Your First Thai Lesson

Back at the start of December, during a long holiday weekend in honor of the King’s 84th birthday, my friend Megan and I visited Khao Yai National Park for some quality time with nature.  We toured the park in search of wild elephants (unsuccessfully) and gibbons (check!) with a great group of folks from our guesthouse.  While Megan and I probed and prodded our Thai company for new vocabulary, one Bangkok resident and teacher from Switzerland mentioned how she’d love to find a website with a list of all words that are the same, or nearly the same, in Thai and English to give her own communication skills a boost. Upon returning home, I scoured the internet but found no such thing.  So, here it is!

Below is a list of Tinglish/ English words, which, spoken with a Thai accent or inflection, will add to your base of Thai vocabulary without you really having to learn anything new at all!  The key is usually to say the words with the emphasis, and perhaps upward tone, on the final syllable, or to drop the final consonant sound, as the Thai’s so often do.  Say any of these words with perfect English pronunciation and you are NOT likely to be understood in Thailand.  BUT, follow these simple rules and, wah-lah! Your Thai language abilities have miraculously increased ten-fold.

This one’s for you, Marina…

WORDS SAME SAME IN ENGLISH AND THAI:

strawberry = straw-bare-rEE

banana = ba-na-NA

vanilla = wa-nill-A (the “v” sound does not exist in Thai, so is substituted for a “w” sound)

t.v. = tii-wii

taxi = tek-sii

okay =oo-kee

computer = com-pu-TAA

hello = hal-loo

menu = men-U

U-turn

badmitton = bad-mit- TON

ping pong (same word, maybe a different meaning)

wine

beer = bia (try this one with a Boston accent and you should be golden!)

soda = so-DA

toilet = toi-LET

sauce

jeans

stamp = sa-dtam (Thai’s often drop the last sound of the word, so even if this one is a little off I think it might be derived from “stamp”)

video = wii-dii-oo

cookie = gug-gii

durian = tu-rii-aan

necktie = nektai

disco = ditsa-goo

karaoke = kaa-raa-o-GEE

botox

broccoli = broc-col-II

gossip = goss-iip

tissue

baby= babe-II

america= am-er-ii-gaa

gas

campaign

dinosaur

more to come, I am sure…

And, if you’d like to move on to Lesson #2, try your hand at learning the Thai alphabet song.  The name of each letter in the Thai alphabet integrates the name of a noun that (usually) starts with that letter.  Imagine, if you will, that the letters “A” and “B” were actually called “A is for Apple” and “B is for Bear.”  Go ahead- have a listen!