Learning Thai

 

It’s now been a week since I started going to the language school and so far it’s going pretty good. Initially, I was looking at attending another school on the east side of town, but it was about a 50 minute walk and classes were five days a week for two hours a day.  Committing to that sort of schedule would not leave me too much time for studying and doing the other activities that I enjoy on a daily basis. So now I am going to the YMCA Thai language school; it’s just a 35 minute walk and is only 3 days a week for two hours a day. The class room is on the third floor of an older building. Inside the classroom are long rectangular white tables, that are reminiscent of my old high school science class. However, these tables have a constant flow of air, created from standard oscillating fans that are attached in the ceiling,  blowing down upon them. The windows are left open to let the warm wet air from the humid world outside in to a circular flow created by the caged blades above. Primarily the class is attended by Koreans and a couple of Japanese, I am one of two Americans and there is one older guy from New England in there with us. We are a motley group to say the least but the diversity of nationalities is enjoyable and I am getting along well with the others who are want to try to get at least a semblance of understanding of this most difficult of languages. Currently we are learning about 40 words a day; first we started with nouns, then verbs, and now adjectives. I can’t tell you how nice it is to have a few numbers to this key of a most perplexing puzzle of a language. Just the other day, I was able to make out a full, all be it very short, conversation with the person serving me my plate of rice and tasty morsels of flavor. That was a nice night.

As well as going to class 3 times a week, I have had the fortune of having made friends with the host/receptionist from the bed and breakfast that I initially stayed at upon my arrival here in Chiang Mai. She has been an immense help in teaching me the subtleties of her native language, such as, when to raise the pitch, lower the pitch, and so on and such. Her name is Sai and she has been studying English for a little over 10 years now. In addition to working at the bed and breakfast, Sai creates subtitles, translating English movies to Thai script and she has also been a tutor to Thais pursuing the acquisition of the English language.  Honestly, I don’t think that I could have lucked out any more than I have when it comes to having such a great tutor and at no monetary cost. In exchange for her help, I am assisting her with getting a better grasp of the subtleties of the English language. So far it has been great fun as well as a great deal of study in trying to understand this unique and wonderful language. During the short span of time that I have in this country, I think that it will be next to impossible to attain even a small percentage of cognizance of the language. And that’s fine; it is just wonderful gaining even a smidgen of understanding of something that seemed almost unattainable a year ago. Most of all it’s just nice to retain the awareness that during all days of our lives we may set a point in the distant horizon to arrive at; and in knowing that it is the steps we take along our journey towards this end in the far-flung enigmatic future, we will care for most in the memories of our internal stories and not the mark we have set.

Enjoy your day.