Learn Read Thai

[Nicke]

I will try to do some effort to learn read Thai, I think if I spend just 5-10 minutes a day I will improve my reading skill alot.

I can also recommend a book available at Patong Language School, Read Thai 1. It's a good start to understand the "grammar" of written Thai. 170 baht.

The hard part is to learn remember the Thai alphabet and Mikegb gave me a good tip before and I will use his method. Make cards with all characters and write the name of it in english on the backside where you can look when you forget. (The name in english helps you remember how to pronounce the chars)

I think cards like this should have a commercial potential too, if somebody made an effort to produce it.

[driv]

The book that comes with the Linguaphone course is outstanding.
After completing it, I was reading very well indeed and it took my language skills to a completely different level.

[hugos]

Originally Posted by Nicke

The hard part is to learn remember the Thai alphabet and Mikegb gave me a good tip before and I will use his method. Make cards with all characters and write the name of it in english on the backside where you can look when you forget. (The name in english helps you remember how to pronounce the chars)

Hi Nicke,

i did this with a programm. Its more fun, than with cards (thats what i think).
And there is an option so you can hear the pronounciation.

Hugo

[Nicke]

Good idea Hugo.

In fact, I bought a Learning Thai CD 5 years ago but at that time it was way to complicated for me with almost no knowledge of Thai. I think it should be a lot more useful now when I understand basic Thai. This CD require some knowledge before using it.

Maybe you use the same program? I have to try to find it, I don't remember the name.

Originally Posted by hugos

Hi Nicke,

i did this with a programm. Its more fun, than with cards (thats what i think).
And there is an option so you can hear the pronounciation.

Hugo

[hugos]

Originally Posted by Nicke

Maybe you use the same program? I have to try to find it, I don't remember the name.

Hi Nicke,

i have a few programs to learn thai. I will have a look and than write you if you are interested. One i bought in phuket seven years before.

Hugo

[sting]

HI
i dont think i have it in me to learn to speak thai fluent but i like to learn som thai so i understand when the girls are taking me for a ride
http://www.learningthai.com/books/manee/index.html

http://www.seasite.niu.edu/Thai/basic/Vowels_FS.htm

[driv]

Anyone who thinks they can learn sufficient Thai to stop the girls getting one over on them, is seriously deluding themsleves.

I've been speaking Thai for years and when they decide to slip into a regional dialect or pattois you have no chance!!!

By the way, sorry to sound jaundiced, but my insider information always leaves me to believe that they scorn every effort you make to speak Thai (although openly encouraging).....

(Told... "I laugh at them" by an older lady in soi 5 - Sukhumvit just a few weeks ago)

Just pleased I didn't know this when I was learning - it may well have put me off for ever!

[Mac]

I use a handheld Thai translator. You speak at it in English and it spouts away in Thai. Unfortunately its vocabulary seems quite limited as everything seems to translate to "I love you tooo much" and "I love you longtime!". At least thats what the BG's tell me it says...

[dawsey]

Its OK for you younger guys to start learning a new language,but I have found, in my own case anyway, that once you reach 40+yrs old you just cannot retain what you have just learnt.
I tried for 3yrs to learn Arabic,but although I understand a bit of what is being said,and also being able to speak a little its a whole lot different to speaking it naturally.
I gave up and accept that if you know most of the pleasantries,directions,common words its enough to get you by.
Why beat yourself up to learn something you may only use for 2wks a year and then forget the next time you visit.
Fair play to anyone who can master another language,but its too hard for me
BTW I am not one of those who is arrogant enough to think everyone should speak English!!

[eric-the-viking]

for me personnaly its not having someone to practise with, i have a couple of books with what to say and i have a few on line (via email)Thai friends who try to help,but not actually having some one to interact with so that you know what you are trying to say is correct can be a bind.previous to my last tour i practised so much only to find that when i was out there what i had learnt was all wrong or was not what i was trying to say.
Ok we all giggle when we hear a foreigner in the uk try to speak English but its as hard for them as it us,i also find it breaks down a lot of barriers even if you just try to speak a little.
when i was introduced to my BKK friends parents i really gave it my best shot to speak Thai, there i was with phrase book in hand talking total bollo cks only to have them look at me in amazement, well i thought i had really impressed them ,you know farang speaking Thai well they just looked at me smiled and said in perfect English very good but may be you need some more practise,well we all had a good laugh especially as they told me what i had said was a bit rude ,but they knew what i was trying to say so that made it even funnier for them .
but my point is i know i am now welcome to their house when ever i am in Thailand.

[Schmeen]

Aah...yes...Erics visit to meet the parents in Kan?...how did it all go...did you get your wai to the right level?

As for language...if you do not learn top read you will never learn how to speak and pronounce properly....forget how Noi from Isaan says something, different accents that you can never relpicate, or you'll end up mixing what different girls say and speak gibberish to someone else. You must see how a word is spelt, then break is down to letters, see the sounds, then say it with those sounds and as it's gets faster you will see hgow it is really pronounced...banana is a classic example of this...most foreigners just say kwai....but it has an L...it is kluay...eventually you will see how it is pronounced at speed. To me there is no similarity at all between say banana and buffalo....

the hardest thing for me about reading is the fact that they run the words into each other by sentance. If my wife writes anything to me (if she doesn't use English) she spliits the words so it is easy for me to read.

Regarding Isaan, I can speak about 3 words of it...i have no use for it at all, and it is different...so even speaking Thai for 16 years I have no chance to follow what is going on, however i can speak a Thai dialect that Isaan girls cannot understand and that seems to put them on the back foot as well....there's a girl in Dali and many in Phuket that speak this dialect, if we start using it, Isaan girls just pout like brats feeling left out...but then pouting is a BG hobby at the best of times.....as said before...you'll never follow them if they don't want you to.

[eric-the-viking]

[quote=Schmeen]Aah...yes...Erics visit to meet the parents in Kan?...how did it all go...did you get your wai to the right level?

ahh meeting the parents , actually it went really well.
we were met of the bus by her father which was funny because as i was introduced i went to wai and he went to shake my hand and had to stop half way through and wai me back with a massive smile,i think that i had asked if they would be offended if i stayed in a guest house as i did not want to appear rude by falling a sleep in the early evening after flying from the UK.which went down well .
As i have mentioned her father is a chief of police so i was given the guided tour of the station asked to sign in as well , then we went in a patrol car(pick up)to the local tourist sights then to the most glourious waterfalls i have ever seen .
I had also turned with small gifts for the family , like a can of guiness, bass ale for her brother , thorntons choclolates for her mother and whisky for her dad.
big smiles all round , small price to pay for all the hospitality i was about recieve. next day after doing the sights my honey said that she had to return to BKK as she had to go back to work at the airport, her parents invited me to stay on but i politley said that i should also return to bkk and pick up my gear i had left in the hotel in bkk.
(also thai new year was about to start and i did not want t miss it )
so before we left for bkk we all sat down to what has to be said was a feast of a traditonal Thai meal, every time i thought i had finnished they kept bringing more food out and when i cleared my plate they just kept putting more on to i t.
untill i could just not eat anymore i felt quite rude to be honest leving food on my plate , but i had to undo my top button of my shorts and point at my belly and do my best bhudda impression to stop the flow of food .
then they started to give me trinkets to bring back with me you know like bead kneckless with a yellow and pinkishstring type affect coming of it , model thai houses small buddha.
like i say i think that i have an open invite back, oh yeah more browniee points scored when i sent her father a birthday card from the uk yeah yeah ok say no more

[geespot]

eric

dont clear your plate, always leave a little bit this is normal practice and the opposite of rude

[driv]

I *have* given this some thought geespot, honestly....!

Originally Posted by geespot

eric
dont clear your plate, always leave a little bit this is normal practice and the opposite of rude

Hmmm, I disagree (when down South, anyway) Clear your plate laew ko - bok wa 'aroy dii !!!' laew ko - ' aw iik mai?'

laew ko - Gaeng caang laeu (, la khraap.)

[phoenetics courtesy of Linguaphone Inst]

[hugos]

Originally Posted by driv

I've been speaking Thai for years and when they decide to slip into a regional dialect or pattois you have no chance!!!

That`s right, but in many other languages "same, same" or not?
If you can speak german very well you will never understand a word when i say something in "bavarian" german. But of course you can learn it, too.
So it`s very hard, but you can learn the "Isaan" language, too. I met farangs can speak this. (unfortunately not me....)

;-) hugo

[geespot]

Originally Posted by hugos

That`s right, but in many other languages "same, same" or not?
If you can speak german very well you will never understand a word when i say something in "bavarian" german. But of course you can learn it, too.
So it`s very hard, but you can learn the "Isaan" language, too. I met farangs can speak this. (unfortunately not me....)

;-) hugo

Some examples of Isaan differences from thai are:

thai - sabadee mai and responde sabadee mai
isaan (lao) - sabadee bau and you respond sabadee yu

thai - aroi mai
isaan (lao) seb bau and respond seb yu

[geespot]

Originally Posted by driv

I *have* given this some thought geespot, honestly....!



Hmmm, I disagree (when down South, anyway) Clear your plate laew ko - bok wa 'aroy dii !!!' laew ko - ' aw iik mai?'

laew ko - Gaeng caang laeu (, la khraap.)

[phoenetics courtesy of Linguaphone Inst]

No probs my experience is purely related to people from Isaan, so this could well be different

G

[Jimmy D]

Sorry i forgot to say if was great time meeting you and other BM's
took hot Bg back to karon the night i was at Mai tai
Jim from USA

[Gumleaf]

The only time I speak Thai is when the Thai persons total English vocabulary consists of "Hello" (farang" ) .. Which here in Korat is just about everyone!