Writing the Thai Language

I feel like I should justify why I'm not a whole lot better at Thai. Particularly at being literate in Thai. So here goes.

Writing Thai makes no sense.

I'm going to scratch the surface of the complexity of reading and writing Thai. This is just an introduction to the craziness. There are 44 consonants, like 25 vowels, 5 tones, and no spaces between words. Buckle your seatbelt, this is more than you've ever wanted to know about Thai!

First off, in English we do this thing where one sound follows another, and we just write the sounds down in that order. Makes sense, right? Well, Thai doesn't do that. We'll use my name as an example.

 The sound 'k' (one of many)

The vowel that says 'a' as in 'pale' (but a long 'aaaaaaa' not a short 'a')

The sound for 't'

The sound 'ee' as in, 'Katie' + a tone marker

If it was English, you'd put the whole thing together like this.

But it's Thai. And there's no way that you can just put the letters in the order that you say them! So it looks like this

Or, in English

Now I'll give you an example.

This sentence says 'Katie is going to an island with a friend.' (literally 'Katie go island with friend)

If it was English it would look like this.

All the letters are there, if you can figure out where they're supposed to go. And that's a lucky case! Sometimes you don't get the pleasure of having vowels in your words.

The Thai word for road is

Transcribed it would be 'tay known'. Two different vowels - 'a' as in 'pale' and 'o' as in 'go'

But how is it written?

No vowels. 

(If there's no vowel, there are 3 different sounds that it could possibly be, depending on a number of factors)

And believe me, figuring out the consonants and vowels is CAKE compared to figuring out the tones in written Thai. Just imagine this blog post as the pinky finger nail on the monster gourilla of the Thai language.

*Truth be told, I absolutely love Thai, even the craziness of the writing system. It's kind of like a giant puzzle. But it's fun to rant about why I have such trouble learning it!

My Roofin' Roots

I know that your breath is bated while you open this post, hoping that this is another edition of Extreme Home Makeover: Katie's House. Currently room #2 (this time it's RED!) is in such mid-painting chaos, I think you'll have to wait for next week! But here's a fun story.

Last month I got to spend some time with Karen friends, and in the process learn some useful skills; like how to make a roof! It reminded me warmly of several delightful summers spent working for Chase Roofing, although the skill set is pretty different.

Step 1: Gather these long, tough, covered-in-slivers jungle leaves.

Step 2: Break off a piece of the tough, central vain of the leaf. Using that, sew the leaf on to a long stick.

* Step 2 is best performed with an old, smiley, brightly attired Karen woman.

End result? This!

And this. 

If you can't tell, there are hundreds of tiny black slivers in my fingers. Some are easy to get out, some you have to dig out with a safety pin, and the rest will fall out after a few weeks. You can always tell who has been working on the roof by their hands.

Actually getting the new roof on to the roof is a task for another day, and a job that girls are not allowed to participate in, no matter how deep their roofing roots.

A place to hang up my umbrella

3 months since my last post? For shame! Unfortunately all of my most harrowing and blog-worthy adventures go on the work related blog. That leaves little time to talk about the mundane areas of my life, like the banana flower curry I made for dinner or the eating contest that I cheered at last month. If you'd like me to hook you up with that much more awesome blog, you can e-mail me! (Not like I really have to sell it, but sometimes I give life-saving breath or bench press boulders on that blog. Well, at least I'm going to bench press a boulder. Soon. It's on the schedule)

But I have News! From The Other Side Of The Pond 

For the last 7 months I have been bumping around a lot. I left the dorm, stayed with friends, have traveled to several different countries, and have not fully unpacked my bags. Until two weeks ago.

My darling Australian flatmate (who fights international injustice as a job then moonlights slaying dragons and saving babies for fun) and I moved in to our new apartment, and we're settling in nicely.

I've hardly scratched the surface on Design Sponging the entire house, but the front room is done, sans stuff on the wall (waiting for a drill that can tackle the concrete walls).

My decorating budget is nearly non-existent (notice the use of my ladder and broken toaster in the decorating scheme), but I did invest in paint and this amazing traditional Thai chair/bench/couch.

More pictures to come (like a Do-It-Yourself Folded Book Bookshelf that I invented!), and I'll keep you updated as I move across the house. This might turn into a home decorating/cooking blog (banana flower curry anyone? And black garlic simmering in the rice maker).

Yes, I think I'm home!

The Power of a Film

I've been told that as a young child I was extremely sensitive to movies. Even as a preteen I would get really upset at any violence or if an animal even got hurt in a film. Then as I grew older I think I came to understand that while the emotions invoked by art are real, the stories are just that; stories. Film lost the power to universally invoke the pits or heights of emotion that it previously had.

I'm still extremely moved, however, by stories that are real. This week it is 'The Lady,' a movie that came out last summer about Daw Aung San Suu Kyi. The story is at once moving, tragic, beautiful, and true. It's not history, but current in the unchanged situation in Burma. 

I think that good art encourages us to see the emotions and complexities of life in the extreme. We feel pain, or love, or whatever it is, in the Platonic ideal of what that emotion can be. Art is a beautiful and powerful way to express life.

Snow on the Other Side Of The Pond

There's snow on the pond! (The infamous pond of 'News From The Other Side Of The Pond) Check my brother's twitter account for a video of me 'tweeting' about the snow.

Last night, nostalgic and missing Chiang Mai, I ordered dinner from one of Boise's Thai restaurant, Chiang Mai House. 

The didn't have cow soi (and didn't even know what it was because none of them were Thai). The pad see euw was not delicious, and the som tham, which was supposed to be a little bit spicy, was so spicy that I couldn't even eat it. But the satay was delicious. Also, American Thai portions are HUGE!

And, the accomplishment of the week, I installed a motion sensor light in the hallway.   3 trips to the hardware store, 1 to the neighbor for a voltmeter, 40 trips to the circuit breaker, and it works!

See the video.

In other news, my dad bought a 55in TV so that "Grandma can watch 'youtubes' of kittens jumping in and out of baskets." - Mom

My Week: In Animals

Last week I ate frogs. They are delicious.

You can't really tell from this photo, but this spider is about the size of a face. A really, really big face. But not dangerous, I was assured.

And saw a cute monkey.

This week I played with a cute monkey.

And got attacked by a cobra.

Let me be clear. I was not antagonizing the snake. I was far away, peacefully observing it in its natural habitat. I was walking carefully and well aware of him from far away (I also didn't know it was a cobra until after the video or I might not have stuck around). That being said, from now on I will obey when Thais urge me not to go places where there are snakes. In fact I've promised to obey everything that my Thai sister says from now on.

But it was a little bit the most exciting thing that happened this weekend (probably just because I slept through the earthquake Sunday. Or that would have been exciting too!)

Penang

I don't really have an interesting/funny/catching intro, and let's face it, y'all really just read the intro to get to the pictures, right? So here are the pictures.

The top of Penang Hill gives you a beautiful panoramic view of the island.

Like this!

But I got tired of the tourist spots and so I wandered off on my own. Good thing I did, 'cuz I discovered this adorable little cottage (completely overgrown) and a few families of monkeys!

I also found this Thai food stall across from my hotel. 24 hours out of Thailand and I was really missing Thai food and speaking Thai, so it was nice to chat with the little family here while they made my fried rice (a Thai friend has offered to teach me to make Thai fried rice so that I have a little bit of Thailand to take with me when I visit the States).