During one of my regular trawls around YouTube, I was presented with the the option of viewing a video from “Learn Thai With Mod”, which apparently would teach me some “new cool Thai word and slang.”
My knowledge of Thai remains hopeless, so here was a chance to impress she who must be obeyed with a new phrase, one which I could proudly use out of context for a couple of days before forgetting it completely, just like all the other phrases I have forgotten.
Khun Mod turned out to be a pleasant on-line companion and I came away with the expression “khon kaen stand up”; easy to remember because Khon Kaen is a place and stand up is English. The phrase means the hair on your arms stand up; and I stored it away for future use.
Yesterday was the anniversary of the Dambusters raid and I watched a BBC documentary which featured extensive footage of a Lancaster, with a couple of Spitfires thrown in for good measure. Evocative stuff, enough to get the old arm hairs at attention on occasion.
When she who must be obeyed came home I told her about it.
It was quite emotional, in fact it made me khon kaen stand up (notice how I just slipped that into the conversation?).
What?
Khon kaen stand up!
What are you talking about?
You know, khon kaen stand up, when your arm hairs stand up.
What has khon kaen got to do with it?
It means arm hair.
No it doesn’t, khon kaen is a place in Thailand.
What’s air hair then?
Khon kaen.
That’s what I said.
No, you said khon kaen, the place.
How do you say khon kaen meaning arm hair?
Khon kaen. And how do you say khon kaen the place? Khon kaen.
Buggered if I could hear a difference; I am never going to master a tonal language when I am tone deaf.
She who must be obeyed was highly amused and was straight onto Facebook to recount the story, with witty references to Chiang Mai sit down. Yeah, yeah, mock if you must.
After she had amused herself at my expense, the conversation returned to hairs standing up on arms.
What do you call that in your country?
Goosebumps.
Why?
Because your arm is all bumpy like the skin of a goose after it has been plucked.
Do you have a lot of geese in your country?
No.
You should call it chicken’s arse, more understandable and easier to spot.
So chicken’s arse it now is, causes less confusion (just) than my attempts at khon kaen stand up.
Comments 🔗
2013-05-17| Chang Noi says“Buggered if I could hear a difference; I am never going to master a tonal language when I am tone deaf” …. thanks for enlightening me always. But living in Khon Kaen I will have to try this once here in town. I am sure the Thai writing between Khon Kaen and Khon Kaen is much different but never mind.
2013-05-17| Pete says55555555 - Priceless!!
Chang - you’ll get funny looks if you can’t get the name of your town right!
Spike - you knew I’d give you an explanation, didn’t you?
ขนแขน - arm hair
ขอนแก่น - the town (The * is to show the split in the syllables and to confuse any search engines which may be looking.)Note how the first syllable is longer for the town name with the addition of the อ, this makes a long ‘or’ sound between the ‘k’ and the ’n’ instead of a short ‘o’. Both rising tone. Kon, Korn, kon, korn; repeat until you feel you’ve mastered it. Privately.
The second syllable has an entirely different consonant though, and a tone mark which makes it a low tone for the town as opposed to a rising tone for an arm. The ข is the same as above, exactly like an English ‘K’, whereas the ก is like a very hard ‘G’. The แ is the vowel sound, which for some reason, just to be awkward, the Thais put before the syllable instead of the logical place between the letters where it should be.
Here endeth the lesson!!
2013-05-17| Kevin Moore saysI also struggle with a tonal language and I’m sure if asked where I lived it would be a town called arm hair. I thought learning Thai was difficult enough without adding new words that don’t have any meaning they just ryme with the previous word. Add to this, a sprinkling of “Tinglish” just to help me look even more stupid ( not sure if that’s actually possible ) when I’m trying my hardest.
Nothing is ever simple in LOS, suppose I’d better just pop down to arm hair and sink a few beers.
2013-05-17| Pete saysJust watched the video - She’s CUTE!!! (Learnt a few new words as well)
2013-05-17| genuinej saysYou not concerned that SWMBO is apparently so knowledgeable about the arses of chickens?
2013-05-17| genuinej says“ryme”? Brings a whole new concept to the dropped “h”.
2013-05-18| Spike saysI am now you have mentioned it.
2013-05-18| Spike saysThank you. Verily, you are a master of the subject.
2013-05-18| BlogDaz saysI also have given up trying to master the Thai languiage (much to the delight of my wife). I remember going in to 7-11 and asking if they had krapow gai (chicken with basil), the staff were doubled up laughing and repeating what I said, apparently I asked for a “chicken bag”.
2013-05-18| Chang Noi saysAs second thought “Spike what were you searching? ….. cute, stupid, Thai?”
2013-05-18| Spike saysIt just popped up on the suggested videos list. I was watching a DigitalRev video at the time.