Chief rabbi helps sick boy fulfill dream to meet the pope

Israel Hayom ^ | Sunday, May 11, 2014 | Unsigned (staff)

[cloudmountain]

Not sure what you’re saying here. If this rabbi’s name is Lau, andhe’s not Chinese, then Lau is not a q100% Chinese name.

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THIS is what I wrote:
Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi David Lau??
LAU is a 100% Chinese name. I saw the Rabbi's photograph and he is definitely not Chinese.
What an odd co-inkydink.

How can you not be sure of what I am saying? Lol. Didn't the CO-INKYDINK give you the TINIEST of clues?
Are you being deliberately obtuse? Rhetorical.

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I looked up Lau on the Wold Name Public Profiler, and found “hot spots” for surname LAU in both Germany and Australia.

Boy do YOU ever need a life. :o)

[cloudmountain]

Lau is Yiddish for ‘lion’, I think.
Leo in English, Aryeh in Hebrew, etc.

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You didn't dig very deep into Wikipedia. LAU is a VERY, very common name in Chinese, both Mandarin and Cantonese.

The following is from http://genforum.genealogy.com/lau/messages/127.html

1) The most popular one is the family name of the kings that rule the Han dynasty in ancient China. It is also a fairly common last name among ethnic Chinese
2) Another translation of Lau is willow (a kind of tree that usually grows along the river).
3) the third translation of Lau is (tall) building.
4) waterfall

Chinese isn't especially rich in vocabulary. In fact, their language has a definite DEARTH of vocabulary. HOWEVER, they are RICH in the use of TONES.

Mandarin Tones: http://www.chinese-lessons.com/conversion/toneConversion.htm
Mandarin is more of a super-group of dialects than a single language. For simplicity, Beijing area Mandarin will be assumed when using the term Mandarin throughout the website.
Mandarin, the basis of putonghua , has a complicated relationship to Middle Chinese. In this dialect there are 4 standard tones and a neutral 5th tone. Because of this, many of the Middle Chinese tone categories are merged. Additionally, both Category 7 (Ru-Yin) and Category 8 (Ru-Yang) are distributed among the modern Mandarin tones in a complicated manner.
Middle Chinese
Ping = Even
Shang = Rising
Qu = Leaving
Ru = Entering
Mandarin Tone
1 - High tone
2 - Rising tone
3- Dipping tone
4- Falling tone
Variations between three and four

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I took Cantonese WAY back when and I learned that there are actually 14 tones. THEY "toned" how you spoke to people. Each of the tones specified an attitude.
It's as complicated as OUR vocabulary.

I figured that this was one of the many reasons why Chinese have such a difficult time with NON-Chinese languages. They have to TOSS out their entire repertory of TONES...then learn English.

Example: Chinese, when learning English, DON'T raise their voice in tone when asking a question. One is SUPPOSED to slightly raise the tone for a question...and conversely LOWER for the end of a sentence.

[Mrs. Don-o]

:o)

[cloudmountain]

I need a life too.

I've started in on plants. I have already killed half a dozen herbs but I do have the cutest flower pots.

One is about 3 inches long in the shape of a lady bug, in all its colors.
The other flower pot is a life-size orange tennis shoe. The next day after buying the one 'shoe' they had the second one. Now I have a "pair." It DID call to me. :o)

[jjotto]

R. David Lau is 39th in an unbroken chain of rabbis. His father was also Ashkenaz Chief Rabbi of Israel and a child survivor of the Holocaust. If there were Chinese relatives close enough related to lend their name, it would be very well-known.

[cloudmountain]

R. David Lau is 39th in an unbroken chain of rabbis. His father was also Ashkenaz Chief Rabbi of Israel and a child survivor of the Holocaust. If there were Chinese relatives close enough related to lend their name, it would be very well-known.

Very true. Thanks for the information.

I had NEVER heard of "Lau" being anything other than a Chinese name. But, I do live on the West Coast of the USA and there are PLENTY of Chinese here.

LIVE and LEARN.

[jjotto]

Heck, there are lots of Laus in rural Iowa, where Chinese and Jews are likely tourists or lost college students. Fairly common German or Dutch Christian surname too, it seems.

[cloudmountain]

Heck, there are lots of Laus in rural Iowa, where Chinese and Jews are likely tourists or lost college students. Fairly common German or Dutch Christian surname too, it seems.

Well, hesh mah moufth and call me stupid.

[jjotto]

Legendary baseball hitting coach Charlie Lau.

[cloudmountain]

Another Lau.

Is the Hawaiian Hooky Lau part of that? :o)

[FourtySeven]

Amen and God bless the Rabbi too! What a beautiful gesture and he’s right. The Pope should see him.

[FourtySeven]

Yes that’s right, either way his faith will be rewarded. Either in this life or the one to come.