Tuesday, August 30, 2011

July 25th to Sept 2nd 2011- No Life but Thai Lessons!

We elected to do an intensive Thai class at the AUA Language Center in Chiang Mai.  The actual class room and building were initially the USIS offices opened in 1951 and handed over to AUA in 1996. The real history of the AUA Language Center goes back to 1924. At that time, Thai students returning from their studies in the US and their American friends in Thailand started the American University Alumni Association as a purely social organization. In1940, AUAA was registered as an Association for the purpose of promoting friendship, education, culture, charity, sports and entertainment. The U.S. community in Chiang Mai dates to 1867, when American missionaries, doctors and teachers first started efforts that led to the establishment of medical and educational institutions in northern Thailand. Today those institutions include McCormick Hospital, McKean Rehabilitation Center (formerly a leprosy asylum – posted pictures of it when we did our bike ride), Prince Royal's College, Dara Academy, Chiang Mai University medical school and Payap University.  The AUA Thai Studies Department at AUA, Chiang Mai was established in 1985 to meet the language and cultural needs of foreigners working, visiting, or residing in Chiang Mai and the North of Thailand.
Inner court yard with class rooms
We signed up for the Thai 1 course which entailed 60 hours over 6 weeks and cost $140 per person. We had to study at least 2 hours for every hour in class.  Our class started with 13 students and Khun (Miss) Thuk, the teacher.  We were advised by a linguist to request and hold out for Khun Thuk because she was the best.  We did this and it meant switching from our preferred morning class to an afternoon class.  She has been an excellent teacher!  It is just us students that are the problem.  We started as 12 students with 2 females and the rest male.  Those 50+ years and older were the 2 women and 3 men. All the other students were young men. One of the 50+ males was repeating Course 1 for the second time immediately following his first course as was one of the younger fellows.  We had 2 drop outs, 1 was the younger second-time around young man and the other was another young man that was trying to run his programming business and attend/study Thai at the same time.  He was not doing well in the class and basically packed it in.  Of the “stars” in the class we have 3 men, of which one had taken Beginning Thai 2x at the YMCA and was now in Thai 1 at AUA, the second was previously an English teacher in Thailand so had studied some before, and the third was a gentleman from Venezuela, who speaks several languages and is a composer (so has a excellent ear for the tones). The Venezuelan had never taken Thai before and his pronunciation is perfect.
Is Thai easy to learn?  The grammar is very simple – the hard part is the tones! Thai is Subject-Verb-Object language. An adjective or an adverb always follows a noun or verb.  
For example;

kháw kin khâaw = He eats rice.
kháw kin khâaw niăw = He eats sticky rice.
kháw kin khâaw niăw reo mâak = He eats sticky rice very quickly.

Raphel, Bernie and Bob
There are no words for "a", "an" or "the", and generally if a word is not needed to communicate meaning, then it's omitted, keeping sentences very simplistic in structure.   Many words are used in compounds to form new words. This makes it possible to understand unknown words just by looking at the parts.

Every day in class we have to report what we did after the previous class finished.  The other day Leslie proceeded to say that we had gone for a massage at the Wat Sri Gerd (Thai temple that also has a massage school) and that we had met one of our classmate’s (Bob) ex- wife, Dhao the mother of Nina.  Bob’s 10 year old daughter, Nina has come to class several times and it has been lots of fun to have her in our class and practice with her. The word for Mother is mɛ̆ɛ but the way Leslie pronounced it she called Nina’s mother a dog (măa )!  The class burst out laughing particularly Bob and Nina and Leslie had to figure out what she said wrong!

Thai is really all about the pronunciation. The vowel length is very crucial in Thai. A long vowel, shown as double letters, is distinct from a short one. Vowel length changes meanings. Tones also are important and can change meanings. Thai has 5 tones; middle, low (`), high (ˊ), falling (˄) and rising (ˇ).  If the tone changes, so does the meaning. For example;

maa = to come
máa = a horse
măa = a dog

Eli, Kelly, Jimmy, Mark, and David
 All the students in the class are actually very amazed at how we can communicate in Thai now.  We know how to ask questions – again very simple- the question words like who, what, where, when and why go at the end of the sentence. There is no past tense in Thai you just put the time period at the beginning of the sentence (last night, last year etc.). Future tense is easy as well you simply use the word “ja” in front of the verb with or without a period of time.

Leslie and Khun Tuk
 Leslie goes to Warorot Market to do her shopping and can now get around the market with the basic Thai we have learned in class. We also now have an easier time using the local transportation consisting of Songthaew (red truck) or tuk tuk (motorized three-wheel pedicabs named after the sound their engines make).

 We have purchased the Talking Thai computer program that is a Three-Way Thai-English English-Thai Talking Dictionary.  We have it installed on the IPAD and on an old ITOUCH. On the ITOUCH we can easily look up new words while we are out and about. As it is a three way dictionary you can enter the words in English, Thai or even how the word sounds using English letters. You can click on the Thai word to hear a native speaker. This has been very helpful to repeat the vocabulary that we learn each day in class.

 Has it been easy for us? No, but neither has it been as hard as we expected! We have been out of the study mode for so long it was difficult to sit down and start memorizing words. You needed to write the words out with all the accent marks so that you were properly putting the tones into the old brains.  Also then in class exercises you needed to put in the accent marks or you would say the word wrong.  We do not think we will go on to Thai 2 which covers the 44 consonants and 36 vowels! We are very happy that we have done this course shortly after we got here so that we can fully benefit from what we have learned while we are here.

Sunday, August 21, 2011

August 21, 2011 Bulbul Bird Survey on Sunday morning in Chiang Mai to raise awareness of bird capture

On Sunday at 6:30 am we were picked up by Chintana for a day with the Lanna Bird Club to do a survey of the birds in Chiang Mai town, particularly the Red Whiskered Bulbul. The club has for several years been doing a survey because many of these birds, which have a lovely call, are captured and placed in cages to sing, and their numbers are going down. The club brought together almost a hundred people to spread around town to count the birds, and most are children between 10 and 18 years old, although some of the senior members of the club are in their 50's and older.  Several of the leaders were medical doctors who were involved in trying to raise consciousness of their communities to the plight of the birds.
The club met up at The Three Kings monument outside Chiang Mai Cultural Center (the museum) and divided up into 4 groups to tackle four areas of town.  Our group covered the nearby areas, so we did not need to get into a car or bus, but several of the teams left in a truck with the Lanna Bird Club sign on it and the project's logo "A Cage is Not a Home" showing a captured Bulbul being released from a cage, logo attached. We saw a number of the Redwhiskered Bulbuls as we walked around the areas of the old Buddhist temples, which were heavilly treed and therefore supported bird populations.

Our group with David on the left
Dr. Mung President of Lanna Club with his daughter
After we completed our survey, we came back to the Cultural Center for snacks with the kids and then programs started with educational discussions followed by a well-known artist starting the kids drawing about the Bulbuls on a canvas that was about 30 feet long and 6 feet high!  The picture will later be used to make a poster to raise awareness about not capturing wild birds that will be distributed throughout the city and Northern Thailand. All the others were Thai and the language used was of course Thai, but the people were very friendly and came over to say "Hello" to us and asked about our stay in Thailand, interest in birds, etc.  Chintana dropped us back at our building at about 11AM after a very interesting morning.
Red Whiskered Bulbul

Sunday, August 14, 2011

Sunday, August 14th 2011 Another CM Hiking Experience

Exhausted and red-faced from climb
The CM Hiking group met today at the Galae Restaurant for a 6.5 km circular walk.  The uphill part of the first third of the hike, 350m of altitude gain, “requires a certain fitness level” advised the notice for this hike.  We had debated about whether we were fit enough but decided we should try it. We had a nice view from the view point across Chiang Mai but Leslie was so hot and tired  from the uphill part she just sat and looked at Janet’s photos of CM in Stitches member’s quilt development.  

Part of the group resting
Offerings under the rock ledges by water
We then walked down for about 1.5 km on the Doi Suthep road before entering a small trail to Wat Palath, where we had a break for snacks and drinks.  This was a lovely Wat in the middle of the forest with a water fall/river running beside it.  Very picturesque and I wish we could find more information on it other than it is on the pilgrim route up to Doi Suthep’s Wat PhraThat.  Wat Phra That Doi Suthep is a major pilgrimage destination, especially during the Buddhist holidays of Makha Bucha and Visakha Bucha (February 13 and May 11, respectively).


After the break, we hiked down a short part of the Wat Palath nature trail before we turned off to a very small and hardly visible nature trail leading us back to Galae restaurant. The trail and become even more over grown in the 3 weeks since the leader last tested the hike so we were using our sticks to tramp down the underbrush and remove spider webs.  Saw two of these lovely creatures that we need to find a name for!
The CM Hiking Club has been rained out the last 2 Sundays so everyone was very happy to be out on this hike. We had lunch with a friend, Janet, at the Galae Restaurant which is right on a small lake and has lovely gardening. 


Now it is back to studying Thai!

Monday, August 1, 2011

Grave of the last king of Lanna Kingdom at highest point in Thailand

Leslie by the falls

Chestnut-Crowned Laughing Thrush

Spotted Owlet

July 30, 2011 Birding with Chintana in Doi Inthanon Park

On Saturday we went birding for the second time in Thailand, this time with a friend of Marie's who is also a talented birder.  We met at 4:45 AM in our lobby for the hour and a half drive to the park, which has unusual species because it extends from about 3,000 feet elevation to over 8,000 feet, the highest point in Thailand.  The mountains here are an extension, say the foothills, of the Himalayas.

Chintana had a telescope and intimate knowledge of the birds of the park, which helped a lot.  Currently we are only seeing the indiginous species, not those that migrate through in the winter, so the number of species in the park is about 250 I think.

We started out by finding a number of birds right near the park entrance at about 6,000 feet altitude, including several pairs of bright red and black Short-Billed Minivets. David spotted a pair of rare Spectacled Barwings.  Further up in altitude we saw Black-throated Sunbirds and very cute Pygmy Wren Babblers. We identified over 40 species over almost 11 hours of looking at different locations, and hiking down some jungle trails.

At the end of the day, we were in an area of a hotel complex at the base of the mountain and found  a Spotted Owlet (pictured) and an uncommon sighting of a raptor, probably a Changeable Hawk Eagle.
It was an enjoyable day, with only a few drops of rain, very lucky as the remnants of a hurricane were scheduled to impact the area.

Birding in Doi Inthanon Park July 30