Usage in Hong Kong
Punti has become a commonly used word in Hong Kong law courts and other authorities such as the police; it is a transliteration of Cantonese 'Boon Dei' meaning 'local'. When a defendant is using 'Punti' in court, that means he elects to use Cantonese as the language in trial instead of English. Despite the reference of "Punti" in this context means nothing much more than "Cantonese" as a spoken language and the Hong Kong variation of the language, there are political and practical reasons of not using direct reference to the word "Cantonese".
Practically, "Cantonese" can be used to mean all the dialects in Guangdong Province, and the Cantonese spoken in Guangzhou, Canton dialect, is actually a bit different both in accent and vocabulary than that in Hong Kong.
Nonetheless, the difference is becoming less significant as the Guangdong province is becoming more and more influenced by Hong Kong culture and linguistic, thanks to the wide Hong Kong television coverage in Southern China. Further, the influx of immigrants and visitors from Guangdong also means their use of vocabulary finds its way to daily Hong Kong usage.
The place of origin of the Punti is Bao'an, Guangdong, a former county that encompassed what is now Hong Kong and Shenzhen, China.
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