Peppy

I'm guessing "Jig" or "Jik" is a girl, and the guy who wrote the message is saying the girl he wrote it to spends more time chasing after "Jik" than after guys, so he's going home. He may be making some kind of insinuation about the girl's sexual orientation here.

I could be wrong though--I think we need more context to make any kind of definative assessment.

I still get "ขออภัย ไม่สามารถเปิดหน้านี้ได้ อาจเกิดการผิดพลาดหรือข้อมูลสูญหาย หรือปิดให้บริการแล้ว".

You may prefer to use คุนลีย์ instead of คุณลีย์์, since คุณ is actually a word in Thai with the meaning of "you", or a title used in front of names somewhat like "Mr./Mrs./Miss" in English. If you use คุณลีย์ Thais may misinterpret it to mean that your name is ลีย์, and the คุณ is just a title, so your name is Mr. Lee... I'd go with คุนลีย์ to avoid any ambiguities. The pronunciation is exactly the same.

It seems your link is missing the ".com"--easily rectified, but even after changing it I couldn't find the page about names... the link you give leads to a "page not found", and searching for instances of "ชื่อ" in the site index didn't turn up anything for me. Is the page still accessible for you?

RichardW: Thank you very much for your reply. I'm not very knowledgeable about the academic terminology for this sort of stuff, but thanks to you and DavidHouston I feel I'm a little better informed.

I'm still not entirely convinced as to the value of what you call graphic transliteration, since it seems that learning any particular system would be nearly as much work as learning the system used by natives, but without any of the benefits that come with knowing the native system. Perhaps it is, as you say, easier to write quickly by hand, when taking notes for example, and if this is the way the experts choose to write the foreign languages they study, then who am I to judge?

I think คนใจบุญ does sort of work, but as Bhoydy noted earlier, its meaning may be wide enough to include those who are generous with their money, not just their good deeds. As Rikker says, not a perfect match--but it is close.

I've often heard ปิดทองหลังพระ, "to stick a bit of gold leaf on the back of a Buddha image", (where it will not be seen or acknowledged by anyone) used by people who lend money (to people genuinely in need) and never see it again. Of course it's sometimes used positively too--in the case of doing good without expecting anything in return--but for the karma-conscious, it kind of describes a breakdown of the ทำดีได้ดี system--you did something good, but you don't get anything back. A person who has been helpful and kind all their life but remains luckless or poverty-stricken could be said to have ปิดทองหลังพระ.

ผู้หวังดี is a very good one--kind of tricky to translate, as the literal Thai meaning comes out in English as something like "well-wisher" (ผู้-person หวัง-hope ดี-good)--it doesn't mean "well-wisher" in the English sense though, but rather in the sense of somebody who has good hopes for others. Somebody who goes out of their way to help people in need. Perhaps the closest match so far, I think, especially given that's it's often used in the same sort of context as "good Samaritan" is in English.

And I admit that พลเมืองดี (roughly, "good citizen"), even though I do think it's a good match, is somewhat broader than "good Samaritan" (not a real Samaritan from the Bible, just a helpful individual)--it's often used to mean people who are helpful to the government and society in some direct way, like by phoning the police to report a crime for example--it isn't just for people who go out of their way to help others, in the sense of "good samaritan", although it is used that way as well.

In short (though this is getting kind of long) I would say, in answer to the question "Is there a Thai equivalent for Good Samaritan?": No, there isn't a direct equivalent. There are words (as iterated above) that have a similar meaning when used in a similar context, but there isn't a Thai word that has the direct meaning of "a person who will take a risk, or go out of their way, to help people in need or distress". But then, there isn't in English, either, is there? "Good Samaritan" is just a metonym; "a figure of speech used in rhetoric in which a thing or concept is not called by its own name, but by the name of something intimately associated with that thing or concept" [Wikipedia]. Given the number of people who die in the street for lack of assistance from passers-by, perhaps it just isn't in human nature to turn away from one's own business and help strangers in distress, especially in public, and this is reflected in the lack of a word for such behaviour in our language. Does anyone know if there's a short, concise word for this in any other language?

My name is John, pronounced like จาน, but the darn official spelling is จอห์น which results in my name always being mispronounced . . . and they can't understand why its not pronounced according to the official spelling . . . I could spell it as จาห์น but that'd just confuse them even more . . .

I too would pronounce John as จอห์น unless somebody told me otherwise.  

It also happens to be my middle name... จอห์น I mean, not จาห์น. 

Peppy -

I have found that many Thais will totally deny that a  tapsap is borrowed and claim that

it is a Thai word.

They have  seen it spelled in Thai and heard it pronounced in Thai since birth, so  

they just assume it is Thai.

Yes, I once had a fellow explain to me that the word บอมบ์ means ระเบิด...

Yes, นักบุญ means saint.  The question is, if saint be understood outside the narrow confines of formal Roman Catholic doctrine, was the Samaritan in Jesus' story a saint?  If not, why not?  If so, then นักบุญ is a reasonable way to convey the meaning of the "Good Samaritan"

How about  คนเสียสละ, as in คนเสียสละแก่คนอื่น?

Here's the RID definition for นักบุญ. I don't think it's commonly used outside of religious or spiritual contexts.

นักบุญ    น. ผู้อ้างตัวว่าเป็นผู้วิเศษ, ผู้ที่ทําความดีไว้มากเมื่อตายแล้ว ได้รับ

 ยกย่องว่าเป็นผู้สําเร็จในทางศาสนาคริสต์นิกายโรมันคาทอลิก,

 ผู้ยินดีในการบุญ.

As for คนเสียสละแก่คนอื่น, it seems like more of a definition: A person who makes sacrifices for others.

I still think พลเมืองดี is the best word to use for "a person who will take risks, or self-sacrifice, to assist people in need or distress".

a person who will take risks, or self-sacrifice, to assist people in need or distress.

Usually the papers and TV news call folks like that พลเมืองดี. Dictionaries usually translate it as "good citizen", as you noted earlier, because that's what it literally means: พลเมือง means "citizen" and ดี means "good". I think the meaning's wide enough, though, that it could also mean a "good samaritan" like you describe above.

I once saw a plaque on a Roman Catholic chapel that called St. Paul a นักบุญ.

นักบุญ means "Saint".

mot is finished in regard to - I am out of it.

jop relates to action. we are finished (today) with the paperwork 

set - finished in finality. she and I are finished.

I think you have "jop" and "set" mixed up--I would say "set" in your paperwork example, and "jop" to refer to ending a relationship. I could be off a bit, but this is my idea of how these words work:

mot/หมด depleted eg. กาแฟหมด/ga-fae mot/We're out of coffee.

set/เสร็จ finished, done, over (used to talk about completing a specific action) eg. ผมทำการบ้านเสร็จแล้ว/pom tam gahn bahn set laeo/I've finished my homework.

job/จบ to end, to conclude eg. เราจบแล้ว/rao jop laeo/We're through!

"Mot" can also be used to give a sense of completeness when used with verbs, eg. อ่านหมดแล้ว/aahn mot laeo/I've read it all. Of course, I could also say อ่านเสร็จแล้ว/aahn set laeo/I've finished reading, or even อ่านจบแล้ว/aahn jop laeo/I've finished it. With "set" I think there's an idea that perhaps it's only finished for now, and could be returned to later, like when you finish reading for the night and continue the next day. With "jop" I get the idea that the book is finished. "Mot" puts emphasis on the idea that every word has been read, right through to the end. And then there's "lerk", to quit, as in ผมเลิกกับเขาแล้ว/pom lerk gap kao laeo/I broke up with her, เลิกบุหรี่แล้ว/lerk burii laeo/I've quit smoking, or ผมเลิกอ่านหนังสือพิมพ์ตั้งนานแล้ว/pom lerk aahn nang-seu-pim dtang naan laeo/I quit reading newspapers a long time ago.

I hope this helps you a bit. It's really just a general guideline, though--English equivalents are never exact, so you have to pay close attention to the various idiomatic ways these words are used in Thai, and try to remember each example you see. It's kind of like trying to explain how to use the Thai words for look, see, and watch--there are rough equivalents to the English words, but they aren't always used in exactly the same way.

Thanks very much for clarifying that for us, Yoot.

เมื่อถามว่า ในฐานะที่เป็นมังกรทางการเมือง มองแววความเป็นนายกฯของนายอภิสิทธิ์ อย่างไร นายบรรหารกล่าวว่า ตนไม่ได้เป็นมังกรการเมือง ตนเป็นแค่มังกือการเมือง เพราะมังกรถูกเด็ดหัวเด็ดทางไปเรียบร้อยแล้ว

From this quote you will see another saying "มังกือการเมือง", what do you think it should mean?  

How about this?

In political terms, I guess it's a dragon with its head and tail cut off... still plenty scary looking, though.

I've been there and also with a boy who wrote his name in Roman script as "Ham".......

That actually seems to be a fairly common nickname, whether it's from Beckham, Hamtaro, or the luncheon meat I don't know. The strangest one I've ever come across was Ultraman, but a teacher friend once had a boy in his class called Superman. Then there's Boss, Garfield, Soda, Punch.... we could go on forever. 

My problem is, that there still is a big gap between what I've learned so far, and understanding what is said on Thai TV. How to best fill in the gap? Any of you guys who are/have been in the same situation?

I think understanding TV is one of the trickiest things in any language, but the level of difficulty does depend on the programs you watch.

If you enjoy following current events and have enough vocabulary in this area to read Thai newspapers to some extent, you may find watching news programs a good place to start. Of course you won't understand everything, but if you've already gone through the newspaper before you turn on the TV, you should have a good idea of what the major stories will be, and have some kind of expectations about what you'll hear.

Another fun way to practice listening is to watch soap operas. Channel 3 and Channel 7 have two hours of soaps every night from 8:30 to 10:30. There's always three different soap operas running on each channel at any given time: One will be on Mondays and Tuesdays, another on Wednesdays and Thursdays, and the last on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays. Each soap usually runs for about two to three months before it finishes and is replaced with a new one. The actors always speak clearly, with perfect enunciation and intonation (unless they're maids or servants from Isan), and the stories are very formulaic and predictable. It will still be difficult at first, particularly if you start watching in the middle of a story, but it will help if you have Thai company who can explain the characters and their motivations to you--preferably in Thai, to keep the immersion factor high. Watching a soap with Thais is great fun--some people get quite involved in the story (or อินกับเรื่อง/in gap rueang, as they say--literally, "in with the story"), and everybody will chip in with commentary on the actors' and actresses' dramatic abilities, the depravity of the villainess, and predictions about what will happen next (this one's easy, since most follow the same general plot outline--if you've seen three, you've seen them all).

The hardest kind of show to follow, in my opinion, is anything involving comedy--sitcoms, variety talk shows, skit shows etc. A large part of the dialogue will revolve around wordplay, which means all kinds of unexpected, out-of-context and off-topic ideas will be brought into play. I still don't understand every word when I'm watching these kinds of shows.

It may be hard work to understand anything at all on the TV at first, but if you start off by watching the news and soaps for a few hours each day, I think you'll see some great improvements in your listening abilities after a couple of months. Good luck!

David, thanks for your comments.

You're right, different cultures may have different ideas of what dragons stand for--the Thai wikipedia article here--http://th.wikipedia.org/wiki/มังกร--notes that while dragons are considered bad guys in Western culture, they're symbols of auspiciousness in China.

Searching for the term มังกรการเมือง returns oodles of hits involving our Mr. Banharn. Apparently it's a nickname of sorts; Wikipedia says:

My translation: Mr. Banharn has many nicknames stemming from his many conspicuous characteristics. His wide support base in Supanburi province and status as a regional godfather have given him the nicknames "Dragon of Supan" or "Political Dragon", and due to his resemblance to former Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping, the media often calls him simply "Deng", or "Deng Xiaoharn".

I knew he was called เติ้ง, but I didn't realize he was also known as a dragon. Perhaps the lead in for your translation of the Matichon sentence could read:

"Banharn Silpa-acha, the so-called "Political Dragon", . . .

Of course, that doesn't get us any closer to what Thais actually think of dragons. I'm still inclined to believe it's a reference to his wiles, power, and Chinese roots ("Wily and powerful Sino-Thai politician, Banharn Silpa-acha, . . ."). Unfortunately the Wiki article doesn't say why or when people started calling him a dragon, so this is just my own conjecture.

Regarding Peppy's comment that consonants often stay the same but vowels change, and eljefe2's comments – Not quite the same as the consonants are more important and the vowels less so, the important point I think is – how very important the vowel sounds are in tonal languages. Although vowels don't change (or very little anyway) between different dialects, the tones often do. The poor Thai, trying to understand a westerner who doesn't get his tones right, also gets confused going through the regional pronunciations he has memorised. Add the differences between similar vowel sounds and the importance of getting the length right. Now we understand that guessing what a farang says isn't easy

Actually, what I said about Thai was the exact opposite: that vowels usually sound the same, but consonants often change drastically across dialects--as you note above.

I agree with you about the importance of getting the vowels right if you wish to speak intelligible Thai. Tones and vowels aren't necessarily related, of course. The vowel does carry the tone, but the tone can be right even if the vowel is wrong, and vice versa.

 People talk a lot about 'motivation' as the key to success, but the real key to motivation is necessity.

Absolutely. What's "necessary" often depend on your perspective, so you can create your own necessity, too: When I first moved in with Mrs. Peppy six years ago, we spoke mostly English at home. I wanted to get more practice speaking Thai, so we agreed to speak only Thai/only English on alternating days. I was very strict about this myself, but after about a month Mrs. Peppy started using Thai even on English days; after three months there wasn't a word of English in our relationship, and it's been that way ever since. She often laments the fact that her English speaking abilities are so rusty as a result of being hardly used for half a decade (though her comprehension remains good, perhaps in part due to the number of English-soundtrack movies she watches), but the necessity for her to speak it isn't there anymore, since we only associate with (non-English speaking) Thai friends and family, and she doesn't really have the motivation to create the necessity for herself.

I'd take a more literal tack and simply say "political dragon" so that readers could make of it what they will. I think the inference is closer to "wily old political veteran" than "respected elder statesman", though. I've always thought of dragons as being wily and powerful, but not necessarily old or respected. It could also be a sort of reference to his Chinese ancestry--I have a hard time picturing someone like, say, Newin as a dragon.

"Political dragon Banharn Silipa-acha . . ."

Thanks, Mike.

My question was poorly stated.  I really want to know whether in the sentence:

"เราควรรักษาส่วนที่ดี ที่เจริญที่มีอยู่ให้คงไว้"

Thai syntax would make the phrase "ให้คงไว้" part of "ควรรักษา" or whether it is part of "ที่มีอยู่".

Yes, I think the basic form is รักษา.........ให้คงไว้ "preserve and maintain ..........".

I'm not sure what you mean by definition because คนที่อาศัยอยู่ต่างประเทศ is a noun (word) for expatriate as far as I can tell.  A shortened version เนรเทศ though not clear if it fits exactly.

I think that คนที่อาศัยอยู่ต่างประเทศ is more explanation than noun (person who lives abroad.) but I admit that may be the only term in common use.

And my understanding is that เนรเทศ is more appropriate for someone who has deported.

I am guessing that when Thais talk about Thais living in the USA or UK or Europe or Australia, they have some word or idiom that they prefer. Just a hunch.

You are correct about เนรเทศ, BookSanook (and it's a verb, not a noun, btw). About คนที่อาศัยอยู่ต่างประเทศ, though, I think Tywais is right. I think the division between "word" and "definition" in Thai is somewhat blurrier than in English, since Thai is very much monosyllablic. Many words (at least, those that don't have Indic or English roots) are composed of syllables which are distinct words by themselves, so it's tempting to interpret them as definitions, especially in the case of nouns, but often the whole phrase is treated simply as a single word. I think คนที่อาศัยอยู่ต่างประเทศ is one of these cases. This is one of the easier aspects of the Thai language in my opinion: many words are definitions unto themselves, and sometimes you can guess the correct word for something simply by defining it, even if you don't know what the right word is.

When Thais talk about Thais living abroad, I've often heard คนไทยในต่างประเทศ, or คนไทยใน[name of country].

A search for "Noparat Motorcycle" in Thai (นพรัตน์ มอเตอไซค์) turned up this: ¹¾Ãѵ¹ìÁÍàµÍÃì It's all in Thai, but it's a business listing for a shop by the name of "Noparat Motor", which offers "Engine Restoration and Repairs" and is located at 51/119 M. 2 Lad Phrao district, Bangkok, phone number 02-9079919. Looks fairly promising.

I think I just got it.  The sentence should read (if written out in full)  พื้นที่  (( ฃึ้งเป๊น)) แปลงเห๊ด

แปลง can mean on its own a garden plot prepared for planting.  Here it means a spot that is naturally a good place for mushrooms, as though it were a prepared garden plot.

What do all you-all think?ื

Very good.

Yes, I agree. And Mike, nice translation of the whole thing, and thank you for pointing out that ทุกขลาภ is not quite the same as a "hard-earned reward".

Perhaps we could say that learning is a form of ทุกขลาภ, since in order to learn new things, one must often undergo the suffering of acknowledging one's former ignorance in addition to the mental and physical effort required to learn. Very Buddhist indeed.

Regarding MikeyIdea's above post on the importance of vowels: It's interesting to note that in the many different dialects of what we call the Thai language (Standard, Central/Supanburi, Southern, Northern/Northern Laos, Isan/Central Laos, etc. etc.), the pronunciation of certain consonants can vary widely, but the vowels generally remain the same, while in the various dialects of English the opposite is true: Consonants sound pretty much the same whether you're from California, Scotland, or Australia, but the vowels are often quite different.

Your version's just fine, David. For the sake of argument, though, here's another take on it:

"บางคนโชคดีเจอกลุ่มเห็ดอ่อนๆเพิ่งเริ่มโผล่จากดิน กลับกลายเป็นทุกขลาภที่ทำให้ต้องหลังขดหลังแข็งนั่งเฝ้า"

"Some were fortunate enough to find clusters of young mushrooms just starting to emerge from the earth, a hard-earned reward for the backbreaking work of sitting and watching for them."

"Gotcha!"

Remembering tones improves your spelling.  Remembering the spelling improves your tones.  Remembering both improves your pronunciation.  Better pronunciation helps you to understand and be understood.

Completely agree. If you're conscious of tones in both reading and listening, advances in one skill will improve the other, and then it will spill over into your writing and speaking as well.

What helped me the most was becoming aware of the tones in just a few common words first, and then learning to "transfer" the intonation to other words. For example, try and focus on the tones in these five words:

น้อง / nawng (high tone) : younger sibling, or a pronoun used by speakers to address people younger than them

หญิง / ying (rising tone) : a female, woman, or girl, commonly heard as part of the compound ผู้หญิง / puu ying

ดี / dee (middle tone) : good, nice, alright, fine

มาก / maak (falling tone) : much, very, a lot

อยู่ / yuu (low tone) : to stay, to reside, to be (in or at a place), to live, to remain (in a particular state or doing a particular activity)

All of these words are extremely common, everyday words that you should be able to hear frequently regardless of the company you keep or the media you listen to. I've picked these particular ones since other words with the same sound but different tones as the above are rather rare, and you're much less likely to run into them. Now, when you hear these words, pay special attention to the tone. When you think you can reproduce the tones as you hear them, practice transferring the tones to other words. For example, when you say พี่ / pee (older sibling, term of address for someone older than the speaker), think of the falling tone used in มาก / maak. When you say ผี / pee (ghost), think of the rising tone in หญิง / ying. When you say ไม้ / mai (wood), think of the high tone of น้อง / nawng. When you say ใหม่ / mai (new), think of the low tone of อยู่. And so on.

If you simply master the five tones in these five words and can transfer the tone to new words you see, you'll have no problem reading the tones correctly, and of course it will also help your listening. If somebody says "nang" (with a short vowel), you can think, "Did he say 'nang' with a tone like 'maak', or 'nang' with a tone like 'ying'"? If you heard "nang" with the falling tone of "maak" then you heard the word "sit down"; if you heard it with the rising tone of "ying" then you heard the word for "movie".