The next time you go to a Thai temple, I want you to listen in on the conversation between monks and the people asking for prayers. What you\u2019ll notice visually is a complex set of cultural motions, and if you listen carefully, you\u2019ll also notice something very interesting about the language too. You may or may not understand much of what they say depending on your fluency level, but you will however notice that the worshippers speak very slowly and clearly. If you have a good vocabulary, you\u2019ll also notice them using very formal words spoken very softly and carefully.<\/p>\n
This, my readers, is how to be polite (su2 paap3 \u0e2a\u0e38\u0e20\u0e32\u0e1e<\/strong>) when speaking Thai.<\/p>\n The first part is easy \u2013 speaking slowly. Unless you\u2019re an expert, chances are you couldn\u2019t speak fast if you wanted to. When I first started learning Thai and I was told \u2018speak slowly to be polite\u2019, the first thing I thought was \u2018I\u2019m the slowest speaker in the country \u2013 this is going to be easy!\u2019<\/p>\n The second part, of using formal language, is almost just as easy. It turns out that when Thais teach their language, they teach you what is called paa1saa5 suay5, or \u0e20\u0e32\u0e29\u0e32\u0e2a\u0e27\u0e22<\/strong> meaning \u2018beautiful language\u2019. This is how books in Thai are written, and it\u2019s considered the grammatically correct way to read, write, and speak. It\u2019s also the language of the educated\/literate, so it closely matches the Bangkok dialect as well. If you were going to write a book, or speak to someone above you (ie monks, your wife\u2019s parents, the King of Thailand, etc), this would be how you should speak. The disadvantage to this is that Thais do not speak \u0e20\u0e32\u0e29\u0e32\u0e2a\u0e27\u0e22 <\/strong>in their daily life \u2013 and if you do, they will say something like \u2018you talk like a book\u2019.<\/p>\n There is actually one other part about speaking politely. Depending on the situation, there are different vocabulary sets you should use. But as this goes into the more intermediate and advanced Thai, I\u2019m not going to go into it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Learn how to speak politely in Thai.<\/p>","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[10208,3],"tags":[47828],"class_list":["post-382","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-beginner","category-culture","tag-speak-polite"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t