[housecarpenter]

Cantonese and other East Asian tonal languages are, more specifically, contour tonal languages; the distinctions between the different tones are based on the change in the tone through the syllable (rising vs. falling, etc.), rather than absolute pitch. This may be easy enough for tone-deaf people to deal with. However, there are other tonal languages, e.g. in Africa, which make use of absolute pitch distinctions.