Episode 15: Happy Valentine’s Day from Thai Girl Talk! Listen in to Mia and Lani discuss some vocabulary for Valentine’s Day, and learn which one is single and which one is married.
Listen to episode15 in Thai version here and download transcripts here
Download MP3 to listen offline hereby Lani
When I think of Valentine’s Day, I think of this scene from one of my favorite TV shows, The Office
I also think what can I do when my students ask me if I have a boyfriend/valentine?
I like to be dramatic funny so I sometimes break into tears, lean against the whiteboard and say,
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
When I tell them I don’t have a boyfriend or fan/แฟน they often don’t believe me, in other words, they think I’m lying. This is extremely flattering and sweet, except when they do believe me, they look at me in utter shock and despair. I think the girls feel this way because they are thinking,
“Jesus, Lord Buddha, if she can’t get a boyfriend, is there any hope for me?”
Yes. Of course there is, you ninny.
I believe everyone has a story and my story is just taking its tee tootle time to unravel because the Lord Buddha and his friends know I like to be alone, get bored easily, and they like to test my patience.
Anyway, according the fortune teller or mŏr doo/ หมอดู that I saw last week (thanks Mia!)
(At the fortune teller)
I’ve got some merit making to do to help things along (I know, so very Thai of me ).
So, this could be awhile…
But for anyone who has been in Thailand during this holiday, they will notice that Valentine’s Day has grown in popularity over the years. I just walked by a restaurant bedazzled in hanging roses and hearts the other day, and that is what actually reminded me – the dreaded holiday was coming.
In this episode we talked about how to say: ‘Happy Valentines Day’
How to introduce your husband or wife, or significant other.
How to say ‘I love you’.
What was interesting for me to learn was how degrading the informal uses of ‘husband’ and ‘wife’ are and even though they were in common usage, in the past, don’t use them anymore!
But the problem is, of course, we don’t want to sound too formal either, so the use of fan/ แฟน is really best.
I like how it doesn’t denote whether or not it is a male or female that you are talking about.
Interestingly, the word fan comes from the English word, ‘fanatic’ meaning to be crazy about something or someone.
I think this is awesome and wonderful. Actually I don’t think I can express how cool I think this is.
To me, this is one of the best things about learning another language, learning where the word comes from!
Wishing our readers and listeners a very Happy Year of the Snake and a Happy Valentine’s Day!
Here is the vocabulary from the podcast:
สุขสันต์วันแห่งความรัก/ sùk săn wan hàeng kwaam rák/ Happy the ‘day of love’
สุขสันต์วันวาเลนไทน์ /sùk săn wan valentines/ Happy Valentine’s
สุขสันต์/sùk săn/ happy
วันแห่งความรัก/ wan hàeng kwaam rák/ literally the ‘day of love’
ความรัก/kwaam rák (noun ) /love
รัก/ rák /(verb) – love
ฉันรักคุณ/ chăn rák kuhn/ I love you (for females)
ผมรักคุณ/pŏm rák kuhn/ I love you (for males)
ฉันรักเธอ/chăn rák ter/ I love you (popular usage)
แฟน/fan/boyfriend or girlfriend/can also be used for husband and wife
สามี/ săa mee/ husband (formal)
ผัว/ pŭa/ husband (informal, don’t use)
ภรรยา /pan-rá-yaa/wife (formal)
เมีย/ mia/ wife (informal, don’t use!)
โสด/sot /-single
นะ/ná/ use to soften the sentence
Mia rák Lani – Mia loves Lani
Lani gôr rák Mia kâ – Lani loves Mia too!
Good luck and may cupid bless you with that happy arrow
iTune Podcast
Another splendid post. I am still working on the listening exercise – and will be for at least a couple of days
Once more thank you!
Thanks Keith. We have a lot of fun recording it. Appreciate you listening in!
Thanks for another great post. I am enjoying listening to the Thai audio.
Btw, when I try to get the Thai transcript from dropbox, all I get is the English instructions. Is it just me? I had no problem with previous episodes.
Never mind about the transcript. I seem to have figured it out. Or stumbled blindly into success!
Another thing, my (default?) avatar looks sooo sad. Can I change it?
I asked the webmaster, seems like we dont have many choices. Anyhow, we did a small change to Avatar. Hope it looks better now
555 Keith’s avatar doesn’t look too happy either…
Mine’s actually a very close likeness. 555
Hey Mia, by clicking back and forth between clips, I have come to the conclusion that you are the same Mia who recorded a massive amount of audio material for Andrej over at Thai Recordings dot com. So thank you for that, too. That’s also a wonderful resource.
Hi Gaelee, finally someone has revealled my secret operation 55555. Yes, it’s the same Mia !!!!
Hi can you translate for me .
Gary
Hi Gary,
If you need a translation service please contact me at learn2speakthai@gmail.com