jcbangkok

This is a very difficult discussion to find a solution, because the end goal is to be able to live out your life with the things you would like, and the security to protect that. This equates out to a reasonable income to accomplish that. Isn't that right, after all? There is way too much importance being given to institutions of learning. That is an error that brings about the downfall of nations. There should be more focus on where the child comes from before he or she enters into these institutions. Thai schools seem to think they have some right to tell parents how to raise their children. Maybe they are right. But where I was raised, the parents told the schools how to raise their children, when these institutions have the children in their keeping; OR ELSE! Not so here.

I am not so sure that Thai people feel that learning English, per se, is going to fit in to their future goals. On the other hand, I am not sure that the Thai people even know what they want themselves. Ask any Thai what their dreams are, and they will stare off into space and say nothing, or they will tell you they want something that is clearly outside of their present capabilities to achieve.

With that last sentence in mind; watch a Thai, and for the most part, they will let 5 or 10 valuable years roll by, and not do one single thing towards achieving that thing they told you they want. Yes; I understand the economical barriers, but that does not even come in to play here. I am talking about minds, and the development of those minds. Where is the genesis of this lack of movement and inspiration; this lack of creative and imaginative reaction of the mind; the "Big Bang" in each individual human being, so to speak? Some wait for it, and some expect it (like the posters here, and the Thai government and their spoken "intentions"), but it never seems to arrive into the minds we all debate, argue and lecture over; the children. Why is that? Can you pour out what has not been put in?

Children age for 6 or 7 years before they ever see a classroom. It is my strong opinion that the development that goes on during those years, with the child's mind, is more critical to that child's successes or failures in his or her life, than the results of what 50 years of what the best schools could ever offer.

I see no father figure here. I do not see, nor know of any evidence, that the fathers interact with their children's hungry, developing minds, and nurture creativity, imagination, inspiration, and the like. Where are the fathers of Thailand? The children that come from families with a loving and dedicated father figure, and a supportive an nurturing mother, are usually well on their way by the time they see their first teacher. It is nothing more than handing a baton over to a capable individual, who sees eye to eye with your needs for the child; someone who builds on what the father and mother began, and not someone who tells the ignorant father and mother what is best for the child and that beating your child will be part of the process. In a near-perfect world, the teacher simply takes over what the father and mother were responsible to begin, and carries on with that. That is because reading, writing, and arithmetic will already have been introduced into the minds of the children. Additionally, fathers who read to their children, create a hunger for knowledge that can never be quenched. Teachers feed that hunger with the fuel of knowledge that only books can provide. A teacher is an extension of the father and mother, and not the other way around.

All I see here is the children learning subconsciously through the common, mind-killing behavior of the adults. Children here see knees, and rarely eyes. Humans need eye contact in their mental development in order to build resolve, constitution, confidence, self-esteem, and self-image. I do not see any methods engaged by this country, or its families, that helps find a child's learning aptitude and style, and develop it before they enter school. Regrettably, the child enters school, an unprepared victim, fully unawares of their positive and negative learning abilities, completely lacking the knowledge and support of the father, and they immediately get hit by a tsunami of culture that condones racism, discrimination, humiliation, abuse and fear. One wrong move or word, and you get momentary blindness from the switch, or an ear or hair pulled, or a cuff to the side of the head. What can be more humiliating and damaging to a child than to have a teacher call you a derogatory name in front of your peers? Public humiliation at that age can be more damaging than physical abuse, and immediately puts you at the mercy of the pack of animals around you. This is the environment these little ones are cast into; children in adult bodies teaching future adults.

This swiftly snuffs out any natural human ability to self-actualize. The teacher is their judge, jury, abuser and bully, and the uninterested father and mother blindly cast these little ones into the mouth of the beast. All mental development to that point (however lacking at this stage of the child's life) is arrested and held in bondage by a culture that tosses aside human self-actualization in favor of "face" and status. Natural selection kicks in, and the child quickly has his or her path charted by a system that bases survival on an "anything goes" style, as long as you come out on top.

Whether by ignorance, infidelity, lack of interest in one's own children, or the Animistic belief that "the boy will find his own path. I can do nothing to change that" are the reasons, I do not see evidence of parents here interacting with their children with a future in mind. With these things in mind, what makes anyone think that English will successfully be "knowledge-transferred" to a demographic that shows no sign of establishing early childhood development, because the parents do not participate in that endeavor?

A lot of these posts are brilliant, and suggest plausible solutions. But how can you explain the color "red" to a man, who has been blind since birth? An education system will only strive to be as excellent as the ones who have a need for it to exist. The parents here do not strive for excellence in their own lives, hence you see the results. We have an education system here that copies other countries, but without the hearts and minds of the parents to be the driving force.

We have an education system that is a corporation, that processes the items, with profit as its only fuel, and no regards for parental input. The schools tell the parents what is and what is not. Instead of people expecting and blindly trusting the corporation to raise their children, fathers and mothers should be the reason that the schools exist. To be stockholders, of sorts, and to make sure that an institution of learning maintains the standards that produce intelligent, literate children, instead of corrupt, money hungry directors and under qualified, jaded, abusive teachers. The parents should tell the schools what to do, and not the other way around.

Any country that condones (as its thousands of years of core belief) behaviors and views such as lying, cheating, backstabbing, racism, illiteracy, discrimination, abuse, violence, nepotism, patricide, corruption on a grand scale, matricide, mutilation, alcoholism, human slavery, sexual impropriety in relationships, avoidance, superstition, "if it's not fun, it"s not worth it", and every other part of the most caustic characteristics of human kind, can never really, truly achieve what their more developed counterparts are achieving. More developed countries have already evolved through these human characteristics, and have, for the most part, subdued these caustic human characteristics in their nature.

For the time being, there will be far too few "Haves" and an obscene number of "Have-nots". Just my opinion, but with a son on the way, this is a chief concern, and I feel I am already doing what a lot of fathers have clearly demonstrated that they never bother to do, or even have an inkling to do; to make a way for my child to begin his life and succeed as a valuable resource, and an intelligent, friendly, strong and wise human being. I do not need a teacher or a director or a policeman or a school to get him there; only their assistance.

It is difficult to lend any credence to your post when you make such a large error in fact and demonstrate to all that you have no knowledge of Thailand or the Thai school system.

You claim that children age for 6 or 7 years before they see the inside of a classroom.

Not in Thailand. Government schools start at 3 years old everywhere I have been.

Maybe you should get out and look at some Thai schools before you talk about the Thai educational system. I assume your post refers to some other countries school system.

Actually I do believe PUBLIC / FREE schools start at 6-years old in Thailand. However, many parents, especially in the BKK area, start their kids early in fee based schools. This may be why you see many 3-year olds going to school.

Edit: I also believe the government may provide pre / nursery type schools prior to age 6 but it is not compulsory to attend. It is not part of the government required attendance for 6 to 15 year olds.

Bottom line is you should have 2 statements. One from Singapore and one from BKK Bank. Once you have both of these, it should be easy to tell what has happened as well as allow you to make any needed dispute. These statements should allow you to see how much was given, sent and received in addition to any fees. You may need to ask but you have a right to this.

Your current receipt from Singapore may say 7800 baht but they may have additional fees too and that may not have been what was actually sent. If I send money from the US, I know I need to add money for the fee because they just deduct it from the amount you give them and want to send rather than collecting it as a separate fee.

Good Luck .. although possible, I doubt the Bank ripped you off beyond their normal practices of gouging customers.

Please keep us informed ... good education for all of us.

PS. 250 Baht comes out as $10.92 SIG right now .. maybe they did some rounding or it was right at $11 at the time you transfered .. although you are likely right that this is not a Singapore issue, don't rule it out until you have all the facts.

This is one of the funniest statements government has made lately.

In Thailand even doctors and lawyers hardly speak English and they want to make it second language?! LMAO-WHAT A JOKE.

In banks, corporations, business-hardly any senior managers speak any English and those are with extremly good education and background

English is the easiest language in the world and yet 99.9% of the locals can not string few words together.

The ones that do, just butcher the language.

For example, can anyone explain to me how the following works

"My friend you" or My dog you"

In Thai, assuming they are translating word for word, it would be "puan kong khun" or "maa kong khun" which word for word is "friend of you" or "dog of you" So how the hel_l do some arrive at "my friend you"??

To further add, one of my Thai teachers at school who supposedly studied in UK, can nto even explain the different between what and which, while the other one studied in Singapore( and correct me if i am wrong but English is the language used at uni) and she does not know what break up means.

I forget to tell everyone that we have 2 kinds of English languages....American English and English English.....

Which one the Thai Government wants to use???

Slangs will be hard for the Thai to learn and That why the people do not understand Break up means??

My opinion....

Actually we have 5 if not more-Oz English, Canadian, South African and all have their own slang.

But i am pretty sure "break up" with girlfriend/boyfriend is the same slang in all English slangs.

I am also fairly sure the word breakup has been around centuries and is not slang.

And not only are there all these various differences of how English is spoken in these countries ... within most of the countries there are different dialects. Maybe Thais should teach Cockney English in the schools.

I have talked with several teachers and been told that the most of the kids really are not interested in learning English.

Maybe it is just me but there seems to be a undertone here that if it is not Thai it is no good.

Most Thai's are really not interested in the rest of the world; so why learn another language from that big world out there.

Have you ever wondered why Thai news shows (like on Channels 3, 5, & 7) report very little news events happening outside of Thailand? Answer: Little interest by most Thai's in what is happening outside of Thailand. As my Thai wife and many Thai friends have told me over the years, Thailand is a simple country and really don't like getting involved in international affairs. Not saying that "lack of real international involvement" is good or bad; just saying that is the way most Thai's seem to think.

I see the Thai news talk about Paris and Lindsay sometimes

English is the universal language and it would be wise for it to be taught to all students. Maybe Thai's think Zulu would be more viable as a 2nd language.

I am not going to argue that it would be wise to teach to all students but keep in mind it is already taught in Thai schools and has been for a while. I have no idea to what level. In the US you are required to take a second language course (usually Spanish or French) in public schools but since it is not practiced outside this one class, few people ever remembers it beyond the basics such as counting to 10. I also question how much an Issan farmer would get from learning English as opposed to learning some other knowledge during English class. But getting off track here ...

I simply wanted to point out that we are certainly putting a very high standard to Thais learning English when even the UN needs to hire countless interpreters because world leaders are all not well versed enough in English to make it the "universal" language at the UN, let alone the world. I'm sure there may be other areas too but the only place I know for sure globally that English would be considered the "universal" language is by pilots .... and that may just be international pilots.

Finally someone with brain has realized what is going to happen in the next 12 months. The only problem is its the wrong person who understands it

BOT does not seem to grasp the concept and most likely driving it down that path with extra speed because in the end, they are(the Thai elite and ministers, including CEO's etc) the ones who will double if not triple their wealth.

The only thing article does not mention is how Thailand would pull out of it this time around, and also considering that the entire world has gone through recession and some parts of it still in it, this time round it will hit Thailand twice as hard.

Well said. I've brought this issue up several times with my friends, that the only ones who could reasonably be profiting from this windfall are the small percentage of financial aristocrats who have enough money and influence to manipulate the market. One of the excuses used to justify the appreciation of the baht was the lower cost of imports for things such as fuel and raw materials, yet Shell just raised the cost of gasohol by 40 satong (no savings there), and TMB just published an article in the BP showing the formula used that determines the value of the baht, and concluding that capital controls do not normally work and usually have the opposite effect of increasing foreign investment; therefore suggesting that there would probably be no changes in monetary policy by this year's end. There is an old economic theory, as you prescribed, that what goes up, must come down. The higher it climbs, the farther it falls. Therefore the choice is to land softly or to crash land. Unfortunately a reversal of fortune has no effect on the ones who were flying the economy, but impacts everyone else who gets caught in its wake.

Don't forget the power of the US Dollar and its government. Lowering the value of the dollar helps the US when it comes to things related to being able to increases exports of goods.

I agree 100% that they should have a Sesame Type show on TV ... in fact, they should simply have Sesame Street

I doubt Big Bird will be more attractive to Thai kids than Ultraman...

Probably showing my age here but I have no idea who Ultraman is, lol

But I do remember these segments they used to have in the USA during Saturday morning cartoons called School House Rock ... I honestly learned more from them then I did during school at that time.

This was my favorite one... http://www.youtube.c...h?v=mkO87mkgcNo

Ultraman is the coolest thing evar! Since 1966! You are not showing your age, but just your cultural ignorance.

And there is some sesame street version on Thai TV. I come across Ernie from time to time on the afternoon.

Thankfully, I have better and more enjoyable things to do than watch cartoons or for that matter much TV especially in the day time. But I am happy for you if Ultraman floats your boat for entertainment.

I used to be an English teacher in Thailand and once we had a seminar with a representative of the Ministry of Education. I asked her then "is it real that we cant fail students in Thailnd and why?" . The answer was "yes because it is not good for business"

Therfore as long as you cant fail kids... they DONT study... so dont waste your time about trying to improve anything.... the kids just dont study.

thats why the education is soooo bad in Thailand.

If u cant fail a kid... how can u motivate them to study???

There is also positive motivation in addition to negative motivation ... but I agree there needs to accountability.

I agree 100% that they should have a Sesame Type show on TV ... in fact, they should simply have Sesame Street

I doubt Big Bird will be more attractive to Thai kids than Ultraman...

Probably showing my age here but I have no idea who Ultraman is, lol

But I do remember these segments they used to have in the USA during Saturday morning cartoons called School House Rock ... I honestly learned more from them then I did during school at that time.

This was my favorite one... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkO87mkgcNo

Thai people need to be brave to speak out , for those who know how to speak English. Most Thai people scared people laugh at them when they using wrong grammer.They are shy. They should start long time ago.

Encourage more Thai young teacher learn English. Thailand should be improve more. Is time for Thailand to follow new century. Thailand need to train more English teacher so they can teach to people from age 3 to age 50's. English sub in every TV drama.

Your first sentence is so correct. It wasn't until about my 6th visit seeing my brother in law that he worked up the courage to speak to me in English. Prior to that we struggled many times speaking Thai and in the end it turned out his English was far better than my Thai. His English got better and better after his nervousness subsided. At first I thought he just knew a few words he could string together but turns out he speaks English fairly well. And this is a smart mid 30s business owner who felt shy to speak English. He doesn't deal with a lot of English speakers in his business and I think in order to have any confidence you really need to have conversations in English. But add to this the tendency for Thais to be shy and avoid conversation ... it really makes for a problem.

How many times has a Thai person told you that you can speak English because their friend or relative will understand but just cannot speak English? Obviously, this is more an issue of their shyness or lacking confidence in their abilities to speak English.

Thailand's 'neighbor countries' score higher in all subjects- according to Thai govt.'s own info as of a few years ago- so presumably English, too. The only way to effect change is to shift the culture away from 'fun fun fun'- that's the problem, as if the only means to social progress is to marry up. Once value is placed on education at all levels, then things might improve. English or Chinese or whatever is secondary. Education is what is important. I doubt that most English-language PhD's in physics can speak a second language. That's no guarantee of a better income, except maybe in 3rd-world tourist-oriented economies.

Then I stand corrected if what you are quoting is true. But my limited experiences tell me different in terms of English compression in these countries.

Bottom line is, I hear you ... but maybe many folks in Thailand prefer to have fun than climb the corporate ladder or feel the strong craving to have much more than what they need. In Buddhism one should not want for more more than they need. I am not saying this is true but I think it is wrong to use or force our definition for success on another culture or nation. Maybe half the problem with Thailand is so many things contradict one another in terms of where they want to be as a nation. Think about how much The Church has prevented modernization over the centuries in the western world. Possibly their beliefs system of not getting too worked up about things and that the goal of daily should be fun prevents a lot of progress in terms of what we believe should be their goal.

In many ways Thailand is a much richer country than other western nations ... richer of course not talking about $

Not sure of all western nationalities but I find it funny (sad) so many Americans get so upset that many folks come to the US for prolonged periods and don't learn English well. "If they are going to be here then they should learn the official language!", they say. Then they go to other countries and are upset that the locals don't speak English better even though it is not the official language of that country.

Land of dreamers and promises. Even by 2015 do you think anything's gonna be any different. I've taught in Thai schools - even a good private Catholic one - and hey, only 50 kids to a room ! You can really teach alot in that time. The whole system is set up to quash real learning and application of knowledge. It was killing my soul. I tried. I fought the system and made the best difference I could, but oh my !

Keep dreaming Thailand ! For some reason your neighbors all around you are producing fluent ESL speakers while you wallow and mince words and argue semantics, and explain and posit and redraft, and prepare materials, and plan to make a plan of how you might and probably should if it's possible, get on the English train.

I love this country, but it only took a few months deep in the heart of Thai institutional learning to see more than enough to disturb me about the system. The rose-colored glasses are tinged.

I wasn't aware Burma, Cambodia, Vietnam or Laos were putting out more English speakers than Thailand.

Thailand is not Japan or China and is closer to being like their actual neighbors above in terms of modernization than Japan or China .. but it is getting there and is ahead of its actual neighbors in my humble opinion.

**Edit: Malaysia may be ahead but as a poster mentioned above, it was a colony. And as for Singapore .. isn't English the official language and not a 2nd?

Thailand is a Buddhist country.

There is no porn in Thailand, let alone child porn.

Agree and disagree

england's a christian country. christains don't have porn. infact neither does any religion. i don't know why Thailand has to use the religous card for normal adult porn. confused!! then again if all porn is illegal then Thailand is number 1 for not promoting child sex through porn.

If they want to stop it they should go for the people who buy it and for the protectors of the children who look the other way and receive cash !

What does religion have to do with doing wrong? The jails in the US are full of Born Again Christians and Muslims. The Catholic church seems to have got a reputation for molesting little boys. And as for Thailand ... Buddhists represent 95% of the population and I doubt even 5% are distributing child porn. Not to mention Buddhism is a much different belief system than a typical God based religion. Although a Buddhist should not lie, they also should not kill. If a Buddhist lies to save a life it is considered both a bad and good act. Although a Buddhist should not be involved in immoral sex, a working girl supporting her family could easily see the good out weighing the bad since kindness and giving are very good attributes to a good Buddhist.

Grant it, I cannot see a valid rationale in selling Child Porn but people through out history have done terrible things including having killed and slaughtered many people all in the name of their loving God. Point is some people twist their claimed belief system all the time (in all beliefs) to rationalize doing bad. This has nothing to do with religion but all to do with a person's moral character. Pointing out a bad person who claims to have higher beliefs certainly should not condemn all the people who do try their best to adhere to those higher beliefs.

It makes no sense to condemn an entire group for the actions of a few.

ok starting again.

considering all porn is illegal then thailand are doing more to protect children from porn than europe and america.

Yes and no. The partial attempt may be there but consider there are not laws against possession of child porn in Thailand. All the laws are based on sales, purchase, distribution or display.

And having a law that is not enforced many times is worse than not having a law at all. Not to get off topic but consider the Red Shirts take over of BKK 6-months ago and their many illegal actions including storming the Parliament. In other parts of the world, it is not the laws that stop people from doing such things ... it is the consequences to breaking these laws.

People get bolder and bolder as they see laws will not be enforced.

And I by no means am slamming Thailand as I love this country and believe it has made significant and rapid changes to improve itself. But it is still a developing nation and like all others ... it takes time.

Hopefully the open display of child porn is something that can be used by the Government to show some things are just not going to be tolerated regardless of corruption ... this would go a long way in curbing other outrageous and terrible disregard of laws that all civil society finds extremely horrific.

This is one of the funniest statements government has made lately.

In Thailand even doctors and lawyers hardly speak English and they want to make it second language?! LMAO-WHAT A JOKE.

In banks, corporations, business-hardly any senior managers speak any English and those are with extremly good education and background

English is the easiest language in the world and yet 99.9% of the locals can not string few words together.

The ones that do, just butcher the language.

For example, can anyone explain to me how the following works

"My friend you" or My dog you"

In Thai, assuming they are translating word for word, it would be "puan kong khun" or "maa kong khun" which word for word is "friend of you" or "dog of you" So how the hel_l do some arrive at "my friend you"??

To further add, one of my Thai teachers at school who supposedly studied in UK, can nto even explain the different between what and which, while the other one studied in Singapore( and correct me if i am wrong but English is the language used at uni) and she does not know what break up means.

Judging by your post.......... it isn't that easy.

I would also challenge the poster to find many Thais who believe English is easier to learn that Thai ... it is all relevant.

Interesting ...

The Foreign Service Institute (FSI), the US Federal Government's primary training institution for officers and support personnel of the U.S. foreign affairscommunity, believes that for a native English speaker, Arabic, Cantonese,Mandarin, Japanese and Korean are the world's most difficult languages. According to their finding,people usually spent the longest time (88 weeks/2200 class hours in average)learning them in order to gain proficiency.

However these finding won't have much effect onBritish nationals it seems considering that they don't much care about learninga foreign language. A recent British survey shows, only one in 10 UK workers could speak aforeign language. Less than 5% could count to 20 in a second language, 80% saidthey could work abroad anyway, because "everyone speaks English"!

This is one of the funniest statements government has made lately.

In Thailand even doctors and lawyers hardly speak English and they want to make it second language?! LMAO-WHAT A JOKE.

In banks, corporations, business-hardly any senior managers speak any English and those are with extremly good education and background

English is the easiest language in the world and yet 99.9% of the locals can not string few words together.

The ones that do, just butcher the language.

For example, can anyone explain to me how the following works

"My friend you" or My dog you"

In Thai, assuming they are translating word for word, it would be "puan kong khun" or "maa kong khun" which word for word is "friend of you" or "dog of you" So how the hel_l do some arrive at "my friend you"??

To further add, one of my Thai teachers at school who supposedly studied in UK, can nto even explain the different between what and which, while the other one studied in Singapore( and correct me if i am wrong but English is the language used at uni) and she does not know what break up means.

English being the easiest language is obviously an opinion but we are not talking about learning a language. We are talking about learning a second language and this is all relevant to the native language of the student. An English speaking person learning Spanish would find it much easier than learning Thai. But the same could not be said about a Thai learning Spanish.

The Thai language is much different than English from tones, sentence structure, plurals, pronouns (use and amount), tonal language, having to learn different sound pronunciations not in the Thai (or Asian) languages as well as the numerous few letters that can be added to a word to make a different word including future and past tense which doesn't exist as a general rule in Thai language.

Very few of the expats living in Thailand can speak Thai as conversationally let alone at the level most Thais can in the populated areas. Consider too what the times were like when most of these Thais grew up and had to leave school early for economic reasons. In fact, I believe Thais are still only guaranteed an education in "public" schools to the 8th grade.

I also think many Thais learn English to the level they need. A person in Udon may not need to know English but a working girl in a BKK bar needs to know "where are you from?", "how long you here? and so on (all her conversations are usually the same). However, if you look at a well traveled businessman in Thailand, chances are they speak English well because of how much they have heard and practiced using English. The official language of Thailand is Thai and it seems odd to make fun of Thais because many speak broken English.

I find the level of English in BKK significantly better than that of most Mexicans who come to the USA or those living right on the other side of the border of the USA.

On a final note .. I am impressed by most people who can speak multiple languages. I have never found it easy. Many Thai bar girls you meet in BKK can communicate in 3-different languages since they come from the north or south where they were brought up speaking either Sow or Issan which is not the same as standard/central Thai.

Sorry to be so vociferous this morning, but just had to add something about TV:

When I interact with a Thai who wants to improve their English, I'll say a phrase in Thai and immediately say the same in English. It sometimes happens the other way: first say it in English, then the same in Thai.

How about a TV program which does the same? Since 95% of Thai TV is soaps dealing with screwed up inter-personal crap, also change the venue - to science and nature topics - and keep it simple. For example, a couple of bright young people explaining the solar system: For each sentence uttered, the same in the other language follows immediately. ....could do it for shows on plants, animals, chemistry, geology, archeology, rocketry...

Naw, perhaps smarter to stick with the TV topic that's most popular in Thailand; Emotionally shipwrecked females screaming at each other.

I agree 100% that they should have a Sesame Type show on TV ... in fact, they should simply have Sesame Street

But in terms of making it sound easy ... English is a very complicated language as compared to Thai in many respects .. except for the tones. I for one am very impressed with the Thais who have little education and can communicate in English as well as they do.

Bottom line is I would avoid preaching to your wife or gf that in English we don't use double words or repeating characters to add emphasis. Because she may end up hitting you instead of responding with love when you write something in her next birthday card like, "I love you soooooooo very very much"

Thankfully we can all get along fine using ThiEnglish

In all seriousness. If the OP is speaking about non-Thais speaking to Thais this way .. then he/she should understand it is for better communication purposes. If this is being said to other non-Thais then it is probably simply a matter of habit.

After speaking to Thais all day, I sometimes find myself speaking to English speakers the same way. Instead of saying something like, "lets not go now because it is too hot" ... I'll end up saying, "No go now, hot"

I can say one thing I like about the Thai language (at least in general speaking) is they don't use a lot of excess words and like to keep the words short.

But in all honesty, I don't hear the word 'same-same" being said all that much. My guess is that they say it twice because they feel a need to recognize both objects being compared. It is a guess but probably not a good one because generally in speaking Thai there is no need to mention the object if it is obvious. But in this case it could be because you have two objects. The Thai language actually has separate words to be added to other words if you want to talk about more than one. In other cases there simply is no plural. If you want to tell somebody they have nice eyes, you would simply say "nice eye" or "eye nice" and the assumption would be you are talking about both and not just the left one ... unless they are missing or have a hideous looking right eye. Yet there is a separate word that you would add to the Thai word for pencil if you were speaking of more than one pencil. Then again there is only one word that covers both "you" and "your"

If you took away all the tones, speaking Thai clearly is much easier to learn than speaking English.

As a plonker, can I use "same same" when discussing things with my English colleagues in Dubai?

For the OP:

I think it would be easier if you published your instructions on how to look like like a plonker, <deleted>, tosser etc. in a little booklet, rather than leading by example.

Whenever I want to hide the fact, I try to behave in a courteous and tolerant manner, rather than eschewing lolanglish (that's like Thinglish or Chinglish or Malinglish or Franglais but generalised to an abbreviation of "local language - English)

Comprendez?

SC

Si Si Senior

Is this Thai Visa Forum or "don't do this in Thailand forum"

The reason the phrase same same has such longevity is because it is understood nearly 100 percent of the time.

Using the phrase amongst native English speakers will make you seem odd, but among Thais who have only a basic hold of the language you will find that this phrase is very successful.

So if you want to be understood in English, why would you avoid using it? Is it better to speak perfect English and be misunderstood?

Just because the phrase is not used back home that doesn't make it incorrect.

Soup can be hot hot, you can like like a girl, and some things are fun fun fun.

Bravo Bravo

I think this thread is very very odd.

Thais have their own language (at least 3 actually) and it seems strange to put them down for using certain practices in their native language when using English. I would wager most folks posting here are not fluent in Thai and if they do attempt to speak Thai they will likely have the sentence structure wrong.

As for English speakers picking up on ThiEnglish .. I don't think it has anything to do with spending too much time in the bars but simply spending a lot of time around Thais who are not fluent in English ... which is the vast majority of them. They only speak English so so because it has many many more rules than the Thai language and Education here is not the best unless you have money.

But I do believe this subject has been covered over and over but we continue to go on and on about it.

Lets just be thankful we don't repeat words in English.

Why are they not arrested, political gathering of more than 5 people?

Good question.

My guess would be the same reasons the Reds were able to paralyze much of Bangkok 6-months ago in violations of the laws and when countless lawful orders were given to disperse.

Bottom law is that if laws aren't enforce they become meaningless and weaken the entire country and the governments abilities to govern the nation.

But who knows .. although i doubt it ... maybe they got some kind of permit since it appears this time, their intentions were peaceful and not to provoke violence..