It's a mystery

I sometimes wonder whether my need to write has increased since I’ve been surrounded by a foreign tongue. Although I can speak some Thai, it’s strictly practical – getting around in a taxi because only about 5% of the city’s taxis know where they’re going; ordering food, finding out where the loo is. I can hold a conversation with a Thai about why we’re here, how long we’ve been here, where we’re from, how many children I have. Those are the things – along side food – that they make small talk about.

With, from memory, some 44 consonants and 26 vowels, I found it bloomin’ difficult to learn Thai but then I’ve never been a natural at learning languages. To start with most beginners are learning from phonetics and not from the Thai alphabet so what you see written is down to interpretation. Then there are the sounds that we don’t make at all, like NG at the start of a word. D and T can sound interchangeable, as can P and B. L turns into an N (don’t ask!) R turns into an L… that old Asian joke. There are many more foibles but it’s a nightmare.

Once I decided I wanted to write a novel, I found my excuse as to why I wasn’t going to learn more than a smattering of Thai. Nothing to do with laziness! Still I’m ashamed after nearly five years to be so pitifully equipped for life here.

There are some words, when written in phonetic that simply don’t or can’t convey the way you’re meant to say them. U Chu Liang, a building in Silom I frequent, tripped me right up in the early days. “You Chu Liang” I said to the taxi driver. “Grunt?” he said. “You Chu Liang…” I said more hopefully… I’ll spare you the details of our exchange but this went on for some time. Thank god I was outside the apartment because my friend L’s driver came to the rescue. I repeated the exchange, then handed him the address that was written in phonetics. (No point, therefore handing it to a Thai who couldn’t read English.) He looked at the card and light dawned on his face and he made a noise like a man pushing a melon out of his backside: “Eurrrrrw Chu Liang.” If you can conjure distaste while you say it, you’re much more likely to be understood.

There’s remained, for the best part of four years, another destination I couldn’t communicate to a Thai. It was the name of the hospital we go to: Bumrungrad. (I’ll hang on a minute while you giggle.) So obviously, I’d say Bum-run-grad: simple. Except I’d get the grunt and total failure to communicate face. After too many embarrassing exchanges with this word, and thinking that one day I might need it urgently, I laminated a card from the hospital with the name written in Thai and I’ve still got it in my handbag. I’ve since worked out that if I say Barm-ruun-graad I stand an 80% chance of being understood.

I still get a frisson of anxiety before I announce "Barm-ruun-graad" to a taxi… as I had to this morning as I had check up there. But hurrah, I didn’t need my laminated card. It was a small triumph and I felt pretty pleased with myself until I went to check in at the counter for my blood test, where I was informed that my appointment wasn’t today at all, but tomorrow.

Tomorrow is going to be something of a Groundhog Day...

OFFICIALLY OVER-EXCITED

This week’s been a washout as far as writing has been concerned: novel writing at any rate. (Pah: just as I started a personal race with Sheepish and I’ll be seriously lagging behind this week and tomorrow is WC day (word count day!)

This week has been full of sickness (mine and Daughter’s) and of course I should be writing now because this afternoon I am on the Neilson Hays Library stand at the Living in Bangkok exhibition at Bumrungrad Hospital.

But instead of writing, I’m jumping up and down with excitement because I read this yesterday. I had, up to this moment, been quietly excited but my trip to London is getting closer and OMG I think it’s time to lose control. This is Othello with Lenny Henry at Trafalgar Studios. AND I’ve got tickets. OMG, OMG. I am going with Leigh. Yay yay yay. Othello is my favourite Shakespeare play and I have a rather large soft spot for Lenny Henry and every faith that he will be stupendous. I am wondering if Leigh will be embarrassed if I want to go to the stage door to swoon a bit…

Now I’ve got myself over-excited. I’ve got to calm down and write lots of words so I don't shame myself in front of Sheepish tomorrow. And then I can get off to the hospital to promote the library when really what I want to do is think about LH as Othello...

Phew

This half term holiday was never meant to be.

First Cambodia was cancelled; then we tried to go to Koh Samet but we couldn’t find any accommodation with vacancies (Thursday last week was a bank holiday so lots of people were having long weekends.) As a last resort we booked a hotel that I saw advertised in the complimentary magazine of Bangkok Airways on my return from Koh Chang.

We went down on Wednesday morning and were due to come back tomorrow. However, we came back yesterday…

Husband had been having some pain for the last week or so in the elbow of his right arm, this got worse and worse and crept up to his neck until Wednesday night he barely slept. And Thursday night he didn’t sleep. So Friday morning we packed up, and asked the hotel to please drive us back to Bangkok so Husband could go to the hospital.

He had an x-ray, which didn’t show anything wrong and then an MRI scan. We went back for the results today and his vertebrae 5&6 and 6&7 have discs protruding into the nerve. I have to say I’m relieved. I’m a doctor’s daughter and sister, which is a very hazardous thing to be: “a little bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing…”

So that’s been what’s stopping me writing these last few days – not just the report coming back. Now that I know Husband’s not got anything more sinister, I think I’ll be able to start writing again.