Wednesday, November 3, 2010

Khor Khai - An Egg


Let's start today with the second consonant of Thai letter, "Khor Khai" which means an egg or eggs. (as I told you yesterday that Thai language does not have singular or plural.) This refers to any eggs including all made-by-egg food.


We call hen's egg as "Khai Gai" and call duck's egg as "Khai Ped".


The yolk or the red part of an egg is called "Khai Daeng" and the white of an egg is called "Khai Khao"

Eggs are one of my can't-live-without food. So I decided to show you some of the most well-known egg menus in Thailand so that in case that you travel here, you can happily order some delicious egg menus easily.



"Khai Jiao" is my, I can tell you this, day-to-day food. I eat it almost everyday. Even when we, Thai, travel abroad, you may have noticed that this menu will be put on our tables.

Khai Jiao or omelet in Thailand does not look like your omelet and it's cooked in a different way too. Don't be surprised if you find Thai omelet looks different. It's delicious, I recommend you try one.

Tuesday, November 2, 2010

Gor Gai - A Chicken


In Thai language, there are totally 44 consonant letters. It start with the letter "Gor Gai" as pictured above.

This is the first letter of Thai consonants. It's pronounced "Gor Gai". We use letter with words to teach Thai language so it would be easier. When you spell the word, you should say it "Gor Gai" rather than only "Gor" because Thai people wouldn't understand it.

The word "Gor" has no meaning. It's a consonant and need to be mixed with other consonants and vowels to create a meaningful word.

In case that you wanna know any specific word, please feel free to ask me.

For today, I'm going to write about "Gai", the word from the letter "Gor Gai". This means "Chicken". The word can be used to call both male and female and apply to all kinds of chicken except for baby chicken.


I'll make the below table for you for your easier learning:-

If it's a female chicken, we call it "Mah Gai" or "Gai Tua Mia"

If it's a male chicken, we call it "Por Gai" or "Gai Tua Phu"


I'll add extra word for you today, you can call baby chicken as "Look Jeab" << It's hard to pronounce but keep practicing.

Thanks for reading today post, come again tomorrow to learn one Thai word a day every day.

Monday, November 1, 2010

Chang Thai: Thai Elephant

Following from yesterday that we have just sung a song named "Chang". Today, I would like to discuss a little bit more about the word "Chang"

If you follow my post yesterday, you may know that "Chang" means an elephant or elephants. Thai words do not separate singular or plural. We use it as the same. Instead, we use numerative noun to identify how many "Chang" in order to specify whether it's singular or plural.

As you see my subject today heading "Chang Thai: Thai Elephant". You may notice that in Thai, we say it backward as of English word.

In English, you call it "Thai Elephant"

In Thai, we call it "Chang Thai"

This usually be the obstacle for both Thai and English speaker to learning each other's language because we speak it in an opposite way.

Another word I wanna point out today is "Tua". This is a numerative noun for calling elephants.

For example:-


One Elephant = Chang 1 tua



Three Elephants = Chang 3 tua


If it's too many elephants and you don't wanna count how many there are. You should use "Lhai" in stead of number. Let's see example:-


Many Elephants = Chang Lhai Tua

Hope you enjoy my post, I'll finish today with YouTube video of an elephant taking bath:-



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I'll add YouTube video to teach you to pronounce the word correctly later, stay tune....

Again, any comments or questions, please feel free to contact me.

Thank you very much.

Sunday, October 31, 2010

Tip: Learning Thai the easy way with songs

Welcome back again, since today is Sunday, I would like to make this day some special post with tips to help you learn Thai language easier.

Today, I'm going to introduce you to a very well-known Thai song. The name of this song is "Chang". This word means elephant. This is a kid's song. Most Thai have heard it since a baby.

Let's see the lyric and meaning below:-

Song Name: Pleng Chang (Elephant song)

Chang Chang Chang Chang Chang
(Elephant Elephant Elephant Elephant Elephant)

Nong Kei Hen Chang Rue Plao
(Have you even seen an elephant?)

Chang Man Tua Tho Mai Bao
(An elephant has a big body)

Jamook Yao Yao Riek Wa Nguang
(Its long nose calls a trunk)

Me Kiew Tai Nguang Riek Wa Nga
(It has fangs under trunk called tusks)

Mee Hoo Mee Taa Hang Yao
(It has ears, has eyes, and a long tail)

Vocabulary:
Chang = An elephant
Nong = Younger sister
Jamook = A nose
Kiew = Fangs
Tai = Under
Nguang = Trunk
Nga = Nga
Hoo = Ears
Taa = Eyes
Hang = A tail

To help you sing this song, I made a video as embedded below. Let's have fun sing this song.

Saturday, October 30, 2010

First word you need to know - Sa-Was-Dee




In English world, you may usually get used to many greeting words in different time during a day. In Thai, we usually use one word to say hello during a day, most of you may already know and have heard this word, which is

"Sa-Was-Dee"


For men, you should say "Sa-Was-Dee-Krab"

For women, you should say "Sa-Was-Dee-Ka"


Actually, there are "Good Morning", "Good Afternoon", "Good Evening" and "Good Night" in Thai as well. These words had been used in the old time. In today world, we, Thai people, mostly say "Sa-Was-Dee" to greeting each other.

"Sa-Was-Dee" is used when we see each other once the first time of the day. No need to say "Sa-Was-Dee" every time you want to greet Thai people.

The most important culture of Thai people you need to know is that those who are younger have to say greeting to those who are older. And those who are older will then Sawasdee back to those younger.

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I hope you'll find this site helpful for your Thai language learning experience. If you have any questions or suggestions, please feel free to contact me.

I'll soon add YouTube video to how to accent the word, please stay tune....

Again, thank you for reading this far, hope you follow this blog ^^