rubystar wrote:Tom Odda? "Look it up in Maledicta, the Journal of Verbal Aggression," said Graham. "You'll find it under Mandarin terms of abuse. Tom Odda means your mother's______, where the blank is too unmentionable even for Maledicta to fill in.
Well mother is 'ma ma' or 'fu mu' depending on whether you are talking to her, or about her. Perhaps it is slang, or perhaps he has changed it to fit a western sounding name. Anyhow, I have not learned too many Mandarin swear words (my knowledge in that area is limited mainly to Cantonese, the language of my friends).
Definitely Anglocised, though 'Tom' isn't a Chinese particle. Anything-om isn't a particle. Same with 'od'. 'To' 'Mo' 'Da' works, though I don't know the meaning without the related tones to narrow it down. 'Mo' sounds a bit like 'yo mo' a filthy word in Cantonese for mother, and translations between the two dialects are usually somewhat similar. However, nowhere does it feature 'Ni de' indicating 'your' (required to specify *your* mother's _____).
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