12. Origin

My newsfeed provided me with an interesting snippet the other day - the origin of the word tea/te/chai/cha (the difference dependant on what part of the world you find yourself in). Tea originated in China and was traded with the rest of the world, over land and sea. What you call it depends on how your ancestors first accessed it.

The Silk Route was the key overland trading lane going West, passing through the Mandarin speaking Chinese mainland. In Mandarin, our favourite golden brew is referred to as 'cha' - hence every other country that acquired the plant overland (India, the Middle East, Russia and North Africa) refers to it as some variation of the word 'cha'.

The major sea ports trading with the West were in the South of China, where in the local Min Nan dialect tea is referred to as 'te'. Whichever countries traded with China by sea (e.g. the majority of Europe) use some variation of that word.

The languages we speak today are dotted by the remnants of our forebear's early interactions with other cultures, peoples and places - like the words 'chai' or 'tea'. As we look back in history, these interactions are easy to trace. Looking forward is a different story.

In the modern day, as the divisions between cultures become even more blurred, what will the languages of our future look like? Where will the origin of our new words be found?

Will it depend on whether K-Pop or J-Pop was more popular in your part of the world? Will it depend on whether your generation watched more American cartoons or Japanese anime? Will it depend on whether you spent longer on Instragram or TikTok?

Will these changes in the way we speak or the words we say be visible in our lifetimes? Maybe they're already happening, spurred on every time we open our mouths.