The Mandarin Chinese word for chopsticks is "kuàizi" (筷子). It is a word made of different parts; it has the phonetic part of "快", which means "quick", and a semantic part, 竹, meaning bamboo. In Chinese, the old word for "chopsticks", and also in some varieties of modern Chinese such as Hokkien, was "zhù" (MC: ) (箸 Pinyin:"zhù", Minnan: "tī"). However, "zhù" became a taboo on ships because it sounded the same as another word meaning "to stop" (住). Consequently, it was replaced by a word of opposite meaning, "kuài" (fast, quick). This gradually spread until it became the word for "chopsticks" in most varieties of modern Chinese. The character for this new meaning of "chopsticks" (筷) for "kuài" has the semantic element of bamboo added to the character meaning "fast" "kuài" (快).