# long time no see

Pronunciation: US say "lawng tym noh SEE" /ˌlɔŋ ˌtaɪm ˌnoʊ ˈsi/; UK/AUS say "long tym noh SEE" /ˌlɒŋ ˌtaɪm ˌnəʊ ˈsiː/

## Idiom

1. Said on meeting someone again, to mean that the speaker has not seen them for a long time.
   - Simple: A friendly way to say hello to someone you have not seen in a long time.
   - _Long time no see! I barely recognized you with the beard._
   - _She hugged her old roommate at the airport and laughed, "Well, long time no see."_

## Origin

Of unknown origin. It is possibly a calque of Cantonese hou² noi⁶ mou⁵ gin³ or Chinese hěnjiǔméijiàn or hǎojiǔbùjiàn, comparable to no can do or chop-chop, and if so most likely from a US Chinatown or from the British Far East, such as Hong Kong. Alternatively it may be of Native American origin, or a native pidgin coinage, particularly in film portrayals of Native Americans such as the speech given to Tonto in the 1930s.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/long-time-no-see (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).