I wonder how countries are pronounced in different languages.
In Chinese ( mandarin ) :
China - Zhongguo
Japan - ribun
korea- chaoxian
vietnam - yuenan
philippines - feilubin
......

umm i think u missed out something there

south korea- hanguo
north korea- chaoxian....

correct me if i'm wrong

china- chyugokku
japan-nihon
korea-kangokku
vietnam-betonamu
phillipines-fuiripino

china- jung gwok
japan- yat bun
korea- hon gwok
vietnam- yuet naam
phillipines- fei lut ban

I believe that's how they say North and South Korea in mainland China. In Taiwan it's just Nan Han for South Korea and Bei Han for North Korea.

hmm...interesting.



In korean we call ourselves hang@@k or hankook.



In korea its nam han for s.korea and book han for n.korea.


Its interesting how the words are so similar.

You're Korean?

An nyeong ha se yo.

I made a couple Korean friends during my stay in Beijing. They are some of the nicest people I've ever met.

Anyway, it shouldn't be that surprising to discover Chinese and Korean pronounciations are similiar. Afterall, Korea, along with Japan and Vietnam were deeply influenced by the Chinese language and culture for thousands of years. Even after only being influenced by the American culture and English language, many vocabulary words have already made their way into the Korean language. When I was in Seoul, I found out that hotel in Korean is ho-tael. I've always wondered though, I'm sure Korean had a word for hotels, but why import the English pronounciation?

Hey this is an interesting topic

Vietnamese:
Vietnam- Viet Nam
China- Trung Quoc
Japan- Nhat Ban
Korea- Han Quoc (not sure about this one but i believe its correct)

not sure about the philippines or any of the other countries. id have to look it up.

Edit: Just thought i'd add that in Vietnamese Nam means south and Bac means north.

Sure,

Khmer:

Japan - Jippun
China - Jen
Viet Nam - Yuen
Korea - Kure
Thailand - Siem
Laos - Liew

Does anyone know what each country's name means in their language? For example in Chinese:

China - Zhongguo - Middle Kingdom
Japan - Riben - Origin of the Sun
North Korea - Chaoxian/Bei Han - Morning Freshness/North Korea
South Korea - Hanguo/Nan Han - South Korea
Vietnam - Yuenan - Yue (name) nan (south)

I think the meaning should be the same for Korean, Japanese, and Vietnamese. But what about other languages like Khmer? As akara pointed out in Khmer, China is "Jen", what does that mean?

Well, if you think about it, both Korean and Japanese use Chinese loan words. The Korean Hanja and Japanese Kanji are all the same. I believe the same rule applies to Vietnamese -- you see, back in the day, Vietnamese wasn't written with Roman letters, but with a script that the Vietnamese called 'Chu-Nom' (The Hanzi characters are 字南, 'zi-nan' but it makes more sense in Chinese syntax to say nan-zi), meaning 'Southern Script'. This script was based upon Chinese characters, and the pronounciations of these characters were originally similar to Cantonese Chinese. Although the system eventually faded, the pronounciations stayed.


This is where the English word "Siam" comes from.

dtl88,
thats interesting info. thanks for sharing.


Yes, im interested to know the meanings of county names too if anybody knows.

I don't think it means 'Morning Freshness'. Since it's pronounced "Chao2" not "Zhao1(morning)" and "Xian3" not "Xian1(freshness)". Though I'm not quite sure why it's called chaoxian. I'll do a little more research on that.

if u want to know about other languages i think in AF lounge it would be more appropriate

Cantonese:

China: Zhong gwok
Hong Kong: Herng Gong
Vietnam: Yurt Nam
S. Korea: Lam Hon
N. Korea: Buc Hon
Japan: Yut Boon
Thailand: Tai gwok

And I know Korean call Chinese: jung gu geen

The reason 'older' Korean words are pronounced the same as Chinese or very similar is because they come directly from China. I know farmer, Nung Ren, is identical to Korean.

I had a discussion on this topic with some Korean friends.

Well, chao2 could mean humidity, and xian3 could mean well..hard to explain..

The meaning of Chaoxian was told to me by a Korean guy. Would any Koreans please clear this up?

Thought id ressurect this topic before it gets buried. anymore comments?

Chaoxian (Choson/Korea)

Chao - dynasty; morning

Xian - fresh, new, delicious; rare, few

Source: Mandarin Tools: Chinese Character Dictionary http://www.mandarintools.com/chardict.html

Also Koreans call their country "The land of the Morning Calm", which fits with Kulong's defintions.