hiero

Usually a tell-tale sign of something not entirely pleasant is a stranger referring to you directly as farang, even thought the word is not bad it's not generally polite in anyway to use it directly especially with people you don't know.

ฝรั่งแม่งตา maybe? watch the £*&! where you are going white boy

http://jamiep.org/mod/spelling/view.php?id=203#

not exactly ideal but a nice little distraction.

sure he said กิน/gin

คาว

Lol. Yeah it could have been glin kao กลิ่นคาว - stinks of fish or something bad.

definately กลิ่นคาว

nickmanchester2 - next time brush the old pegs before you go.

sure he said กิน/gin

คาว

I think the whole skin colour vs beauty thing is quite simple in thai mens eyes:

สาวไทย ๑: Pretty, good body, nice hair, clever, kind, good personality, tall.......... but has dark skin.............. ไม่สวย

สาวไทย ๒: Average................................................................................................... but has pale skin.............. สวย

Status has to come into this as well, i've not met many isaan girls that have pale skin however i've met (and been out with) white skin girls that are central thai's so if you're dating a dark skin girl it's probably more likely she is lower status than a paler girl. I know america from what I have heard is a little different but in the UK at least, it's not odd or strange for say a Doctor to go out with a factory worker, if two people like each other then no probs, but in Thailand I found people stick to their own, so for a thai motorcycle taxi man a pale skin hi-so girl is merely just a fantasy (or at least until he saved up enough to hit a high class massage parlour for his birthday).

For us (farangs) I mean, the skin colour thing doesn't really matter a great deal at least no where near the extent it does to thai men, at least with white girls it's not set in stone what is attractive, so guys like a tanned girl, some like white skin and some even like the fake orange tan! In fact I would take pretty and a good body over the shade of a girls skin anyday

I mean, when I first came to thailand to live (just for 2 years) it was my first time here and my taste in what I found attractive somewhat changed, I at first really liked the dark skin, the flat nose wasn't even an issue, neither was the height but as time progressed perhaps due to the media, talking to thai guys etc etc I somewhat found that those attributes less attractive and the paler skin น่ารักy (<check out that thaienglish) look more pleasing.

Possible to be ''fluent'' in 12 months? I suppose it's not exactly measurable anyways.

Can you use these interchangeably, for example:

ผมชอบอาหารแบบนี้

ผมชอบอาหารอย่างนี้

Pretty sure they both work, but is there a subtle difference, should one be used over the other depending on the context, subject, situation etc?

I'm not sure about levels, I think my knowledge is a bit like swiss cheese and I know lots of advanced stuff but often can be stumped by the most basic question, I think this was down to just picking things up for a year whilst I lived there.

My teacher says that my accent, pronunciation and vocab is good but the structure is one of my biggest problems, I can communicate the point fine but not 100% correctly, so for example "the shop, I was there yesterday at 2pm, afterwards I had dinner", anyone would understand that but it's not the correct way.

So I am currently 'pattern' studying buy using example sentences and words and then modifying it multiple times e.g:

ถึงแม้ว่า

ผมจะเรียนภาษาไทย ถึงแม้ว่า ภาษาไทยยาก

__________ ถึงแม้ว่า ________________

ผมจะไปที่ตลาด ถึงแม้ว่า ตลาดไกล

ถึงแม้ว่า อาหารคุณฝน ไม่อร่อย ผมก็จะกิน

Also, when I learn new words before I add them to anki I try and create a sentence out of them, like yesterday I learnt the word จริงจัง which is like 'serious about..'

ถ้าเราจริงจังกับการควบคุมอาหาร เราควรจะ...

klons, how are you finding learnthaipodcast? I use a podcast called Chinesepod to learn mandarin and would love something similar for thai.

learnthaipodcast is pretty good as it's mostly all 'real' talking thai. The only thing is the lack of explanations to the sentences.

The alg level 5 stuff on youtube is great imHo, I love the women who talks for those lessons, quick, clear and real thai. Highly recommended.

I forgot, the jamook-bee! that aint no hi-so yo

thanks^ i've used the later before but I daren't say where i learnt it from

I always thought boom-boom came from kubrick putting it in full metal jacket and it just becoming popular after that

Groongtep - a little off topic, but what is a casual way of saying sex without saying 'boom boom' or being crude, like if you were describing a film to some friends and wanted to say.. "...then they had sex..."

As i've always thought การ ร่วมเพ็ศ was the equivalent of "sexual intercourse" and a little formal?

thai hi-so:

nice cars, a house with a name, pet dogs, kids with cars, drink coffee in starbucks, paler skin, fashionable clothes, holidays abroad, not eating in roadside cafes, not riding on the back of motorcycle taxi's, i-phones, i-pods, blackberrys, beauty treatments, "you are farang, big money, why shop at MBK", trips to the 'clinic', can or want to be good at english language, jewellery, being seen at paragon or central, buying whiskey inside nightclubs rather than bringing their own, narak photos, 5,000 friends of hi-5, "i like salad no somtam", not mixing with others outside the hi-so, "i will buy that dress..." whilst watching ละคร

bitter? nah, just went out with a hi-so girl.

The dead givaway is the use of L in words rather than the rolling R

Yet another thai language pundit weighs in on all thingz thai. With as many 'experts' on the thai language as this forum has I wonder why I don't hear more foreigners actually speaking clear, coherent thai instead of '2-word-tourist-thai', 'horse-peak', or that hideous mix of 'baby-talk-engrish-thai' which seems so prevalent.

The only time I hear distinct r-rolling in normal thai speech is;

*overly pretentious newscasters

*wanna-b-hi-so thai kids acting better than they are

*goof-ball foreigners who think they speak thai better than they really do.

Even at Immigrations, the police stations, MFA, etc; when dealing with the officials there, the slight blurring of r's and l's is more than evident.

One the street this type of pretentious over pronunciation and/or rolling your r's will get the thais you interact with to roll their eyes and think you're too full of yourself for your own good. Especially if the rest of your thai is marginally pronounced.

I totally concur with the poster known as "mikenyork" in his observations about rolling your r's.

I agree, but I think it really depends on the situtation and environment you're in. If i talk with my teacher I รรรร and ผม and ครับ but with thai friends, people my own age etc that stuff is usually omitted.

However I don't agree with thai's 'rolling their eyes' (that is unless you're cleary a fluent/near native speaker) the benefit of the doubt is usually always given

btw, I am no expert, I would probably class myself as intermediate depending on what is being spoken about

ติดตาม and เดินตาม

I am not sure about this but anyways perhaps I can find out where i am going wrong:

Example: You and a friend are driving seperate cars and your friend whats you to follow here, so they say: a:ไม่รู้ทางไหน b: ไม่เป็นไร ติดตามฉัน

Example: You ask directions and the person says "follow me" (on foot): a:_______ตรงไหน b: เดินตามผม

for def 3: that is the one I am most familiar with.

someone enlighten me on the alternate meaning of หมู:

ฝรั่งเศส หมู แพ้ ชัวร์

france will definitely lose

ฟุตบอลโลก - footbawn lohk - World Cup

TeamA กับ TeamB เสมอกัน 1-1 - Team A and Team B tied 1-1

I tried watching a film called "see prang" earlier, it's pretty famous in thailand. Jeese, it kicked my ass, pure teenager talk all the way through.

Thai films with english subtitles?

it's quite good I find to get a hollywood movie that you have seen before but with a thai audio track over the top of it with english subs.

By the way, I feel I understand much of what is being said in the AUA level 5 lessons, but it still seems to be a far way from actually understanding thai tv :-) Agree?

Yep I agree, but then TV is tough, imagine a thai student who is learning english watching a show like eastenders (in the UK) or some American soap opera set in Boston, there would be so many references to things happening in the news, history, references, strange accents etc etc.

bob - do you listen to thai radio ever? there quite a few news stations that have chat radio also.

bobthedog - I think if you're at the level where you can pick bits out of TV then check out this:

It's AUA level 5 lessons, there are quite a few with this woman.

She speaks to the students just like she would with her friends and is funny and entertaining. I found watching all 5 of her lessons (5 hours in total) a few times really helped me pick up a lot of things.

See what you think.

we gut fish as well.

Actually "Devastated" is right, but a more colloquial version of the world used on more lighter subject matter. I guess there is not a direct translation but the ones listed so far would work pretty well, thanks.