Re: Asian Number Systems (was Re: FYI re: Greenberg's Universals)

CONLANG@LISTSERV.BROWN.EDU writes:
>Japanese has two sets too. The Chinese set (ichi ni san shi/yon go roku
>hachi
>shichi kyuu jyuu) and a native set (hitotsu, hutatsu, mitsu, yotsu....
>seven
>is hanatsu....I forget the rest, but you get the idea) They are used in
>different situations; as mentioned below for Korean, different "counters"
>take different sets. (counters: suffixes such as -ban "number": ichi-ban
>"number one"; -hai "glass": ippai "one glass [of a drink]" ...there's some
>irregularities in the counters in there, sorry. but anyway, there's lots
>of
>counters.) People are counted with hitori, hutari, sannin, yonnin, for an
>extra weird one.
Tagalog also has two sets of numbers. the native and Spanish. One of my
books on Tagalog says that the Spanish numbers are used mostly when buying
or selling BUT, both sets are  often used indiscriminately. I've heard my
grandma say she uses the Spanish numbers because it's a little easier than
the Tagalog way

1 - 10 in the two sets:

Spanish: uno, dos, tres, kuwatro, singko, seis, siyete, otso, nuwebe, diyes
Tagalog: isá, dalawá, ápat, limá, ánim, pitó, waló, siyám, sampû
(circumflex - glottal stop + accent).

The ordinals are interesting in that "first"is represented by "úna", while
the others are in Tagalog style: 2nd - ikalawá, 3rd - ikatló, 4th - ikaápat

Prices can be in Spanish or Tagalog:

P (peso) 1.20:

Tagalog: isang piso't dalawampung sentimos - One peso and 20 centavos
Spanish:  uno y beinte

Note: "Isang" is actually isa + ng, the linker. It's become an adjective
describing pisos (as has dalawampu for sentimos) . Piso't is a
contraction: ...piso at... - ....peso and.... Plural is implied by the
number .

----------
Also, I saw an interesting thing today in the local Mexican grocery. I was
looking for sugar skulls, and saw the sign over the aisle for drinks
(bebidas). Instead of a b, it was spelled with a v : bevidas.