Farang phuut passat Thai reu plao, k-?

[Guest]

The one I love is when you are talking to a few people and one of them is so amazed that they can understand what you are saying that they repeat word for word every sentence that you say, until one of the group tells them to shut up cos they can all understand you.

The other one I love is as stated by an earlier post, when you go into KFC or any shop and the assistant quakes with fear cos of the farang walking towards them and the look of relief when you speak Thai to them.

The one i loved most was a few months back, i dived in a taxi, said where i wanted to go, the driver started driving and making small talk, after about 5-10 minutes he suddenly almost jumped out of his seat, "UH, Khun pen Farang!!!" It just hadn't clicked with him from the time i'd got in his taxi to then that he'd been talking Thai with a foreigner.

[Pescator]

quote:

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Originally posted by rictic:

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The one i loved most was a few months back, i dived in a taxi, said where i wanted to go, the driver started driving and making small talk, after about 5-10 minutes he suddenly almost jumped out of his seat, "UH, Khun pen Farang!!!" It just hadn't clicked with him from the time i'd got in his taxi to then that he'd been talking Thai with a foreigner.

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So he was blind then?

I dare say, I blind cab driver!

[Guest]

quote:

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Originally posted by Hua Nguu:

So he was blind then?

I dare say, I blind cab driver!

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Certainly was, had someone running in front with a white stick!!!

[Guest]

I wasin noway saying I speak perfect Thai,it was a long the lines of a lot of times the problems are from the perception of AHHH a foreigner no matter what he says I cant understand him.

[bibblies]

I've got a book that takes the position that Thais won't often be confused by incorrect tones, but more by whether you've pronounced the vowels with the correct length. Often, I find myself neglecting the length of vowels, but I'm not as conscious of it as I am of the tonal difference. Maybe it's something to do with this.

[Lamock Chokaprret]

Bibblies said:

quote:

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I've got a book that takes the position that Thais won't often be confused by incorrect tones, but more by whether you've pronounced the vowels with the correct length.

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My book, the one distributed with Thai flashcards that was supposed to be a reference work on the subject, implies grammar is more important than tones.

I suspect that they're all correct to some degree depending on listener and speaker. Tones, vowel length and grammar all contribute to fluency.

[daeng bireley]

I think the most common problem I see when

thais misunderstand farangs is incorrect vowel pronunciation then vowel length followed by grammer and then tone.

Tone and grammer are not as important because as previously mentioned the wrong tone will be understood by context.The same with grammer, alot of thais use bad grammer

I think the average school leaving age is still about 12 so a lot of thais speak very bad thai, especially if they are from districts where the language is a dialect not central thai.

Most farangs have trouble with thai vowels. If you want to speak good thai master the vowel pronunciation and to do this I think its necessary to be able to read thai.

When a thai cant understand a farang speaking its nearly always poor pronunciation