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Felang/ferang


blueeyes

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The word ferang seems to bother some people

and many people commented earlier in somrisonphimai post,about this. According to my Thai wife, ferang simply means a person with pale/white skin.and maybe blue eyes or blonde hair, And that they have a lot of money whereas a dark skinned foreign person would be called something completely different.

If however you are called ferang kee nok then you would be deemed to be a poor white person. So being called a ferang is a compliment to me although rich I am not. If I ever hearvferang kee nok I am going to have to smarten up pretty quick.

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All Thais racially profile all the time. It is a facet of their culture.

So whilst 'farang' is not, in itself, a perjorative term, anything that a 'farang' does or says will be immediately linked to their race, 'farang', and not their personality. Indeed, many Thais get their facts about 'farangs' third or fourth-hand from somebody who may have perhaps worked with tourists as a taxi-driver or hotel receptionist or a middle-class Thai who may have spent a month at their Thai uncle's house in Oregon. These facts, once obtained, are then immediately applied to all others of the same race.

Same applies for 'Yippon', 'khaek', 'niggo', 'phama', 'eskimo', etc.

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Kee nok, is bird shit, so it generally means you are "mean" or " tight as shit" with your money, not poor. Atleast that was my understanding.

As for "ferang", that entirely depends how its used, the tone etc. If you are walking in the street and a child says "look a ferang" no big deal.

If you were in a restaurant with your wife, and the waitress asked "what does the ferang eat" that another matter,

or in a Government Office or Police station and the say "What does the ferang want", or "take the Ferang with you", you see the point here hopefully.

Its not whats said, its how its said and used.

Without facial expression and tone its hard to make the point, but I hope you see how some may find it offensive in some circumstances.

Edited by CharlieH
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Kee nok, is bird shit, so it generally means you are "mean" or " tight as shit" with your money, not poor. Atleast that was my understanding.

Kee niaow is tight. Kee nok is peasant. Do keep up.coffee1.gif

Yep, now you said it, I remember...Doh ! thumbsup.gif

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Farang khee nok has two meanings as farang can mean both Westerner or guava.

1. A 'farang khee nok' is the name of a wild not cultivated fruiting tree in the guava family. The fruit is edible but not one immediately appealing.

2. 'Farang khee nok' is a perjorative term for a Westerner living on a tight budget. It is often used by tourist industry workers to express their scorn and disappointment that the Westerner, tourist or expat, is not chucking his or her money around, in particular, not in the speaker's direction. If the 'farang' in question can understand, it may be used to guilt trip them into handing over more of their cash.

'khee nok' alone does not mean stingy, it means bird muck, guano, bird shit. The word for 'stingy' is khee neeow'.

Hope this helps.

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2. 'Farang khee nok' is a perjorative term for a Westerner living on a tight budget.

Hope this helps.

True,

Its one of the more rude swear-words for foreigners.

I think one of the posters has mixed it up with kee niaow (khi niao, ขี้เหนียว).

Literally it means something like "sticking sh*t", but stands for (very) closefisted/penny-pinching.

Not that insulting like kee nok, more to laugh about.

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All Thais racially profile all the time. It is a facet of their culture.

So whilst 'farang' is not, in itself, a perjorative term, anything that a 'farang' does or says will be immediately linked to their race, 'farang', and not their personality.

Yes, this is true

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Kee nok, is bird shit, so it generally means you are "mean" or " tight as shit" with your money, not poor. Atleast that was my understanding.

As for "ferang", that entirely depends how its used, the tone etc. If you are walking in the street and a child says "look a ferang" no big deal.

If you were in a restaurant with your wife, and the waitress asked "what does the ferang eat" that another matter,

or in a Government Office or Police station and the say "What does the ferang want", or "take the Ferang with you", you see the point here hopefully.

Its not whats said, its how its said and used.

Without facial expression and tone its hard to make the point, but I hope you see how some may find it offensive in some circumstances.

Not poor, just cheap!

I've been told it means that you are so stingy that even your own kee ( or poop ) sticks to you!

A farang is a guava!post-147745-0-71515000-1387181197.gif

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Farang khee nok has two meanings as farang can mean both Westerner or guava.

1. A 'farang khee nok' is the name of a wild not cultivated fruiting tree in the guava family. The fruit is edible but not one immediately appealing.

2. 'Farang khee nok' is a perjorative term for a Westerner living on a tight budget. It is often used by tourist industry workers to express their scorn and disappointment that the Westerner, tourist or expat, is not chucking his or her money around, in particular, not in the speaker's direction. If the 'farang' in question can understand, it may be used to guilt trip them into handing over more of their cash.

'khee nok' alone does not mean stingy, it means bird muck, guano, bird shit. The word for 'stingy' is khee neeow'.

Hope this helps.

The only people I've heard being called 'khee nok' are backpackers, the ones whose appearance makes it obvious they're on a budget and are therefore not worthwhile targets for people living off the tourist industry. Never heard it used in a pejorative way, though, but more in a 'don't waste your time, they have no money' way.

'Khee niao' however, does indeed have more negative implications, sometimes justified, sometimes not, as a lot of Thais don't grasp the concept of regulating expenses and will splash out if they happen to have money until everything is gone.

Edited by Sam Gold
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2. 'Farang khee nok' is a perjorative term for a Westerner living on a tight budget.

Hope this helps.

True,

Its one of the more rude swear-words for foreigners.

I think one of the posters has mixed it up with kee niaow (khi niao, ขี้เหนียว).

Literally it means something like "sticking sh*t", but stands for (very) closefisted/penny-pinching.

Not that insulting like kee nok, more to laugh about.

Kee meaning feces is a different word, the word you mean denotes personification of an adjective

"Sticky shit" now that is funny...

Sent from my GT-I9100 using Thaivisa Connect Thailand mobile app

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All Thais racially profile all the time. It is a facet of their culture.

So whilst 'farang' is not, in itself, a perjorative term, anything that a 'farang' does or says will be immediately linked to their race, 'farang', and not their personality. Indeed, many Thais get their facts about 'farangs' third or fourth-hand from somebody who may have perhaps worked with tourists as a taxi-driver or hotel receptionist or a middle-class Thai who may have spent a month at their Thai uncle's house in Oregon. These facts, once obtained, are then immediately applied to all others of the same race.

Same applies for 'Yippon', 'khaek', 'niggo', 'phama', 'eskimo', etc.

So that means you better not steal bananas off of the banana tree. No wait. I got that wrong. A Thai landlord who owned the land that the bananas were grown on stole them from a person who rented the land and the Thais were all identified as banana and all other kinds of fruit stealer.

So I guess looking at the threads for a while it is fair to say anything one Thai does gets applied to all Thais.

And anything a Farang does gets applied to all Farang.

It is called stereotyping guys and it is nothing new and applied to any identifiable minority in any country in the world with no exceptions.

5 Ways To Smash The Generational Stereotype Trap

http://www.forbes.com/sites/meghanbiro/2013/04/07/5-ways-to-smash-the-generational-stereotype-trap/

Edited by thailiketoo
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I've never heard this word farang used by Thai people. I think it would be worth starting a thread as to its origins and whether it is considered insulting or not.

i second that motion and wonder why this was never discussed before whistling.gif

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