Taxi Thai

[oevna]

On the whole I find taxi drivers really interesting people to talk with. They sit in their taxi usually about 12 hours a day. One driver said if they don't own their own taxi that they rent it in either in 8 or 12 hour shifts. They do nothing but listen to AM "talk radio" and they have some of the most diverse opinions on all things thai.

This is so true. Of my conversations with Thai people, some of the most frank, honest, interesting and humorous have been with taxi drivers.

[SimonN]

What are the tones for the words in this expression, please?

maa[?] dtae[?] sai[?]

Where do you come from? (Isaan dialect)

มาแต่ไส

[oevna]

What are the tones for the words in this expression, please?

maa[?] dtae[?] sai[?]

Where do you come from? (Isaan dialect)

มาแต่ไส

maa dtae(1) sai(4)

[SoftWater]

What are the tones for the words in this expression, please?

maa[?] dtae[?] sai[?]

Where do you come from? (Isaan dialect)

มาแต่ไส

maa dtae(1) sai(4)

So how would one distinguish this from มาแต่สาย - vowel length of the final word? or just context? (I mean, depending on whether your audience thought your were speaking Isaan or Central Thai dialect, the meaning would be totally different).

[SimonN]

So how would one distinguish this from มาแต่สาย - vowel length of the final word? or just context? (I mean, depending on whether your audience thought your were speaking Isaan or Central Thai dialect, the meaning would be totally different).

I suppose you could add the second person pronoun เจ้า.

เจ้ามาแต่ไส

[Rikker]

The vowel length, yes, but "มาแต่สาย" as a single phrase in Central Thai doesn't really make sense.

It seems to me that this particular combination in Central Thai of words would more likely be broken up as มา แต่สาย, which could mean "(someone) came, but (they came) late", as in "Why didn't Joe come to work today?" "He came, but he was late."

(Or if you're putting them into larger sentences, it's easy to find contexts that will find these three words in this order. For example, โทรมา แต่สายไม่ว่าง "I called, but the line was busy", among numerous other possibilities.)

[SoftWater]

The vowel length, yes, but "มาแต่สาย" as a single phrase in Central Thai doesn't really make sense.

Could it not be analogous in meaning to

เขากินแต่อาหารไทย

kao(3) gin dtehr (1) aharn(4) thai

He only eats thai food (i.e., you never eat any other kind of food)

คุณมาแต่สาย

khun mah dtehr(1) sai(4)

You only come late (i.e, you never come on time)

What if you phoned for a cab and it came late again? (As the ones round our way always do). You jump in, give him a quick mah dtehr sai...what's he gonna think?

[Rikker]

I just don't think it's how you'd say it. It would be phrased some other way, like คุณมาสายตลอด คุณไม่เคยมาตรงเวลา คุณมาสายทุกครั้ง คุณมาสายอีกแล้ว. Because I believe แต่ in the sense of "only" must always followed by a noun, as in เขากินแต่ผัก "he eats only vegetables" (he doesn't eat other things). And with the phrase มาสาย, สาย isn't a noun.

สาย can, of course, be a noun in Thai -- but usually that's a totally different word, with a totally different meaning (as in สายโทรศัพท์ or สายไฟ, or แม่น้ำสองสาย). The only noun sense of สาย relevant here is "late morning" -- the period that comes after เช้า but before เที่ยง, approximately 9am to 11:59am, is referred to as สาย. As in เขาจะมาส่งพัสดุตอนสาย "they'll deliver the package late morning."

But even if we try to use สาย in the noun sense of "late morning" here, มาแต่สาย still doesn't really make sense. Because แต่ seems most likely to take on a totally different meaning, anyway -- acting as a shortened form of ตั้งแต่ "since". Compare it with the phrase มาแต่เช้า, which means to come early in the morning, and emphasizes the earliness of something. If you arrive at work and find someone there earlier than is usual, you might ask ทำไมมาแต่เช้า, which in effect means "why are you here so early?" -- or you might instead just make a passing comment, like วันนี้มาแต่เช้าเลย "well you're here awfully early today."

But you can't really plug สาย in there in place of เช้า, if the point is to emphasize the earliness of the arrival. It doesn't work with แต่ in this case, because you can't comment on the lateness of someone's arrival with a preposition meaning "since".

So I don't really see how it can make sense as a comment on habitual tardiness. But I'm happy to be disagreed with.

[mangkorn]

...But I'm happy to be disagreed with.

It was an attempt to render a Lao/Isan phrase in Thai alphabet ("Where do you come from?"). The implication was that one was speaking Lao with an Isan person, and that was already understood by both parties.

Edited October 15, 2009 by mangkorn

[Rikker]

Yes, I know. But if you read back through the thread you'll see the confusion starts with an attempted joke in post #13:

ma dtae saii - มาแต่สาย (you only come late) - you sure that's not you complaining to your girlfriend? (bet she doesn't find it funny...)

So I was really just giving an overly thorough refutation of the idea that this would make sense in the meaning they claimed. Heh.

[mangkorn]

Oops, sorry Rikker. The thread took some confusing turns. (I didn't get that joke, because as you note, it wouldn't be said that way.)

[SoftWater]

Yes, I know. But if you read back through the thread you'll see the confusion starts with an attempted joke in post #13:

ma dtae saii - มาแต่สาย (you only come late) - you sure that's not you complaining to your girlfriend? (bet she doesn't find it funny...)

So I was really just giving an overly thorough refutation of the idea that this would make sense in the meaning they claimed. Heh.

Yeah, but we did learn an awful lot by the end of it. Hah!

(I'd only ever learned that แต่ in the sense of 'only' follows a verb, but didn't know it's needs a noun after it. Nice.)

Edited October 15, 2009 by SoftWater

[HalfSquat]

If you want to go to a subway/metro/mrt station in Bangkok which is the best way to say it to a taxi driver for them to understand?

I've tried the above and not had as much luck as I do with saying BTS for the skytrain.

Thanks.

[SoftWater]

If you want to go to a subway/metro/mrt station in Bangkok which is the best way to say it to a taxi driver for them to understand?

I've tried the above and not had as much luck as I do with saying BTS for the skytrain.

Thanks.

rot(3) fai dai(2) din = electric train under the ground

รถไฟใต้ดิน [+name of station]

so you can say

bai rot(3) fai dai(2) din dai(2) mai(4) krab(3) = can you take me to the subway?

ไปรถไฟใต้ดินได้ไหมครับ

Add the name of the station if you're obviously not nearest to one or another.

Edited January 9, 2010 by SoftWater

[bellste]

Wouldn't it be a better idea to try a laguage course, without a taxi driver? 

[rgs2001uk]

If you want to go to a subway/metro/mrt station in Bangkok which is the best way to say it to a taxi driver for them to understand?

I've tried the above and not had as much luck as I do with saying BTS for the skytrain.

Thanks.

rot(3) fai dai(2) din = electric train under the ground

รถไฟใต้ดิน [+name of station]

so you can say

bai rot(3) fai dai(2) din dai(2) mai(4) krab(3) = can you take me to the subway?

ไปรถไฟใต้ดินได้ไหมครับ

Add the name of the station if you're obviously not nearest to one or another.

ไปรถไฟใต้ดิน

Shouldnt that be, bai rot fai tai din, for the underground?

Bai rot fai fa + name. for the skytrain.

[HalfSquat]

Wouldn't it be a better idea to try a laguage course, without a taxi driver? 

I am having classes believe it or not! Some things I forget to ask in the class.

[Rikker]

รถไฟฟ้า can refer to both the BTS (informally known as the "skytrain" in English) and the MRT (informally known as the "subway" in English). Since for a long time the BTS was the only electric train, though, รถไฟฟ้า became the informal name of the BTS. Now that there's a subway, too, simply saying บีทีเอส "BTS" is becoming more common in Thai.

This is a bit off topic, but the grammatical interpretation of รถไฟฟ้า is technically ambiguous -- it can be parsed as [รถไฟ]ฟ้า (literally "sky train") or รถ[ไฟฟ้า] (literally "electric vehicle"). I did an experiment asking several Thais about this, and they're split on how they interpret it. I asked them whether the phrase รถไฟไฟ meant รถที่เดินด้วยไฟฟ้า (a vehicle powered by electricity) or รถไฟลอยฟ้า (an elevated train).

Clearly the technically correct interpretation is "electric vehicle", though. The formal name of the subway is รถไฟฟ้ามหานคร, which means "Metropolitan Electric Vehicle" (i.e. train).

In any case, to actually get to the subway, I always say รถใต้ดิน /rot tai din/ or รถไฟใต้ดิน /rot fai tai din/.