rdearman wrote:I suspect that there are many people in Singapore in the same boat. Hokkien makes up almost half of the ethnic Chinese group in Singapore, and I know many people speak Hokkien, but education is in Mandarin (and English, Malay, and Tamil)
May I humbly say that you don't have to suspect, because that is true?
Hokkien is widely spoken in South East Asian countries and regions among ethnic Chinese people in Singapore Malaysia, Indonesia, Myarma, the Philiphine etc. Their forefather were generally originally from Fujian province, and had to leave their hometown, to make a living there.
My mother was born in Burma which was a former British colony, so she could speak a little English too, except for Hokkien, Mandarin, and Burmese.
Most of Taiwanese people's forefathers originated from Fujian because of the end of Civil War in 1949.
Hokkien refers to Fujian in the language per se, but Hokkien, which is dominant in the south of Fujian, is just one of dialects in Fujian.