Three politicians

Ko Wen-je 柯文哲

Dr. Ko, a surgeon with the refreshing habit of always speaking his mind (attributed to #Asperger’s), is Taipei’s most beloved mayor (and Taiwan's most beloved politician).

A trauma physician's view on life and death | Wen-Je Ko (柯文哲) | TEDxTaipei 2013

EDITORIAL: The mis-education of Ko Wen-je
http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/editorials/archives/2015/02/04/2003610757

Su Jia-chyuan 蘇嘉全

Mr Su is somewhat less well-known. Although he is cited as Su Jia Chyuan on ROC government websites as far back as 2007 (based on a cursory search), in its infinite wisdom Wikipedia has decided to rename him as “Su Chia Chyuan”, an error which is unquestioningly repeated on many other websites.

Hwang Yea-baang 黃雅榜

Mr Hwang is an even more obscure figure, the Secretary-General of the equally obscure (which is unfortunate) Examination Yuan.

When the Republic of China was established, it was decided to continue China’s unique civil service examination system used in Imperial China under a new name: the Examination Yuan.

China’s civil service exams were much admired in Europe. Jesuit priests adopted these ideas of merit-based promotion in their school system and this was later taken up by Napoleon and instituted in France. Civil service exams are just one of China's many gifts to world civilization!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Imperial_examination

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These are just three of the many people from Taiwan who use GR Tonal Spelling (Gwoyeu) for their names:

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GR Tonal Spelling

The last syllable in 黃雅榜 Hwang Yea-baang’s name is a good example of how Mandarin finals 韻母 are spelled in GR Tonal Spelling (Gwoyeu) when there is no medial vowel that can be pressed into service as simultaneous vowel and tone.

For 2nd tone, GR adds the letter -r after the main vowel (English mnemonic r rising + rising stroke which serves as a graphic mnemonic).

The 3rd tone, which is much longer than the other three tones, is written as a double vowel.

Thus, TANG “soup”, TArNG “sugar” and TaaNG “lie down”.

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Summary

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Previous article in this series:

https://steemit.com/cn/@wentong-syhhae/gr-tonal-spelling-who-s-who-taiwan-politics

Who I am:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@wentong-syhhae/enthusiastic-intp-polyglot