Cantonese and Mandarin / American poets

This is where Corey attempted to teach me some Mandarin while I tried catching up with Billie:

[21:11:20] Corey: Corey, chu fan lo
[21:11:27] Corey: time to eat lunch :P
[21:12:58] Flami: lunch, eh? I haven't "sik fan" yet
[21:13:16] Corey: sick fan? gross
[21:13:33] Corey: lunch is wo san, though... what they said just means "eat" :P
[21:14:34] Flami: that's "eating rice," literally... I forgot what "lunch" and "dinner" are :P
[21:45:13] Corey: zao and wan are "morning" and "evening"
[21:45:19] Corey: just add san
[22:15:18] Flami: jo-chan, mm-chan, and maan-chan... something like that?
[22:16:01] Corey: no, I think Joe Chan is a plumber or something
[22:21:02] Flami: you KNOW what I mean :P
[22:28:18] Corey: well, in REAL Chinese, "morning" is zao-san... I don't know about your crazy stuff.. it doesn't even have words!
[22:29:05] Flami: jo-sun to you, then!
[22:38:51] Corey: that's what people here say about Cantonese :P it doesn't even have words!!!
[22:39:26] Corey: they mean that Cantonese "stole" the Chinese characters, and they don't have their own set of characters. they say Japanese stole their characters, too
[22:49:42] Flami: given the similarities I think I see between those two written languages, that could very well be

Trivia fact for Tuesday, June 29: What Pulitzer Prize-winning American poet was granted a conditional appointment to West Point, but had to leave after failing the grammar and math sections of the entrance exam? Carl Sandburg, in 1899.