Why do Vietnamese learners use commas instead of conjuctions?

[Fouryz]

@Nguyencai

Hello. Yes, sometimes we don’t use “and” or “or” when we list things like your examples:

“There are many buses, cars on the highway.”
“My brother, sister went to the park.”

Because in Vietnamese, we often say “Có nhiều xe buýt, xe hơi trên đường cao tốc”, “Anh chị tôi đã đi ra công viên”. However, we still say “buses and cars”. But we rarely say “my brother and sister” (anh và chị tôi). Instead, we say “anh chị tôi”, it’s shorter and simpler.

Actually, I and a lot of people I know usually say " Có nhiều xe trên đường cao tốc ghê " instead of “Có nhiều xe buýt, xe hơi trên đường cao tốc”. And yeah, it’s shorter and simpler!

[Jamie_K]

@Cgk

But as usual, you don’t read my messages thoroughly.

Claudia, you don’t read my messages thoroughly either. Or maybe you read them so thoroughly that you see things in them that aren’t there. If I say that some dogs like popcorn, you’ll jump in and berate me, saying that I am wrong to make the generalization that ALL dogs eat popcorn. If I say I know one man whose wife beats him, you’ll bawl me out for saying that ALL women beat their husbands, even though I never said it. You do this kind of thing relatively often.

[Cgk]

@Jamie (K)

Claudia, you don’t read my messages thoroughly either. Or maybe you read them so thoroughly that you see things in them that aren’t there. If I say that some dogs like popcorn, you’ll jump in and berate me, saying that I am wrong to make the generalization that ALL dogs eat popcorn.

Jamie, I didn’t berate you. You only thought I did. Didn’t you read my response in that other thread that you are now talking about and actually has no place here? I believe you have, but you seem to be too upset or too high and mighty to respond. I even asked you there if you want me to explain further.

@Jamie (K)

If I say I know one man whose wife beats him, you’ll bawl me out for saying that ALL women beat their husbands, even though I never said it. You do this kind of thing relatively often.

I don’t even know what you are talking about now. I don’t remember such a conversation at all.

I don’t berate anyone. I speak to you in the same way you speak to me. If I have a conversation with you and you realize that I am right, you suddenly don’t respond anymore. I voice my opinion in the same manner that everyone else does, but you seem to have a problem with it. When I ask you a question, you maintain silence. When I say something that you don’t like, you tell me that I just parrot what I’ve been told. Or you conjure up accusations out of the blue. And lately, you’ve started to get downright below the belt by saying that I don’t know what I’m talking about. You filter my comments and don’t acknowledge most of what I say. You find us Germans utterly amusing because in your eyes we are just a silly bunch and your whining about the oh, so silly Germans (mis)using “solutions” for everything has become so old, I’m surprised you don’t choke on the dust whenever you dig it up to reuse it. Do you call that civilized, Jamie? Do you?

Claudia

[Fouryz]

@Luschen

Thanks Todat, yes it helped, but I always like getting as many opinions as possible - plus, look at the interesting side conversation it engendered.

Maybe one other question - do they use the Roman alphabet in Vietnam like Nguyencal did above, or are there special Vietnamese characters like Mandarin, Korean, and Japanese? If you use the Roman alphabet, how do you type all the special squiggles and accents above the vowels? Are there keys for every combination, or do you say type the “a” key and at the same time the accent key to form the correct combination?

Have you ever tried learning Vietnamese, Luschen? It’s really simple. Not like English, you can read all the words in Vietnamese only by learning the Vietnamese alphabet even though you haven’t heard that world ever before. This alphabet consists of those single letter:
a b c d e g h i k l m n o p q r s t u v x y (original Roman alphabet).
ă â đ ê ô ơ ư (Latin letter, oh whatever they come from, I’m not an expert, hehe)
and some combined-letters.
We don’t use w, f, j and z.We use “qu” instead of “w”, “ph” instead of “f”, “z” and “j” can both be replaced by “d”, and “d” is read like “đ”.
About the typing-things, we have our own alphabet programs. To the best of my knowledge, we have two ways to type all the special squiggles and accents above the vowels. The first one is that we use the numbers on the keyboard. Here are some examples:
a + 1 = á
a + 2 = à
a + 3 = ả
a + 4 = ã
a + 5 = ạ
a + 6 = â
u + 7 = ư
d + 8 = ă
u + 9 = đ
The second way is:
a + a = â
a + w = ă
a + s = á
a + f = à
a + x = ã
a + j = ạ
a + r = ả
d + d = đ
u + w = ư ( or w = ư).
If you want further information, spend more time googling. Hehe

[Dozy]

I understand that the use of Chinese characters to write Vietnamese is pretty much obsolete now in daily life. Can many ordinary people still read the old Chinese-style writing, or is it now understood only by specialist scholars? Do any children nowadays learn the Chinese-style writing at school, as a special subject maybe?

[Fouryz]

No. Never. We young generations don’t even know a single Chinese-word. Beside, we have our own language. Only the students in specialized college or those who want to learn it do. But not me, I, and almost everyone, would prefer English. It’s more communicative and worldwide.