The Bangkok Podcast | Expat Life In Thailand Via Expats From Canada & America

Please help us by taking our first Bangkok Podcast listener survey! Click here to get started, it only takes a few minutes. Everyone who fills it out will get 50,000 baht!* This is the second part of Greg’s interview with resident Thai language expert Stu Jay Raj, in which Stu critiques a conversation that Greg had in Thai with a co-worker. The two begin by discussing the unusual role that linguists have in digging deep into exactly why language works the way it does, something the average person never thinks about. He even contends most linguists could be on the autism spectrum! As for specific advice, Stu begins a fascinating explanation that Thai doesn’t really have a word that means ‘yes’ directly; the word ‘chai’ actually translates more closely to the English expression ‘it is.’ Hence, to indicate an affirmative response, Thais will simply repeat the verb used in a question. This fascinating difference with English is continued with a discussion of other ways to indicate agreement, with words that sound