Gaccha

I can't help but feel sorry for the bar.

Here they are trying to earn an honest living when all of a sudden the worst elements of humankind spill into their bar to watch them perform their daily night time shift activities.The bar must be so embarrassed by its association with British teenagers.

If I was the bar owner I would write a press release condemning Thailand in allowing the scum of the earth (British teenagers) into the country and violate the good bar scene of beloved Thailand, and expressing my hope that these teenagers can be contained in the vast human nursery called "the UK".

I don't think any of the links solve the issue I have with learning.

The two current options are Jamie's typing programme or the generically named 'Thai typing tutor'. The Jamie programme is an excellent spelling test but not so great for getting to grips with speed typing. The latter programme is so simple that it fails to live up to its purpose. I used it and still cannot touch type. I suspect anyone who now claims to touch type just eventually succeeded by thrashing away on msn etc.

Is there anything like the famous Mavis Beacon out there?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mavis_Beacon

Clearly, in some way, the Thais feel ASEANish. Or at least you must otherwise come up with an explanation of why the nation-states of ASEAN have chroncially failed to invade each other. Yes, they have had their spats (Prear Vhear) , but they seem to live in peace.

But, yes, they feel Thai first and foremost. The nation-state with its monoploy of violence can in its desperate desire to project its own existence go to great lengths to make the people living within it feel part of it. The 72 (according to Chula Uni) races tha tmake up Thais have experienced incredible amounts of national myth making. How else could they feel anything but first and foremost Thai. Other countries also have similar simplistic systems of propagation of identity (e.g. US children standing and swearing their oath of allegiance). Only France and the UK are odd, interesting, and perhaps healthy exceptions (but this is well off topic).

So what is going on. Well, how about this positioning:

"The case of the EU points to the need to re-conceptualise the relationship between

self and other in the IR literature. I argue that the literature forces us into an artificial choice

between the liberal constructivist approach of disregarding the constitutive role of difference

in identity formation and the critical constructivist approach of assuming a behavioural

relationship between self and other, and therefore cannot account for the diversity in the EU’s

interactions with various states on its periphery. I identify three constitutive dimensions along

which self/other relationships vary to produce or not produce relationships of Othering:

nature of difference, social distance, and response of other. "

---Constructing identity and relating to difference: understanding the EU’s mode of differentiation by BAHAR RUMELILI, Review of International Studies (2004), 30, 27–47

So the Other (ie. non-Thais in our topic, usually Farang, but historically the great non-Thai was the Burmese) should not be immediately seen as the hostile Other. Add I think this can be seen in Thai relations with Malaysia, Cambodia etc.

If we raise the intellectual bar a bit, I strongly recommend this:

'Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity'-- Judith Butler

After you've read that it will be difficult to take any of these Cosmopolitan magazine-style books seriously again. I appreciate that , for some, 'Men are from mars...' can be a 'good laugh' as it picks up on certain superficial observations and then repeats them, but if you want to know what is actually going on you need to read the Butler classic. Sometimes, the truth can be hardgoing.

Um, this is assuming that radical French feminist theory has had a major impact on gender relations worldwide. Nobody thinks we are the same, but I, for one, do not see why treating people equally is so disturbing for some people.

Crikey, I don't think for a minute the theory has had any impact on gender relations. If it had, the book would be now redundant. The point of the book is to examine the performativity of not only gender, but of sex and sexuality. To grotesquely parody her position, she sees us all in a constant drag performance. What you see as being a man, or being male, she regards as not only constituted by social relations, but the very performativity of it. So perhaps your examination of what makes your male friends/boyfriends/ husbamd tick is to actually generate the tick itself.

If we raise the intellectual bar a bit, I strongly recommend this:

'Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity'-- Judith Butler

After you've read that it will be difficult to take any of these Cosmopolitan magazine-style books seriously again. I appreciate that , for some, 'Men are from mars...' can be a 'good laugh' as it picks up on certain superficial observations and then repeats them, but if you want to know what is actually going on you need to read the Butler classic. Sometimes, the truth can be hardgoing.

The basic point I'm making is Thailand was never Thailand, so it didn't exist to be colonized... It's a bit like saying Slovakia has never been colonized and leaving it there; ignoring thousands of years of movement and different ruling groups.

Right. And just to add to this point, the mainstream position on Thailand is that it underwent dramatic 'internal colonisation'.

Ask yourself what makes a nation-state a nation-state. Bearing in mind, it exists only insofar as it is constituted in the minds of the people within the map boundaries. If all but a tiny number are slaves, what does it matter why the land was not taken by the Europeans. You are fetishing a concept not relevant to the time or place. It is like asking why dinosaurs did not have democracy. The implication by raising the topic of epic Thai resistance to colonisation, is that it is something to be proud of.

This was one of the great unmentioned parts of the Hurricane Katrina story. The fridges absolutely stunk. They defrosted, maggots began swarming, the smell was utterly rancid with 2 or 3 inches thick goo around the walls of the fridge and in the freezer bags, black frozen maggots. The solution then was to chuck the fridges away.

On the bright side, the smell of a decaying human body of 3 months is not as bad as an egg left for 3 months, so should you ever come across the former (as I have) then you might not be so shocked thanks to your current experience.

"When you're young, anyone a decade older or more can seem like a gauche joke, tragically unaware of their own crashing irrelevance. They're either hopelessly out-of-touch (LOL! He's never heard of Lady Gaga!), embarrassingly immature (Ugh! He listens to Lady Gaga!) or hovering awkwardly in-between (Pff! He uses Lady Gaga as a catch-all reference for youth!)."

---The Guardian (12 October 2009)

The comic timing of this Guardian article with this Thaivisa topic is poetry itself.

The One Stop Visa shop located 150metres from MRT exit 3 of Phahon Yothin at Rasa Tower 2, which is now by far the best place for 90 day reports (since the new Immigration Office is sooooo inconvenient) if you live in central bangkok and want to use the MRT or BTS only.

But now it is also moving. But it is good news. On January 4th it is moving to just next to Siam Square... ( am unable to recall the exact location but it is posted on the front entrance on the 16th floor at Rasa Tower 2, something like "Chatumak Tower")

Perfect. Clearly God is a Scotsman after all.

No doubt the information will seep out the closer the date.

http://www.thaivisa.com/359.0.html

This has for people with 1 year visa or better the following ramifications:

1. if renewing the visa you'll need to head to the new Immigration Office

2. if you are just doing the tedious and totally pointless 90 day reports you can pop into the office near Siam Square

Ok I get the picture I must be the most misunderstood guy in the world.I read all your replies and to be honest see l;ittle in them relating to what was on my mind when I started this thread or the last one. So I willsimply give up trying to make sense with you guys .

Strictly speaking your unseen Thai person problematised the bar girl, rather than yourself, so you protect yourself from asserting any opinion. Indeed, you provide your opinion as a source of assistance for us farang who are apparently constantly being asked by your unseen Thai party "Why do farang always marry bar girl". Well, perhaps it is always more interesting to turn the question back on the questioner.

When Thais say bar girls they have something special in mind. Although a great deal of the young (boys and) girls working as bar girls are actually university students of the elite universities and the not so elite colleges the Thais are resolutely not talking about them. They have in mind the ladies mainly from Issan who are forced by the invasion of late modern capitalism to destroy their old tight-knit community life and work in the diaspora of Issan people in the horrible trades of Bangkok: many a construction worker is an Issan lady, many a toilet cleaner.

The Thais clearly regard the bar girls as sinners, hence why they raise the issue to you (although not to me, not once, not even once) and that is what "to problematise it" means: to hold your frame of reference by a certain contingency. Your response is to attribute behavioural traits for the Thais and the farang to explain a problem that you create.

My response, au contraire, would be look at the mechanisms of late capitalism , the violent hypocrisy in the male upper classes in claiming not to partake in the vices, and the total lack of honesty in viewing the Issan girls as equalling bar girls. I have yet to meet any hi-so friends of mine who do not partake in the vices available and I feel they are a normal crowd.

The non-night worker girls often have curfews and are subject to strict regimes to suppress their sexual beings. Enormous social pressures deny them access to farang despite the recent fashion for the farang man.

So "why do farang marry Thai bar girls?". To answer this unseen Thai man:

a. the question is never asked (Thais do not think this)

b. is it because of smoking and drinking similarities? (no- it is a confluence of factors ranging from capitalist exploitation to old style patriarchy)

This is a tricky balance. Bonobo, even before he was a moderator, was my favourite contributor. I cannot mention and don't mention his reason for stopping your last topic. Indeed I am not allowed to do so. But I want you to note that you were not 'targetted' by your topic being described as trolling.

He made a hard call. I don't think you are necessarily of evil intent in posting what you posted, but I fear it goes down such an obvious series of narratives that you it is doomed to drop into a rant. Had you reframed your position it might have stood a chance. As it was you did this:

You problematised the type of women that farang men marry in Thailand (why did you choose to do this?)

You appear to associate women's desparate need for resources as a form or moral failure (an arguable position)

You used the conceptual framework of class (you seem to have not noticed you used two meanings of class: 'classy' and 'class of social status' )

You assumed a preference for the middle class, upper class girl (and assumed they are superior)

You assumed the vices are the problems of the lower classes only

You naively assumed Thais who marry up the social ladder do not suffer such vices (since they told you so)

You were inviting a narrative that is inherently insulting, since your assumptions are twisted away from reality. I just never seem to meet these men who are falling off bar stools trying to take in their next drug trip, who then stagger home, to have SM with their barn chicken, before exploding from the gluttony they suffer as a consequnce of marrying a woman of low morals. I just keep meeting gentlemen with nice wives who quietly get on with their lives.

just testing if MP3 will up-load.

opalhort

15___Take_Me_Home.mp3

appears to have uploaded.

Edit: just tested it and yes the up-load went through okay.

Try to insert it into the text editor after up-load is complete.

Tried and tried and nothing.

So I split the file in two. And it seems to have worked...

So the lesson from this is: any more than 7mb and it might get bounced despite the 20mb limit.

You can see the end result in the "Thai language" forum.

"Generations to come will scarcely believe that such a one as this ever in flesh and blood walked upon this earth."--Albert Einstein

If Ghandi was... Thai and female then this is what he would sound like.

I got a friend to read out parts of the script as well as the introduction for the astonishing 1982 film (it won 8 oscars) in the Thai translation.

Download the attached MP3 file here:

Ghandi_by_Jia_part_1b.mp3

Ghandi_by_Jia_part_2b.mp3

The English language is here for the whole film: http://www.imsdb.com/scripts/Gandhi.html (just use 'find' by Ctrl + F)

Scene 1.

Ghandi: Doesn't the New Testament say, "If your enemy strikes you on the right cheek, offer him the left"?

Charlie: I think perhaps the phrase was used metaphorically... I don't think our Lord meant --

Ghandi: I'm not so certain. I have thought about it a great deal. I suspect he meant you must show courage -- be willing to take a blow -- several blows -- to show you will not strike back -- nor will you be turned aside... And when --....

Scene 2

Ghandi: I am asking you to fight -- ! To fight against their anger -- not to provoke it!....

Scene 3

Ghandi: Since I returned from South Africa, I have traveled over much of India. And I know I could travel many more years and still only see a small part of it....

Scene 4

Ghandi: We think it is time you recognized that you are masters in someone else's home. Despite the best intentions of the best of you, you must, in the nature of things, humiliate us to control us.....

Scene 5

Reporter: ...The object of this massive tribute died as he had always lived -- a private man without wealth, without property, without official title or office...

More about the film: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gandhi_(film)

The Thai script is available in the book: "Learn English with movies" published by MIS Studio. A book that is readily available in almost all medium or large size bookshops in Bangkok.

[and like Ghandi I went through great suffering to get this to you-- about 30 upload attempts, a re-editing of the sound, a 'cleaning' of the MP3 and so on. So you better download it... or I'll burn my ID card]

I want to upload a 9mb MP3 (it is about 12 min long of audio). I have tried to upload around 20 times.

I have ensured the problems of uploading are not on my side of the fence; I have checked the codecs of the MP3. It is normal. I then 'cleaned' the MP3 by 'converting' it back into an MP3 (from MP3 to MP3). This usually works to kill off all buggy aspects of it. The file is of course ".mp3". The Forum should just accept the uploaded file.

Please can you check there is not some problem with the Forum uploads. When it fails to upload it always says: "You did not select a file to upload".

I am getting awfully exasperated.

In case it was just a short term problem I aborted after 17 tries yesterday. But today it is still not working....

Thanks iin advance.

Not sure how much this wiII heIp you at this stage but if you have (or can get) an account opened with HSBC, they do send cards and maiI to overseas addresses. However, ive been with HSBC a Iong time, not sure if that changes anything.

I second this. HSBC will send to your address in Thailand or they will send the card by internal mail to their Bangkok branch for you to collect. In either case they are very careful. They rang me on their initiative to see if it had arrived at their Bangkok branch when I picked the latter option, as they pointed out they have no communication with each other (Bangkok and London branches). Brutual honesty, that might explain Barclays reluctance to suggest the same solution.

Behind the Blur:

Uncovering Thai Cinema

Written & Directed by Erich Fleshman

72 minutes

Thursday, 01 October 2009

20:30 - 22:00

Rain Dogs Bar & Gallery

Soi Phraya Phiren, Rama IV Rd

Admission free

An insightful documentary about Thai cinema, which boasts a long and colourful history, yet struggles as the industry attempts to move forward. This film examines the past but focuses mainly on the Thai New Wave since 1997 by combining film clips and interviews from Thai directors and others artists, such as Asian hip-hop sensation Thaitanium, who are trying to create a more personal style of art.

Would have loved to have seen this. But 'tis too late. Are there any other showings?

And about this Rain Dogs Bar, what type of place is it? A swanky arty bar? Sounds interesting.

1日二度の食事と労働が牢獄内の犯罪者の生活のすべてだった。

I don't know much about Japanese language, but when attempting to read:

のすべてだった,

I shall read 'no su be teh ta ci ta', somehow I know that 'の' shall stand by itself, and 'だった' is the extension (some tenses) of 'すべ' ... Or rather each character already has the built-in consonant and vowel, thus u can read rather easily.

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย ว่าเธอไม่ชอบเรา

Somehow in Thai, there is no spacing between the word, and there is a possibility that a consonant can be at the front or at the back of a word, so for beginner, it can be very difficult to break up the sentence into separate words in a glance. And the vowel can wrap at the front, back or top or bottom of the consonant. So somehow I find it difficult to 'glance' the sentence and sing to the tune to my favorite Thai music.

I am just voice up my problem when learning Thai, and wondering others may face the same problem, and how they finally overcome it. To drill those Thai characters and word formation rules are really a must, but wondering if one has a fancy method in overcome it. That's the intent for my post.

I think your good-hearted attempt here to contrast Japanese and Thai tends to highlight the weakness of your initial assertion. I'll show you why:

You said:

"のすべてだった,

I shall read 'no su be teh ta ci ta', somehow I know that 'の' shall stand by itself, and 'だった' is the extension (some tenses) of 'すべ' ... Or rather each character already has the built-in consonant and vowel, thus u can read rather easily."

Your second issue is wrong and your third issue is wrong: だった' is not the extension. And not all the letters have a built in consonant and vowel. Many are vowel sound only (e.g. 'あ'). Some are then not pronounced the way they are written depending on circumstances (e.g. 'へ').

You then rather reinforce my point by providing a perfect example of a word that can be spotted immediately in Thai.

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย

Those first bits 'แ' are an absolute dead giveaway of the start of a new word. Japanese has no such easy tactic. You can also wildy guess other starts to words:

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย

And endings:

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย

If you heard the whinging of Japanese learners then you would understand this is not just a Thai issue.

But linguistics is fun.

Isn't 'へ' always pronounced as 'he' (thought I was taught to read it as 'eh' rather than 'he'), it is one of the hiragana character.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hiragana

Many are vowel sound only (e.g. 'あ'), I am confused by this statement. Isn't each hiragana has can be read 'with a consonant and a vowel'? Or are you referring to compounded vowel like 'desu', where it should be pronounced as 'des' rather than 'de-su'. Yup I had make this mistake, but it can be corrected quickly and easily.

Somehow I still find it a challenge to identify the first consonant in a Thai sentence.

The wikipedia reference that you provide proves each point I made. You should read it. Such quality lines from it:

あ a [a]

"With a few exceptions for sentence particles は, を, and へ (pronounced as wa, o, and e), and a few other arbitrary rules, Japanese is spelled as it sounds. " Yep. So へ can be pronounced as 'e' or as 'he'.

It then has two pages of spelling rules that tell you they are not as simple as they seem.

I feel you are tying yourself in knots. I think you need to understand I am a very advanced learner of Japanese (I passed the highest level proficiency exam 7 years ago) so there is not much point in lecturing me on it. I am just trying to help you.

1日二度の食事と労働が牢獄内の犯罪者の生活のすべてだった。

I don't know much about Japanese language, but when attempting to read:

のすべてだった,

I shall read 'no su be teh ta ci ta', somehow I know that 'の' shall stand by itself, and 'だった' is the extension (some tenses) of 'すべ' ... Or rather each character already has the built-in consonant and vowel, thus u can read rather easily.

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย ว่าเธอไม่ชอบเรา

Somehow in Thai, there is no spacing between the word, and there is a possibility that a consonant can be at the front or at the back of a word, so for beginner, it can be very difficult to break up the sentence into separate words in a glance. And the vowel can wrap at the front, back or top or bottom of the consonant. So somehow I find it difficult to 'glance' the sentence and sing to the tune to my favorite Thai music.

I am just voice up my problem when learning Thai, and wondering others may face the same problem, and how they finally overcome it. To drill those Thai characters and word formation rules are really a must, but wondering if one has a fancy method in overcome it. That's the intent for my post.

I think your good-hearted attempt here to contrast Japanese and Thai tends to highlight the weakness of your initial assertion. I'll show you why:

You said:

"のすべてだった,

I shall read 'no su be teh ta ci ta', somehow I know that 'の' shall stand by itself, and 'だった' is the extension (some tenses) of 'すべ' ... Or rather each character already has the built-in consonant and vowel, thus u can read rather easily."

Your second issue is wrong and your third issue is wrong: だった' is not the extension. And not all the letters have a built in consonant and vowel. Many are vowel sound only (e.g. 'あ'). Some are then not pronounced the way they are written depending on circumstances (e.g. 'へ').

You then rather reinforce my point by providing a perfect example of a word that can be spotted immediately in Thai.

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย

Those first bits 'แ' are an absolute dead giveaway of the start of a new word. Japanese has no such easy tactic. You can also wildy guess other starts to words:

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย

And endings:

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย

If you heard the whinging of Japanese learners then you would understand this is not just a Thai issue.

But linguistics is fun.

Yes and No.

Example: 煙草 reads 'toe-ba-coe'. From the English word tobacco, and it misleadingly means cigarette. The sounds are not constituted from the kanji parts, so it disproves your hypothesis that they are each a syllabus. But in this case, the Chinese characters do offer a meaning: 煙smoke-草leaf which is readily understandable.

The character can then, when it is using the syllabus of whcih you speak, have enormous numbers of readings. So many, it might as well be random. e.g. na/i/u/ki/nama and another 16 other readings for this character 生.

There are then lots of Kanji with no fundamental meaning. The idea of Chinese characters as exuding a meaning is common among beginners because typcially they are taught those very characters first that not only have a clear meaning but even look like what they mean: e.g. 川　river (it looks like a river).

e.g. 臥薪嘗胆 (as used above) [meanings: supine- firewood- [no meaning]- amazed/gall bladder]

So the characters can in some ways mean something (e.g. firewood) but they actually also means nothing, since they aid no interpretation of the word. Or else the meaning is only that very word of which the meaning you know not. Or else, it has multiple unconnected meaning.

So what does this word mean?

"To put your self through great suffering for the sake of vengeance. " I think if you could work that out from "supine- firewood- [no meaning]- amazed/gall bladder" then impressive are you.

For 卧薪尝胆, if you break out the words it means (sleep or lie down - firewood - taste - gall bladder). So what it means is to sleep on firewood and to taste gall bladder (bitterness).

There is a story regarding this 卧薪尝胆 :

典　故：公元前496年，吴王阖闾派兵攻打越国，但被越国击败，阖闾也伤重身亡，阖闾让伍子胥选后继之人，伍子胥独爱夫差，便选其为王。此后，勾践闻吴国要建一水军，不顾范蠡等人的反对，出兵要灭此水军，结果被夫差奇兵包围，大败，大将军也战死沙场，夫差要捉拿勾践，范蠡出策，假装投降，留得青山在不愁没柴烧。夫差也不听老臣伍子胥的劝告，留下了勾践等人，三年，饱受侮辱，终被放回越国，勾践暗中训练精兵，每日晚上睡觉不用褥，只铺些柴草（古时叫薪），又在屋里挂了一只苦胆，他不时会尝尝苦胆的味道，为的就是不忘过去的耻辱。

勾践为鼓励民众就和王后与人民一起参与劳动，在越人同心协力之下把越国强大起来。

一次夫差带领全国大部分兵力，去赴会，要求勾践也带兵助威，勾践见时机已到，假装赴会，领3000精兵，拿下吴国主城，杀了吴国太子，又擒了夫差，夫差悔当初未听伍子胥言，留下了勾践，死前，他只求，不要伤害吴国百姓。

(This happened during Before Christ 496) There is this 勾践，whose kingdom (越国) was overthrown by 吴国。For 3 years, he suffered tremendous humiliation and was finally allowed to be returned back to his earlier (越国)。He trained his army secretly, and in order not to forget his past humiliation, for each nights, he will sleep on firewood (薪) and sucked on the gall (胆).

And finally, he lead a 3000 elite army and seized an opportunity in overthrowing 吴国。

"To put your self through great suffering for the sake of vengeance." - So you now know why (卧薪尝胆) means that? I can further elaborate if you still in doubt.

http://baike.baidu.com/view/35626.htm

For your tobaco, I shall explain it later.

I did know the origins. It is a famous story. It shows how the 'meaning' of the characters can become detached from the word so become functionless to all but the most educated users. Rather like Latin hidden into English words.

And for Japanese, except for Kanji, I believe each katagana and hiragana has a syllabus. A string of katagana or hiragana shall form a word.

No (in effect) and no, I'm afraid.

The hiragana and katakana can be altered by the letters around them, as well as their stress changing depending on the particular word.

For example: 敗因 (haiin) 'i'　is rendered 'i' in English phonetics (pronounced 'ee') but can become what an English speaker would recognise as a final "n" sound or else it can be a nasal "h" sound. Ask a japanese beginner to pronouance hai'in and they will say "hain", but then listen to a native speaker and it sounds like this "hanern" because a native English speaker can not register the nasal 'g' sound that is a consequence of the positioning of the 'i' in the word.

Then more fundamentally, a string of katakana and hiragana often do not constitute one word. They can be several words (as a Westerner would understand it) or could be the tail end of a verb or adjective.

e.g.

1日二度の食事と労働が牢獄内の犯罪者の生活のすべてだった。

Two meals a day and labor constituted all of the criminal's life in the jail.

This is the hiragana divided into arguable word concepts:

1日二度の食事と労働が牢獄内の犯罪者の生活のすべてだった。

The one good thing about Japanese is that the Revised Hepburn System totally dominates the transcription to English so you don't have the chronic problems that you find in Thai. And, in theory, the Roman alphabet is actually Japanese (is is called the 4th set, after katakana, hiragana, furigana). So the surname 'tanaka' written using the roman alphabet is also Japanese alphabet.

A chinese character does not necessarily make up a word in Chinese or Japanese. The following 4 characters are one word in Japanese:

Let me clarify, a Chinese character is definitely a syllabus.

臥薪嘗胆 (wo4 xin1 chang2 dan3). And each character has it own meaning. Example 尝 (simplified form for 嘗) means to taste. And 尝试 means to try.

As for Japanese character, example hiragana ひらがな, each character is a syllabus, and for tabeshimata 食べました, 食 is a kanji and has 2 syllabus tabe. Most kanji may have the equivalent hiragana written ontop of the kanji to aid the reader in reading the kanji.

So basically, a Japanese character except for Kanji, should have a syllabus.

Yes and No.

Example: 煙草 reads 'toe-ba-coe'. From the English word tobacco, and it misleadingly means cigarette. The sounds are not constituted from the kanji parts, so it disproves your hypothesis that they are each a syllabus. But in this case, the Chinese characters do offer a meaning: 煙smoke-草leaf which is readily understandable.

The character can then, when it is using the syllabus of whcih you speak, have enormous numbers of readings. So many, it might as well be random. e.g. na/i/u/ki/nama and another 16 other readings for this character 生.

There are then lots of Kanji with no fundamental meaning. The idea of Chinese characters as exuding a meaning is common among beginners because typcially they are taught those very characters first that not only have a clear meaning but even look like what they mean: e.g. 川　river (it looks like a river).

e.g. 臥薪嘗胆 (as used above) [meanings: supine- firewood- [no meaning]- amazed/gall bladder]

So the characters can in some ways mean something (e.g. firewood) but they actually also means nothing, since they aid no interpretation of the word. Or else the meaning is only that very word of which the meaning you know not. Or else, it has multiple unconnected meaning.

So what does this word mean?

"To put your self through great suffering for the sake of vengeance. " I think if you could work that out from "supine- firewood- [no meaning]- amazed/gall bladder" then impressive are you.

I have spent slightly more than a month making attempt to learn Thai. I am able to recognize all Thai Characters (Vowels and Consonants). I understand there are some rules in forming a Thai word (example how to read ร and รร and many many more). Somehow I feel that the most challenging for me was to break up the long strings of words into individual words

(example: แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย ว่าเธอไม่ชอบเรา).

Definitely it would be easier to read if there are gaps in between the words or some block distinction ...

แต่ใจเจ้ากรรมไม่รู้เลย ว่าเธอไม่ชอบเรา

And what make reading Thai scripts difficult is the vowels can appear infront, behind, top or bottom of the consonant. And a Thai word can have open or closed Vowels...

So far those languages that I know of have clear distinction for a word, like Chinese (a character is a word and has a syllabus), English, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, French .... I am not sure if Burmese, Laos, Khmer, Arabic, Indian ... language behave like Thai (that there is no spacing between words).

Definitely I need to spend alot more time to get myself more acquainted with Thai Characters Set and those words formation rules, and hopefully I can read the Thai scripts as smooth as a Thai.

Do you have the same thought?

No.

A chinese character does not necessarily make up a word in Chinese or Japanese. The following 4 characters are one word in Japanese:

臥薪嘗胆

Or else it can be a mix of characters and the syllabic alphabet:

逆ギレ

Westerners have complained about the need to break up the sentences into the 'words' but unfortunately they have failed to problematise the concept of a word.

The English language has (mostly) dealt with this. Chinese and Japanese have not. Here is an example:

休ませて頂きました.

[The English translation would be something like: "Gone out, be back soon"]

It literally is the following components:

休ま-- to rest (verb)

せて--[causative attachment to verb]

頂き--[associate verb, literally "to receive", indicating from junior to senior]

ました-- [past, formal tense marker]

i.e. allow me to take time off

So where are the 'words'. I have divided into four. An English speakers instinct might be to divide into two or perhaps one. Yet this is the whole sentence. The English sentence has 5 words. Thai does not even come close to the difficulties I have presented here.

Goodnight and good luck.

I'm a little confused. This is the first I've heard of the "One-stop shop". I'm on an Extension of stay/Work permit and have to do my 90-day report on 7 October. Can I use the "One stop shop" instead of the main Immigration office?

Board of Investment (BOI) One Stop Service Center

It doesn't do permanent residence visa, but it certainly does 90 day notices. It does do work permits. It is operated jointly by the Labour and Immigration departments.

It is not well known. But it is here:

555 Phayonyothin Rd. Rasa Tower 2.

It is on the north bound lane of Phayonyothin Rd. just prior to Soi 19. Tower 1 is on Phayonyothin and Tower 2 attached but behind it. Service Center is on floor 16 in Tower 2.

I predict a huge spike in customers until they finally abolish the 90 day requirement.

How to get there by SkyTrain or Subway?

From Mo-Chit Skytrain stations there are minivans going that direction

The answer to this is to not use the new immigration office, but instead use the "One stop shop" for 90 day notice, which is located close to Mo Chit station. Here is a map. It is meant for businessmen but can be used for anyone on a year visa of any kind.

So just to ram this home: if you use public transport (Skytrain and MRT) do not use the new immigration office, instead go to the "One stop shop" on themap above.

And then there are words that both English and Thai don't have (I think):

e.g. 八つあたりに [yatsuatari ni]: to indiscriminately/ recklessly get angry with everyone around you (just because you are in a bad mood)

逆ギレ[gyakugire]: to get unjustifiably angry with someone who is justifiably angry with you

It's a shame English and Thai don't have these words as they, like all words, have a constitutive effect on the people who use them. Any Japanese having an argument is stopped in their traps should they be told they are doing either of the above, but since there is no concept in English or Thai, then Thailand and the England have many a person who unjustifiably get angry when someone is annoyed with them, or who shout at everyone in sight.

One more word:

臥薪嘗胆 [gasshinshoutan] to put yourself through great suffering for the sake of vengeance