食蛇

Chinese

		eat; food; to feed eat; food; to feed; animal feed	snake; serpent
trad. (食蛇)		食	蛇
simp. #(食蛇)		食	蛇
Literally: “to eat snake”.

Pronunciation

• Southern Min

  (Hokkien, POJ): chia̍h-chôa

  (Teochew, Peng'im): ziah⁸ zua⁵

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• Southern Min
  • (Hokkien: Penang, Singapore)
    • Pe̍h-ōe-jī: chia̍h-chôa
    • Tâi-lô: tsia̍h-tsuâ
    • Phofsit Daibuun: ciaqzoaa
    • IPA (Penang): /t͡sia(ʔ)⁴⁻³ t͡sua²³/
    • IPA (Singapore): /t͡sia(ʔ)⁴³⁻²¹ t͡sua²⁴/
  • (Teochew)
    • Peng'im: ziah⁸ zua⁵
    • Pe̍h-ōe-jī-like: tsia̍h tsuâ
    • Sinological IPA ^(key): /t͡siaʔ⁴⁻² t͡sua⁵⁵/

Verb

食蛇

1. (Malaysian and Singapore Hokkien) to slack off; to play hooky; to take off from work

Synonyms

Dialectal synonyms of 偷懶 (“to slack off; to lie down on the job”) [map]

Variety	Location	Words edit
Formal (Written Standard Chinese)		偷懶, 躲懶, 偷閒
Northeastern Mandarin	Beijing	躲懶兒, 偷懶兒, 脫懶兒
	Taiwan	偷懶
	Singapore	偷懶
Lanyin Mandarin	Ürümqi	躲懶
Jianghuai Mandarin	Yangzhou	躲懶, 隑懶
Cantonese	Guangzhou	躲懶, 放蛇, 偷雞
	Hong Kong	偷懶, 蛇王, 吞泡
	Dongguan	偷雞
Gan	Nanchang	偷懶
Hakka	Meixian	偷嫽
	Xingning	偷嫽, 怠懶
	Huizhou (Huicheng Bendihua)	偷嫽
Jin	Taiyuan	偷懶
Eastern Min	Fuzhou	躲懶
Southern Min	Xiamen	想惰
	Zhangzhou	想惰, 想死
	Penang (Hokkien)	食蛇
	Singapore (Hokkien)	食蛇
Southern Pinghua	Nanning (Tingzi)	偷懶

Descendants

• → English: chia chua, jiak zua (Singlish)
• → English: eat snake (calque) (Singlish)