Tangible onomatopoeia

I’m writing this while on the subway. I’ll of course have posted from somewhere else by the time you’ve read it.

A father and child are standing in front of me. The kid was admiring a rather bright light and saying “light (灯 dēng)” while pointing, in order to get his father’s attention. As his father looked, the subway doors began to close as the warning chime rang. Or dinged. Or denged in this case.

As the door went 噔噔, 噔噔* the kid went 灯灯, 灯灯.

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* also dēng

One response to “Tangible onomatopoeia”

  1. Randy Alexander says:

    I’m writing this while on the subway. 吹牛! 😉

    Anyway, very nice conjunction of unintended meaningfulness. Sometimes it seems that there is a groove that things just seem to pop into.

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