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> waiters who can effectively converse in Cantonese, Mandarin, Hokkien, English, and some additional family dialect

Chinese who can speak any one of those languages (Cantonese, Mandarin, Hokkein) or some others (like Hunanese, Gan) can easily pick up one of the others by living in one of the places where they're spoken.




This is, of course, true, but I don't know that it really diminishes the accomplishment.

(As the joke goes, for some dialects, you just "modulate [the tones] down.")




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