jam5稔
Jyutpingjam5
Yaleyáhm
Definition
Soundly asleep; in a deep sleep and hard to wake up.
colloquialdaily actionshealth
How it's used
Primarily used to describe the quality of sleep, specifically how difficult it is to be disturbed. It carries a sense of peacefulness and heavy rest. While it can technically describe fruit ripening, in everyday spoken Cantonese, it is almost exclusively reserved for describing deep sleep.
Examples
He slept so soundly last night that he couldn't hear the alarm clock at all.
Related words
Common mistake
Do not confuse this with the Mandarin word for 'familiar' or 'ripe', as the Cantonese usage is highly specific to sleep. Learners often mistakenly use 熟 to describe deep sleep, but 熟 usually refers to cooked food or being familiar with someone.
Grammar color guide
Noun
Verb
Adjective
Adverb
Pronoun
Classifier
Particle
Connector
Grammar guides
- LocationHow to say where something is using 喺 (hai2), place words like 度, and the common coverbs that work like English prepositions.
- Serial verbsStringing two or more verbs together without any joining word, like go to the shop buy things. Extremely common in Cantonese.
- 將 disposalHow to move the object in front of the verb with 將, to focus on what happens to it. Common in instructions and writing.
