Tips for Learning the Thai Language

Thai uses a simple sentence structure: Subject, Verb, Object. If the subject is a pronoun, you can leave it out if the context is clear:

I live in Rayong --> live in Rayong --> yoo tee Rayong.

Verbs are not conjugated; past, present, and future all use the same word; you use time words to indicate the tense, and the time word always follows the verb.

You indicate past tense by putting “already” (lay-ow) at the end of a sentence or by using a time word (such as “yesterday”). Example, “I ate” --> “I eat already” --> gin [with a hard G] lay-ow.

Future is indicated with “will/shall” (ja). “I shall eat in 2 hours” --> dee-chun ja gin ny song? cheu-mohng. The word for 2 in Thai is “song?” with a rising tone, which is why I put a question mark. In English, questions rise at the end of a sentence.

Plurals are either generic or specific, as in English. With generic plurals, you double the noun. “teeth” --> “tooth tooth”. (This is also true in Malaysian and Indonesian.)

Specific plurals follow a specific pattern, and surprisingly, we do the same in English in certain circumstances. In English, we can say “I have 3 children”, but in Thai, you have to say “I have child 3 person” --> mee dek sahm? kohn. The “child” is the noun, “person” is called a “classifier” or “group word”. An example of this in English is “The farmer has three head of cattle”.

Questions are asked by making a statement and then plopping a question word on the end. “When are you going to the market?” --> “You go market when?” “What is that?” --> “that what?” (which you probably know is nee arai or ahn nee arai). [“ahn” means “thing”. “ahn nee arai” means “thing this what?”]

Negatives are formed by putting “mai” (pronounced “my!” with a falling tone) in front of an adjective or verb. Mai chai, as you probably know, means “not correct”. “Mai bai” means “don’t go”, “mai dee” is “not good” or “no good”, “mai suay” is “not pretty”.

You can also ask a question by pretending you are Canadian, and sticking “eh?” on the end of a statement. In Thai, “eh?” is “mai?” with an upward tone. “This is good, eh?” --> ahn nee dee mai?

Don’t be afraid to learn the Thai alphabet, those funny looking characters are just our letters drawn differently. Thai letters always have a noun attached. For example, “G” is “gah guy”. “Guy” is the Thai word for chicken, as you know, and it begins with that letter. Thai consonants have an implied vowel, which we don’t do in English. A K in English is just a consonant, but in Thai, a K has an implied vowel “ah” or “oh”. You can override the implied vowel by writing a specific vowel.

Thai has several Ks, several Ps and Fs, etc. They use the noun attached to distinguish. We say “B is for Baby”, “C is for Car”, which is the same thing, but in English we can say the letter name by itself, B, C, D, etc. In Thai, you always say the noun so you can distinguish one K from another, one P from another, because all the Ks are called “kah”, all the Ps “pah”, etc.

By the way, English has 3 Ks: K, C, and Q all make K sounds: kitten, cat, quit all have a phonetic K.

We also have 2 Js: John and George both have phonetic J.

And we also have 2 Ss: Cecile and Sam.

And two Zs: amuse and zoo.

So English has some of the same peculiarities as Thai, and these result from the same reason: the historical roots of the language.

Many of the Thai letters are exactly the same as their English equivalents; they are just drawn differently. A hard G in English is a hard G in Thai, but it is drawn in a different fashion.

One other oddity: Thai vowels can appear above, below, behind, and in front of a consonant, but they don’t wander around. A vowel is always pronounced after the consonant, no matter where it is drawn.

And now that you are thoroughly confused, let me leave you with this final mind-blowing thought.

You have been brainwashed since the age of 6 or 7 to accept the English alphabets as normal and natural. We actually have four separate and distinct alphabets, each of which is drawn differently, and each letter in each separate alphabet HAS THE SAME NAME AS IN THE OTHER THREE ALPHABETS. This is very, very stupid, but you accept this as natural because you have been brainwashed. A six year old does not question why the language is that way. I am referring to upper and lower case printing and writing. There are 4 different ways of writing an A, a B, a C, etc. Thai only has one, which makes far more sense. There is no upper and lower case in Thai, and there is no “writing” and “printing”; the Thai word for both [kee-an] translates as “drawing”. So you have to learn one Thai alphabet. Thai people have to learn four English alphabets.

I hope you found this useful, and I wish you fast progress with your Thai. I have had many, many people thank me for writing Speak Easy Thai and making it available so cheaply. In the 45 years I have been programming in Canada, France, and Australia, nobody ever thanked me for my work, but in Thailand, it has been a frequent occurrence. I lived there for 2.5 years while I was finishing the software, packaging it, and getting it on the market. I will be returning November 29, 2008. Sphere: Related Content