) is a very common profanity in Cantonese. It is mainly seen in Hong Kong and Guangdong province, for example, on graffiti, especially in secondary schools, or appears in the conversations especially among males, low educated class and MK guys.
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[edit] Semantics
Puk kai may be translated literally as "Fall onto the street". Indeed, the literal pronunciation for "仆街" is "父街" ([fu6 gaai1]), but genuiuely Hong Kong people (and Guangdong as well) read it as puk kai, which is the conversational pronunciation. However, sometimes students in schools may pronounce as fu to trick the teachers.
[edit] Related catchphrases
Puk kai can be applied to daily life under a large variety of situations. For example, someone may shout "Puk kai!" at somebody when he or she finds that other person annoying. Sei puk kai (死仆街, Sei means death as stressing tone) or Puk keui go chau kai (仆佢個臭街, lit. "Fall onto his/her smelly street") is another form inferred from the original one.
[edit] History
Puk kai is one of the oldest Cantonese swear words. It was originally used by the Triads to mean "to lie dead on the street with no one retrieving his corpse", which implies that the person's subordinates have all betrayed him or died. But nowadays very few people know the original meaning, misunderstanding that Puk Kai means falling on the street due to its literal meaning.
[edit] Characteristics
[edit] Application
As well as exclamation in communication, puk kai is usually used to describe somebody who is naive or pretentious, arrogant or scholastic, too serious or frivolous, handsome or ugly. In fact, this expression can be used against anything "damnable". For instance, students may wish that their teacher puk kai for assigning a difficult task. It's usage is similar to the English usage of 'fuck', of which could be used as a noun, verb, adjective or adverb depending on the context of its use.
[edit] Variation
Puk kai can also be used as a verb to represent many different meanings. For example, after misbehaving, one may say Ngo gam chi puk kai la (我今次仆街喇) which means "I'm screwed this time". It is further applied to undesirable events, such as losing money in gambling.
[edit] Short form
Sometimes to avoid being too rude, people use "PK" as a short form instead of directly using puk kai as it sounds "alphabetically similar". This form is an application of acronym. This short form may even be used in conversations among educated people in places such as offices to express the feeling of falling into troubles or problems.
Because of the spread of the HKGolden subculture, the word sometimes written in "Hi Hi" by teenagers.
[edit] Non-Cantonese usages
In Mandarin, puk kai is pronounced as Pǔjiē, and is mostly used in teenage subcultures in Taiwan. This usage is thought to have carried into Taiwan by Hong Kong manhuas, which use the swear word quite frequently. Pǔjiē, however, is not considered as an obscenity in Taiwan and means nothing more than "lying dead on the street." (unless the person is specifically imitating the manhuas.) For example, one might say "Lèi dào pǔjiē" (累到仆街) which means "I'm so exhausted I'm lying on the streets."
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Cantonese Swearword Research Site Puk Guy at Chap. 5.1 (Traditional Chinese)
- Puk Kai in EVCHK (Traditional Chinese)
