Saving Macau's Dying Language

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Meet Aida de Jesus.

She's 103 years old.

Aida is from Macau, a Chinese city that was formerly colonized by Portugal for 400 years.

She and her daughter, Sonia, are among the few people who still speak Patuá, a critically endangered language that is unique to Macau.

Here's a local music video with subtitles in four languages: Patuá, Cantonese, Portuguese, and English.

You can see how Patuá mixes the languages of places along the Portuguese trade route in the 16th century.

Aida and Sonia are Macau locals of mixed Portuguese-Chinese ancestry.

They are the Macanese, and they make up less than 1 percent of a city that is over 90 percent Chinese.

To understand Aida's community, we first have to understand her city, Macau, which is an hour's ferry ride away from Hong Kong.

It has rapidly developed over the last few decades and is now known as the world's largest casino town, raking in five times as much money as Las Vegas.

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