The Ghost of Phoolan Devi

I like that one, "they don't wai anybody".

If you still wai anybody in Thailand, other than when meeting some top-notch bigwig with a lot of "amnaat", you're a big fool and deserve to be looked down upon.

Take it from someone who's been here for 17 years.

A few weeks back, I saw a farang wai one of those shoe polish boys in Soi Nana (he must have been about 9 years of age), after the latter had polished the farang's shoes. I didn't know if to laugh out loud or cry. Any Thai seeing that would have cringed in agony, too.

La Gondola in Kata. For me, the best pizzas on Phuket, and at very reasonable prices, too. As good as the best pizzas in Bangkok.

They also have a quite inexpensive but decent house wine, another reason for me to go there.

The famous "Buddha tooth" in Kandy, Sri Lanka, is on all historical accounts a fake, but try telling that to the devout - religion and common sense don't always go hand in hand, to say the least.

I am from Sri Lanka and yes, a Buddhist.

First, I challenge you to put down the basis for you to confidently claim that the "tooth relic of buddha" in Sri Lanka is a fake. Ok..explain your historical accounts..

From where you got this information to claim that the famous Buddha relic in Kandy Sri Lanka is a fake?

Know your facts before you talk..

So you must be knowing about the Sri Lankan and Buddhist history more than the Buddhist live in my country? It would have been much nicer if you can introduce yourself first so the readers will know your background. Atleast your country and the religion.

I am sure you are the "Ghost of Phoolan Devi" and infact she was a ........... (find out from internet more before you talk)

Being Srilankan does not automatically make you an authority on Srilankan cultural history. This is quite obvious here.

According to Portuguese chronicles, in 1560 the tooth was "captured" by the Portuguese, who then brought it to Goa. The Arch Bishop of Goa had the tooth burnt in a public ceremony, so as to demonstrate the "victory over the heathens". The ashes of the tooth were strewn into the sea. The event was recorded in such detail by various Portuguese sources that there's hardly a doubt its veracity. Of course. Of course, the Srilankan Buddhist clergy would never admit to the fact, since the tooth in Kandy is the most potent symbol of the religion (in Sri Lanka). You could compare it with the Jade Buddha (Phra Kaew) in Bangkok.

Even before the original tooth was burnt, many copies of it existed. These were kept at various royal courts. Marco Polo related that in 1281 Kublai Khan asked the Ceylonese king for a copy of the tooth and in fact received two! One was an oversized molar. Along with it he sent a tuft of hair, supposedly of the Buddha.

Before you ignorantly slag off people here, I recommend you study some historical sources. You find many reprints of old books on this subject (and others) even in Colombo. Just try Lake House Bookshop (40 Hyde Park Corner, Colombo 2) and you might actually learn something.

I don't see how my nationality or religion come into this. There are many non-Srilankan scholars who know more about the country than the average Srilankan (this goes for all other countries too, of course). And being born into a Buddhist family don't make anyone an expert on Buddhism. My background? I research for a living ... that should be enough for you to know.

Ayubowan.

There are so many "Buddha bones" around that Buddha must have been a 20 m tall giant.

For example, almost any temple in Sri Lanka claims to have some of Buddha's bones or ashes buried in their dagobas (stupas). Some ashes are kept in the Buddha figure at Wat Indraviharn in Bangkok, at these were donated by Srilankan monks.

The famous "Buddha tooth" in Kandy, Sri Lanka, is on all historical accounts a fake, but try telling that to the devout - religion and common sense don't always go hand in hand, to say the least.

Btw, "sarira" in that article (or rather "sharira", to spell it correctly) does not mean finger bone, but simply "body".

Thailand is probebly one of the safest places to live in my opinion. 

Are you mad?

He must be.

If one compares world-wide crime statistics, one realizes that Thailand has one of the highest homicide rates on the planet. But some people just want to keep on dreaming, I guess.

Can you give us a link to these statistics?

The magazine Asiaweek, now defunct, published crime statistics some years ago which support this claim. Thailand and Sri Lanka amonbg the top 5 or so in Asia. By contrast for example, India's murder rate was relatively low, being virtually on the same level as Germany's.

I've seen an official Thai police website (can't remember the URL, you'll find it via Google), which put the number of murders in Thailand at about 6,000 per annum. It is an accepted fact that many murders are not registered as such; wisely, the police statistics that I saw talked of "murders known to the police".

The US's murder rate per year is currently about 16,000, with a pop. of 280 million in the US. Compare that to even "only" 6,000 murders in Thailand with a pop. of 62 million, you know where your statistical chance of being knocked off is higher.

Thailand is probebly one of the safest places to live in my opinion. 

Are you mad?

He must be.

If one compares world-wide crime statistics, one realizes that Thailand has one of the highest homicide rates on the planet. But some people just want to keep on dreaming, I guess.

khon (thii) ruu - people (who) know = "informed people"

thanon (thii) jaroen krung - the street (which) makes the (capital) city prosperous

That is the basic pattern I was talking about in my previous post.

I can see your point now. Unfortunately, the moment Thanon Charoen Krung becomes Charoen Krung Rd. the original meaning gets obscured.

A word like "savoey" (eat) is undoubtedly from Khmer, but I reckon "sadet" (royal procession) is from Sanskrit (I'm not sure how it's spelled in Thai). Another interesting subject in itself!

Ratchasap (ราชาศัพท์) is indeed compsed of Sanskrit elements, but if composed in Sanskrit, the second vowel would be short, giving *ราชศัพท์. The form of this word in Khmer also has a long vowel in the second syllable.

You're right of course, it's a short a as in "shabda".

Seeing how most aspects of the Thai Royal court was borrowed from the neighboring Khmer empire including architecture, court structure, symbolisms, and even Royal Thai (raatchasaap is really plain Khmer) it is no wonder that the nascent Thai court decided to borrow a Khmer influenced word for the new capitol.

Good point. Ratchasaap is indeed mainly from Khmer, though the name itself is from Sanskrit (raja-shabda = royal sounds/words/language).

Aside from Khmer, there are also some Sanskrit elements in Ratchasaap, but these may have been imported into Cambodia by Indian Brahmins. Indian-Khmer Brahmins later settled in Nakhon Si Thammarat and were subsequently invited to the court of Ayutthaya. Their few remaining descendants can be found at the Brahmin Temple (Bot Prahm) in Sao-Ching-Cha, Bangkok.

A word like "savoey" (eat) is undoubtedly from Khmer, but I reckon "sadet" (royal procession) is from Sanskrit (I'm not sure how it's spelled in Thai). Another interesting subject in itself!

(Now some geeky person can fill in the full name of Bangkok... )

With complimentary translations included for dessert!

krungthep mahanakorn

The great city of angels,

amorn rattanakosin mahintara yutthaya mahadilok phop

the supreme unconquerable land of the great immortal divinity (Indra),

noparat rajathani burirom

the royal capital of nine noble gems, the pleasant city,

udomrajaniwes mahasatharn

with plenty of grand royal palaces,

amorn phimarn avatarnsathit

and divine paradise for the reincarnated deity (Vishnu),

sakkatattiya visanukam prasit

given by Indra and created by the god of crafting (Visnukarma).

Cheers.

Snowleopard.

These translations are often a bit loose. "Amorn", which crops up in this translation one time as "supreme", and another time as "divine", actually means "eternal" (from Skt. amara = lit. "undying").

Vishnukarma is correctly speaking the heavenly architect of Indra.

Interesting to note also that all the words in this exhaustingly long name are of Sanskrit origin, with the exeption of "krung".

And krung thon bridge of course.. :-)

As for Charoen Krung being an exception in that it's an adjective in front of a noun, I wonder if this is specific for the word 'charoen' ?  Indeed there are some roads in Chiang Mai with charoen in it and both also appear in front. (charoen prathet, charoen muang and charoen rat; all mean pretty much the same too and are close together. ;-)

Is charoen really an adjective though?  When it appears after a noun then it's actually a name, not an adjective..  As in 'Raan Charoen', "Charoen Store" .  (Funnily enough my dictionary lists is as a verb.. weird.. I can just about see adverb.. )

Yes, you're right. I know Charoen Prathet Rd. but never thought of it. "Charoen" does seem a strange word and I have a suspicion it might also be of Khmer origin.

Tai-derived word are mostly one-syllable-words, and I can't think of a Sanskrit word which could be the root of "charoen". It would be interesting to know in which order noun and adjective are placed in Khmer.

Strange, that "charoen" is supposed to be a verb. In expressions like "kon charoen" it is clearly used as an adjective.

Sorry to stick my neck out, but I always interpreted "[Thanon] Charoen Krung" in the usual Thai sense, in which case it might be translated as "[the road] intended to make the city prosper".

I have nothing to back that up, though. Is the translation you present an official one?

I've never seen an official translation, but I don't think "Thanon Charoen" would make any sense. "The road that makes ... prosperous" sounds a bit far-fetched to me - firstly as a translation, and secondly as an idea or concept.

It would be interesting to find other adjective-plus-Krung combinations to see which way round they're placed. I would except Krung Thai Bank from that since it's probably a fairly modern name.

Possibly...  Though, Ayudhtaya is in full:  Phra Nakorn Sri Ayudthaya.  Shows like that on official things and even car license plates from there.  So with "Nakhorn" in there.  And it's very much a (ex-)capital & respected holy city.  My dictionary has 'capital (city)' for both Nakorn as well as Krung.  Actually for Ayudthaya you sometimes also hear 'Krung Sri  Ayudthaya (as in the bank name). 

This might support my initial hypothesis that the word "krung" could have become "en vogue" at a relative late point in time. Ayutthaya is of course a much older town than Bkk. (As an aside, I always find it ironic that Ayutthaya, the name meaning "[The town] not to be warred upon" was almost completely destroyed in war.)

Charoen Krung Rd., the "Road of the Prosperous [Capital] City), was built and named in the 1860's, also at a relative late stage. Interesting to note that in this case the adjective is placed in front of the noun, whereas normally in Thai it's vice versa.

There's definitely a Portuguese sala, meaning room. So PIE is likely the source for the Skrt, Latin, Portuguese, and probably also French & Spanish salon. So that solves that ...

It does ... and we get another interesting aspect here.

The Hindi word for "room" is "kamra", which is derived from Portuguese "camara" (Engl. chamber, German Kammer).

So, Portuguese received one word for "room" from an Indic source and gave another back.

Another Portuguese word in Hindi (and Engl.) is indigo, which is traced back to the name Indus (the river), arrived in Portuguese via Greek and Latin, and was finally re-exported in a changed form to the land of its origin. Strange world indeed.

I understand that "krung" is used only in relation to the capital city, whereas "nakhon" is an ordinary city.

That would make perfect sense.

We all know what the name Krung Thep means, but can anyone throw light on why in this case "krung" is used for "city"?

Krung is of Khmer origin and appears nowhere else in Thai town names. "Town" is usually either nakhon, as in Nakhon Pathom, Nakhon Sawan etc., or -buri, as in Kanchanaburi, Lopburi etc.

Was krung an "en vogue" word when Ban Makok was renamed Krung Thep? All the towns with nakhon or -buri in their names are of course much older than the relatively young Krung Thep/Bangkok. Or did krung just sound more unique? I wonder.

It's also quite unusual to have a Khmer-Skt. compound in a town name here. The only other one I can think of is Nakhon Phanom (Khmer phnom = mountain).

If this is beyond your level of comprehension, why not stick to the more "fun" sections of this site?

I did'nt say that i did'nt comprehend it just asked why you were doing it.

You dont know mwe you dont know my intelligence, so why take offens at a simple question? (unless it's true)

There happen to be people with an inquisitive mind.

If there weren't, you wouldn't have a computer to use, no car to drive, no plane to fly to Thailand with, and you'd have no decent books to read ...

Question answered?

Sorry is this a serious disscussion or are you all trying to show how clever you are?

If this is beyond your level of comprehension, why not stick to the more "fun" sections of this site?

Two or three years back the treasury issued a limited edition of 100 Tical notes.

I think it was to commerorate the 100th anniversary of the Bank of Thailand (or some other anniversary) 

There was a limit of 2,000 Bahts worth to persons applying and there were queue's a mile and a half long at the respective Bank's of Thailand.

I managed to get my 2,000 Bahts worth. (which is perhaps the only time I have got full value of anything in Thailand)

If you had been around in the 1930s, you'd felt quite happy with your 100 tical note, too. At that time, a labourer's monthly wage was 60 ticals.

In the late 19th century, a tical was worth about 1/20 of a British pound.

The value of the tical was originally tied to silver, but in 1902 the state bank switched to a gold-based currency system.

@ KVIZ 117

... and where do you get the idea from that Tamil and Thai "originated from Sanskrit?"

Tamil does have some loan words from Sanskrit but otherwise it is a Dravidian language and has nothing to do with Sanskrit at all. If it had, you Singhalese and the Tamils would understand each other much better (quite literally, I mean).

Yes, Singhalese is of Sanskrit origin, but during the southward migration of the Singhalese (originally probably from the area of today's Gujarat and NOT, as the Singhalese chronicles claim, from Orissa) the language also picked up some Dravidian elements.

Thai has a very large vocabulary derived from Sanskrit/Pali, but it certainly did not originate from Sanskrit. Thai is a, well, Tai language, and it's only because the Thais moved southward from their original home in Sipsongpanna that they were exposed to Indian cultural and linguistic influences.

Well I enjoy your meanderings. My disciplines are somewhat less interesting, and lack the esoteric inputs. 

Haha, thanks for the flowers.

And to add to my ramblings:

There's also a regional variant of Hindi "baat", which has has a nasal after the long a. This though is unlikely to be the source of Baht.

The word "baat" is still very much in use in Hindi; it also appears in several compounds, such as "baat-tarazu" (weights and scales). But I bet hardly a Hindi-speaking Indian tourist in Thailand will realize the connection to the Thai currency.

Mind you that the t HAS to be retroflex, otherwise the word changes its meaning. "Baat" with a "common" t has numerous meanings, such as affair, word, talk, discussion, matter et al.

A few more reflections on the subject.

Some may be puzzled how a Hindi word could be the closest relative to "Baht", instead one of S/P origin.

Up to the late 19th century, next to the Tical, many deals in Siam were struck by using the Indian rupee, a spillover from the British Raj. In fact, in Northern Thailand, upwards of Tak and Sukhotai, the rupee was the only accepted currency (until ca. 1890). So we have a "modern" Indian connection here; and it's not entirely unthinkable that the word Baht was introduced by Indian traders in that period.

It took the Siamese government a major effort to stamp out the use of Indian rupees, a feat accomplished sometime in the early 20th century. "Rupee", that ubiquitous currency from Pakistan to Indonesia (in various linguistic avatars), is derived from rupya, "wrought silver" and was first coined in India in the mid-16th century. Oh yea, I'm straying again ...

Surely all this is superstition/animism and has nothing to do with Buddha's teachings?!

But then there are a multitude of Buddha images which are used as amulets. I wonder if Buddha would approve, if he was still here to talk?

You're spot on. Buddha would turn in his grave, if he had one. His teachings actually were supposed to counter all the prevailing superstitions of his day, as well as Hinduism which was stifled in rituals.

Buddha never told anyone to make images of himself and worship them. He taught to seek "the light within". But then, it's so much easier to pray in front of a statue and juggle a few joss sticks about than to sit down for hours and meditate ...

@ KWIZ 117

You mix up historical facts and dates:

Thero Ubali, or to call him by his Thai name, Phra Upali, arrived in Kandy in 1753, accompanied by twenty other monks. So Sri Lanka and Thailand must have recently celebrated the 250th anniversary of that event. If you go to Malwatte Vihara in Kandy, you see a plaque in Singhalese and Thai which will confirm the above date.

So, Phra Upali's journey to Sri Lanka occurred before the Chakri Dynasty was founded (1782).

You rightly say that Upali hailed from Ayutthaya. At that time Ayutthaya's ruler was King Boromgot (1732-58).

However I've never checked a Sanskrit or Pali dictionary to see whether they contained an entry for shala/sala or whether, if they do contain entries for this word, whether they refer to the same thing.

Any Skt. dictionary confirms that shala and sala indeed mean the same thing.

If there's a Portuguese word sala, it may have originated from some similar Latin word which in turn possibly can be traced back to a Skt.-related word.

In this respect, see also my submission in the thread on the origin of "Baht", the relationship between "Satang" with Lat. centum and English Cent. Some Skt.-related words in European languages arrived via Latin, and Portuguese sala might just be one of them (my guess).