DM, has said it.. The English language cannot correctly represent the full range of sounds that are used in Asian languages (we think its tough to have 5 'tones' high / middle / low / rising / falling, I read recently that Khamer dialects use 7 tones so you have to be able to differentiate between things like high and mid high !!!! Very hard initially for the western ear to pick up the nuances of a tonal language as we are simply not wired to listen to that).. Just ask you woman to tell you the wors for near and far and then try not to scream at the insanity of opposite words sounding like that
Transliteration is 'the best guess' system for example the question word (mai) is a rising sound and is transliterated as above as in general a westerner will create a rising sound from an ai and a falling tone (or at lest a low) from a 'my'... My Thai is still crap but I was atounded when a contact of mine who has done the language course two seasons and still was struggling took a reading and writing course.. He claimed in 2 weeks to be able to read most Thai (even if he could not understand the words he read) and his spoken Thai just jumped a whole league ahead.. If you have the time combining learning the script seems to have a real advanatge for those that want to get ahead in really speaking this fairly tough language..