How to ask in Thai "Are you open?"

[tgeezer]

Bearpolar, I see your point.

I don't see ครับ as sir, I think it ensures that as a foreigner, liable to be misunderstood, I at least I won't be thought rude. Without words of course a smile has the same effect but we farang so often forget to smile.

There is an argument that says if you are going to pronounce words wrongly, the fewer the better, but I disagree. A sentence has more chance of being understood than two mispronounced words.

คุณครับ says that you are making a polite address, it can't be ignored. Long words allow for more mistakes, that is why farang love long words. บริการ to serve or service is a good word. Put ให้ in front and you have 'giving service,' which is what you are asking. Are you prepared to serve me. In my experience if you can talk to someone in a shop, then they are prepared to serve you, but why not flatter them by being undemanding, saying; it is your option, I have no rights; please me.

So much depends on your personality, I consider myself an interloper here and in my first overtures I try to show that, Thais I expect to respond at a similar level. The single word "Open?" works but it isn't friendly and if this shop is not open there is no excuse for anyone to help you by directing you to a shop that is open.

If Thais wouldn't say this so much the better, it is futile in any situation to try to pretend that one is Thai except perhaps on the 'phone.

When I hear Thais speaking slang my reaction is "Oh dear" especially if they think it English. I say things which Thais notice; เออจริงเหลอ for my "oh really! "

their reaction makes me doubt that it's Thai, I don't care whether it is or not, it is my foreign way of speaking.

[bearpolar]

I hope there isnt gonna be a new trend of changing the T sounding end consonant back to D.

[Sheryl]

Certainly a variant of เปิดไหม? (bert mai?) but the additional words will depend on whether the doubt is whether or not they have opened up yet vs. whether they are still open.

Open yet? = เปิดแล้วไหม bert laew mai? or เปิดยัง? bert yang? To me, in colloquial speech, I hear Thais more often saying "bert yang?" and usually no "mai" added when the sentence already ends in "yang" as the "yang" at the end already makes clear it is a question.

Still open? = ยังเปิดไหม yang bert mai?

Note that ยัง "yang" is in both but the sequence is different. Yang means both "yet" and "still" (as in continuing).

In most cases just "bert mai?" will work -- especially if you mean "are you open yet?". But in cases where the place has clearly already opened but you are in some doubt as to whether they are in the process of closing up/are willing to still serve customers, it would make sense (and be polite) to say "yang bert mai?"

In the above situation you could also ask in reverse: Pit laew mai? (are you already closed?)

I left off the ka/krob to all of these but of course add them on as well.

[Tahnil]

I'm going to address the above going backward to make a point.

[In the above situation you could also ask in reverse: Pit laew mai? (are you already closed?)]

This is incorrect.

ปิดแล้วยัง pbitd laew young NOT ปิดแล้วไหม pbitd laew mai.

[In most cases just "bert mai?" will work -- especially if you mean "are you open yet?". But in cases where the place has clearly already opened but you are in some doubt as to whether they are in the process of closing up/are willing to still serve customers, it would make sense (and be polite) to say "yang bert mai?]

เปิดไหม pbertd mai is especially EVERYTHING and better in succinctness than ยังเปิดไหม young pbertd mai.

If you want to especially emphasize now is the time to go to the longer form, the longer the more emphasis, ยังเปิดอยู่ไหม young pbertd you mai.

And even better because of the even longer form now that you are going after the emphasis is ยังเปิดอยู่หรือเปล่าครับ/คะ young pbertd you rue pblough krapb/ka.

[Open yet? = เปิดแล้วไหม bert laew mai? or เปิดยัง? bert yang? To me, in colloquial speech, I hear Thais more often saying "bert yang?" and usually no "mai" added when the sentence already ends in "yang" as the "yang" at the end already makes clear it is a question.]

เปิดแล้วไหม pbertd laew mai is not correct.

The correct form is pbertd laew young เปิดแล้วยัง

[Certainly a variant of เปิดไหม? (bert mai?) but the additional words will depend on whether the doubt is whether or not they have opened up yet vs. whether they are still open.]

I hope I have demonstrated from the above that unless you really know what you are doing, adding these words is pitfalls more than what you imagine to be better, more correct, more polite, etc.

The OP actually has it right, stick with the simplest to get your point across or risk derailing.

After all, that's why native speakers like to keep it succinct as apposed to verbose.

And please get yourself a good Thai tutor because a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation are apparently widespread among the self taught.

And listen to your tutor.

The problem with this repetition to no avail is because it's free.

You'll pay attention when it costs you real money.

[Tahnil]

I'm going to address the above going backward to make a point.

[In the above situation you could also ask in reverse: Pit laew mai? (are you already closed?)]

This is incorrect.

ปิดแล้วยัง pbitd laew young NOT ปิดแล้วไหม pbitd laew mai.

[In most cases just "bert mai?" will work -- especially if you mean "are you open yet?". But in cases where the place has clearly already opened but you are in some doubt as to whether they are in the process of closing up/are willing to still serve customers, it would make sense (and be polite) to say "yang bert mai?]

เปิดไหม pbertd mai is especially EVERYTHING and better in succinctness than ยังเปิดไหม young pbertd mai.

If you want to especially emphasize now is the time to go to the longer form, the longer the more emphasis, ยังเปิดอยู่ไหม young pbertd you mai.

And even better because of the even longer form now that you are going after the emphasis is ยังเปิดอยู่หรือเปล่าครับ/คะ young pbertd you rue pblough krapb/ka.

[Open yet? = เปิดแล้วไหม bert laew mai? or เปิดยัง? bert yang? To me, in colloquial speech, I hear Thais more often saying "bert yang?" and usually no "mai" added when the sentence already ends in "yang" as the "yang" at the end already makes clear it is a question.]

เปิดแล้วไหม pbertd laew mai is not correct.

The correct form is pbertd laew young เปิดแล้วยัง

[Certainly a variant of เปิดไหม? (bert mai?) but the additional words will depend on whether the doubt is whether or not they have opened up yet vs. whether they are still open.]

I hope I have demonstrated from the above that unless you really know what you are doing, adding these words is pitfalls more than what you imagine to be better, more correct, more polite, etc.

The OP actually has it right, stick with the simplest to get your point across or risk derailing.

After all, that's why native speakers like to keep it succinct as apposed to verbose.

And please get yourself a good Thai tutor because a lot of misunderstanding and misinformation are apparently widespread among the self taught.

And listen to your tutor.

The problem with this repetition to no avail is because it's free.

You'll pay attention when it costs you real money.

[bearpolar]

ปิดแล้วยัง pbitd laew young NOT ปิดแล้วไหม pbitd laew mai. เปิดไหม pbertd mai is especially EVERYTHING and better in succinctness than ยังเปิดไหม young pbertd mai.

Everytime you post you change your transliteration and ideas

You went from an average transliteration to complete nonsense

transfering "bp" to "pb" transfer a T ending consonant to "td" when "dt" would make more sense.. yang for young? That would only work with a very rare and trashy english accent, it's not even close to the right sound.

Before that you were using bert for เปิด ... bert as in ernie and bert from sesame street, go on youtube and hear how people pronounce bert, its not even close to what it should sound like. It's not hard to go on thai-language and follow the norm. From the sounds you chose, i don't believe you are half thai or speak thai at all everything you write is probably taken from someone else or you were simply blackout drunk when you wrote those transliteration .

As for the rest, its hard to follow as you posted your own thoughts in between the quotes. The only point i saw was you categorizing "native speakers" as people who love to keep it short. My girlfriend is one of them and even for her, bpeut mai was bad and impolite. She used a few words including yang and raan and said it would be better to add a shortened or full sawatdi or you sound like an inconsiderate, antisocial low level person(unless you already know the person pretty well, then you can shorten it to only bpeut mai)

[Tahnil]

ปิดแล้วยัง pbitd laew young NOT ปิดแล้วไหม pbitd laew mai. เปิดไหม pbertd mai is especially EVERYTHING and better in succinctness than ยังเปิดไหม young pbertd mai.

Everytime you post you change your transliteration and ideas

You went from an average transliteration to complete nonsense

transfering "bp" to "pb" transfer a T ending consonant to "td" when "dt" would make more sense.. yang for young? That would only work with a very rare and trashy english accent, it's not even close to the right sound.

Before that you were using bert for เปิด ... bert as in ernie and bert from sesame street, go on youtube and hear how people pronounce bert, its not even close to what it should sound like

As for the rest, its hard to follow as you posted your own thoughts in between the quotes. The only point i saw was you categorizing "native speakers" as people who love to keep it short. My girlfriend is one of them and even for her, bpeut mai was bad and impolite. She used a few words including yang and raan and said it would be better to add a shortened or full sawatdi or you sound like an inconsiderate, antisocial low level person.

[transfering "bp" to "pb" transfer a T ending consonant to "td" when "dt" would make more sense.. yang for young? That would only work with a very rare and trashy english accent, it's not even close to the right sound.]

I think pb is better than bp because the beginning sound is p rather than b but the b is there to prevent the p from being pronounced with a puff of air, i.e., closed throat.

For the td I think it's better than dt because what you are trying avoid in the utmost is the t ending of English/German.

For example, god and got.

See how in English the d ending is prominent when emphasized but the t ending is usually prominent in good English/German pronunciation.

As for yang, the problem is an American would pronounce that like ying/yang.

Young, however, forces both British and American speakers to make the correct sound.

Now you may think the American accent is trash but it is arguably the world standard at this point.

[Before that you were using bert for เปิด ... bert as in ernie and bert from sesame street, go on youtube and hear how people pronounce bert, its not even close to what it should sound like]

The same situation as in the above.

B is less pronounced than p in English.

If you are going to have only one letter then b results in a more understandable pronunciation of the Thai word.

In the beginning I wanted to write it out in the simplest way possible unsure of the audience.

Subsequently I saw that some were familiar with the idea of mixing the p and the b to force ambiguity as the ป is like a p but made without the puff of air like a b.

The best way to spell ป then is like a p but with a closed throat like a b, hence, pb.

[As for the rest, its hard to follow as you posted your own thoughts in between the quotes. The only point i saw was you categorizing "native speakers" as people who love to keep it short. My girlfriend is one of them and even for her, bpeut mai was bad and impolite. She used a few words including yang and raan and said it would be better to add a shortened or full sawatdi or you sound like an inconsiderate, antisocial low level person.]

The so-called posting my own thoughts in between quotes is otherwise known as answering each quote point by point.

You may have your girlfriend's ideas, nobody will attempt to disabuse you.

It's only when you try to instill same on others that it is an open forum.

Many people have already chimed in that pbeutd mai is normally what is heard among Thais.

If your girlfriend thinks that it's "inconsiderate, antisocial low level person" saying so then regular Thais are thus.

She is entitled to her opinion, and you hers.

Now before you get upset once again that I spelled pbeutd above, there are many ways to skin a cat.

The "eu" sound is familiar to me in English through its French root.

I earlier used "er" because that would be more commonly known among English speakers (with the r suppressed).

I change to accommodate my audience.

If you understand the eu sound I can use that too for you.

[roytheoldboy]

[I mean asking the people in a small thai shop or (especially) restaurant if they could serve me]

[Gosh, a last word freak!]

[For a moment there I thought that I had invented shop restaurant.]

What part of "what if" don't you understand?

And answer this from my post that you conveniently skipped:

What if it's late near closing time?

How bright is it to ask, "have you opened yet?"

You ask, "are you STILL open?" ยังเปิดไหมครับ Or, simply, "are you open?" again เปิดไหมครับ

Jeez Tahnil whats the point of telling us in English then writing it in Thai which no one can read?

You came up with a verbose line that the OP himself commented:

Quote

Nether ever learn long form sentences in Thai! Only basic words and combinations!

the more words are in a your phrase the difficult for Thais to understand because of your wrong tones pronunciation (in 99% cases) => to many alternatives

for instance mispronounced "laeo" may be understood as "turn" and so long

End Quote

As the OP pointed out, laew แล้ว is hard for a beginner to correctly pronounce.

And now it's pointed out that it limits the applicability outside which you would not look too bright.

It's also pointed out that by unnecessarily adding ran ร้าน, the line becomes even more limited in usefulness.

Most of all, it is pointed out that as a guiding principle, Thais have a penchant for succinctness and brevity.

Something the OP interestingly picked up but not tgeezer who claims to be the expert here.

Succinctness as apposed to verbosity is also a principle of smart English.

But never "tgeezer" who insists on adding แล้ว or already even as he claims only a Jew would say already in English.

[เปิดบริการ springs to mind for non specific services.]

Go ahead, say what you want, since you are of the opinion: "Who gives a damn what Thais would say?"

Nobody should "give a damn what a tgeezer would say."

Thankless, pompous and condescending, offensive, it would be nice if he actually practices what he writes:

[ We are not Thai, most people, present company excepted I presume, want foreigners to speak nicely. I think for very good reason; you cannot offend anybody or be misunderstood if you know what you are saying.]

But alas, he doesn't know what he's saying, in English much less Thai!

[Richard W]

[transfering "bp" to "pb" transfer a T ending consonant to "td" when "dt" would make more sense.. yang for young? That would only work with a very rare and trashy english accent, it's not even close to the right sound.]

You're hoping that people will get the sound right by trying to read the text as English. There's a technical word promoted by Griswold for that type of transcription - 'slapdash'. It generally confuses people who realise that the English spelling system won't work for Thai. If I didn't know the word you meant, I'd have pronounced it the same as ยุง [M]yung 'mosquito'. As for the idea that <a> is inappropriate, just remember to pronounce it as in Pali. You guys did come to the longest continuously-running Buddhist kingdom for the temples, didn't you?

When the Thai language forum was young, we agreed on using RTGS with obvious modifications for vowel length, the ambiguity of RTGS <ch>, and would let usage decide the preferred solution to resolve the ambiguity of RTGS <o>. What probably wrecked the scheme was showing the tone - I think a lot of people can't remember the tones. RTGS was justified as a starting point because it's the most widely used system outside of teaching. In particular, it's the dominant scheme used on road signs. Note that RTGS was designed to be capable of enhancement. The idea was that a breve would be written above the vowel to show a short vowel, and the tone mark would go on top. Unfortunately, these enhancements don't work with ASCII, and they tend not to be very readable.

Now before you get upset once again that I spelled pbeutd above, there are many ways to skin a cat.

The "eu" sound is familiar to me in English through its French root.

I earlier used "er" because that would be more commonly known among English speakers (with the r suppressed).

I change to accommodate my audience.

Here you hit another ambiguity. There is a modification of RTGS - it used to be used in The Nation and may still be - that uses <ue> for the long vowel sound of คืน [M]khuen 'night; to return' and <eu> for the less frequent, short sound of ขึ้น [FS]khuen. English-speakers are generally not good at distinguishing this vowel pair form the vowel pair of เปิด [L]poet 'to close' and เงิน [MS]ngoen 'money'.

[Tahnil]

[transfering "bp" to "pb" transfer a T ending consonant to "td" when "dt" would make more sense.. yang for young? That would only work with a very rare and trashy english accent, it's not even close to the right sound.]

You're hoping that people will get the sound right by trying to read the text as English. There's a technical word promoted by Griswold for that type of transcription - 'slapdash'. It generally confuses people who realise that the English spelling system won't work for Thai. If I didn't know the word you meant, I'd have pronounced it the same as ยุง [M]yung 'mosquito'. As for the idea that <a> is inappropriate, just remember to pronounce it as in Pali. You guys did come to the longest continuously-running Buddhist kingdom for the temples, didn't you?

When the Thai language forum was young, we agreed on using RTGS with obvious modifications for vowel length, the ambiguity of RTGS <ch>, and would let usage decide the preferred solution to resolve the ambiguity of RTGS <o>. What probably wrecked the scheme was showing the tone - I think a lot of people can't remember the tones. RTGS was justified as a starting point because it's the most widely used system outside of teaching. In particular, it's the dominant scheme used on road signs. Note that RTGS was designed to be capable of enhancement. The idea was that a breve would be written above the vowel to show a short vowel, and the tone mark would go on top. Unfortunately, these enhancements don't work with ASCII, and they tend not to be very readable.

Now before you get upset once again that I spelled pbeutd above, there are many ways to skin a cat.

The "eu" sound is familiar to me in English through its French root.

I earlier used "er" because that would be more commonly known among English speakers (with the r suppressed).

I change to accommodate my audience.

Here you hit another ambiguity. There is a modification of RTGS - it used to be used in The Nation and may still be - that uses <ue> for the long vowel sound of คืน [M]khuen 'night; to return' and <eu> for the less frequent, short sound of ขึ้น [FS]khuen. English-speakers are generally not good at distinguishing this vowel pair form the vowel pair of เปิด [L]poet 'to close' and เงิน [MS]ngoen 'money'.

For the first part, I hope you realize that the quote belongs to bearpolar.

Something that is not clear when you begin the second part with, "Here you hit another ambiguity."

I hope by you, you mean "one," as in, "Here one hits another ambiguity."

In answering both, I deal in the real world, what I can expect people to know.

An expectation such as this is totally unrealistic: "As for the idea that <a> is inappropriate, just remember to pronounce it as in Pali."

But I can do it every which way depending on the audience.

With the latter unknown, it's best to assume that they know nothing but the language they were born and raised in.

I want, however, to particularly call attention to one thing:

[RTGS was justified as a starting point because it's the most widely used system outside of teaching. In particular, it's the dominant scheme used on road signs.]

Whatever dominant scheme being used is an utter disaster.

Soi On Nut in Bangkok comes to mind, as I stay there when in Bangkok.

To make it resemble how it's actually pronounced, it should be spelled, Awn Nutd or simplified, Awn Nud.

Never use a t ending for Thai words as it simply does not exist in Thai.

[เปิด [L]poet 'to close' ]

That's just a slip I presume, but there are obviously novice reading this forum, so เปิด means open not close.

[bearpolar]

even with this accent its still sounds like ยอง and with most people sounds like ยุง

[KarenBravo]

S'trewth..........

[Tahnil]

even with this accent its still sounds like ยอง and with most people sounds like ยุง

The second one, young, is in fact ยัง in Thai.

ยอง would be yong.

ยุง would be yoong but with a short syllable sound.

If you know German, ยุง is jung.

[bearpolar]

you are the only person in the world to think that

thai-language.com is universally used and its accurate, i can read it in a few different accents and it always sounds pretty close to the real thing

http://www.thai-language.com/id/131369

telling me that young is yang in your head, i don't know what you're trying to accomplish.

the a in ยัง sounds very close to the a in "pat" in english.

bert sounds like a person vomiting, not even close to the real thing

it seems you are unaware that your tick American accent is not common worldwide.

[Tahnil]

you are the only person in the world to think that

thai-language.com is universally used and its accurate, i can read it in a few different accents and it always sounds pretty close to the real thing

http://www.thai-language.com/id/131369

telling me that young is yang in your head, i don't know what you're trying to accomplish.

the a in ยัง sounds very close to the a in "pat" in english.

bert sounds like a person vomiting, not even close to the real thing

it seems you are unaware that your tick American accent is not common worldwide.

I think the parting statement summarizes your attitude.

In which case there isn't much left for a fruitful discussion in English.

Perhaps we should continue in Thai to get to the points more quickly?

[bearpolar]

My attitude is im not thrilled with people that try to teach thai to others incorrectly, its just like if i were teaching english to someone and used "keskertebe" to write perspective because i did not know the spelling. It would show my lack of understanding of the language, as i cant even sound out a word correctly".

All you seem to be trying to convey is how you see thai language, instead of going at it the elevated way, which is the best way to learn a language correctly.

[Mole]

Well, this surely escelated out of porportions....

"Mr Teacher" is at it again, and wrong again...

No Thai would say "เปิดแล้วยัง". It's just wrong. We NEVER say like that to ask if a place is open or not.

We say "เปิดหรือยัง" which means "open or not (yet)".

Ask any Thai about this.

Actually, we never say "แล้วยัง".

In every instance that Tahnil use "แล้วยัง", Thai people use "หรือยัง".

ปิดหรือยัง

กินข้าวหรือยัง

มาหรือยัง (Yes, we don't say มาแล้วยัง but มาหรือยัง)

แล้วยัง is just wrong!

Forgot to mention that even though it's gramatically correct to write หรือ but when we say it, it's colloquially pronounced with different tone as รื้อ. (Similar situation as เขา (they), which is pronounced as เค้า)

[bearpolar]

everyone we know/meet says gin khao leo yang (when speaking fast)

but not bpeut leo yang

[tgeezer]

There are wide variations in the way people speak, words like, everyone, never etc. don't apply.

แล้ว and ยัง are opposites so they look strange together. เปิดหรือยัง is Open yet? เปิดยัง changes the meaning of ยัง I think unless you are thinking เปิดyet?

[Tahnil]

My attitude is im not thrilled with people that try to teach thai to others incorrectly, its just like if i were teaching english to someone and used "keskertebe" to write perspective because i did not know the spelling. It would show my lack of understanding of the language, as i cant even sound out a word correctly".

All you seem to be trying to convey is how you see thai language, instead of going at it the elevated way, which is the best way to learn a language correctly.

Well, let's look at your English then:

[My attitude is im not thrilled with people that try to teach thai to others incorrectly, its just like if i were teaching english to someone and used "keskertebe" to write perspective because i did not know the spelling.]

This is known as a run on sentence. If you don't know what that is, look it up.

"im" in correct English is "I'm."

"People that" shoud be "people who."

"thai" has to be capitalized, "Thai."

"Its" should be "it's."

"english" has to be capitalized, "English."

[It would show my lack of understanding of the language, as i cant even sound out a word correctly". ]

"i" needs to be capitalized, "I."

"Cant" should be spelled "can't."

Then again the correct form would be "would ..., couldn't" not "would ..., can't."

[All you seem to be trying to convey is how you see thai language, instead of going at it the elevated way, which is the best way to learn a language correctly.]

Perhaps you should start with elevating your English as it is totally sloppy.

And it it plain that the reason for your ad hominem diatribe is because you have nothing left to argue in regard to the subject of this thread.

Which is not surprising because the subject is the Thai language.

[Tahnil]

Well, this surely escelated out of porportions....

"Mr Teacher" is at it again, and wrong again...

No Thai would say "เปิดแล้วยัง". It's just wrong. We NEVER say like that to ask if a place is open or not.

We say "เปิดหรือยัง" which means "open or not (yet)".

Ask any Thai about this.

Actually, we never say "แล้วยัง".

In every instance that Tahnil use "แล้วยัง", Thai people use "หรือยัง".

ปิดหรือยัง

กินข้าวหรือยัง

มาหรือยัง (Yes, we don't say มาแล้วยัง but มาหรือยัง)

แล้วยัง is just wrong!

Forgot to mention that even though it's gramatically correct to write หรือ but when we say it, it's colloquially pronounced with different tone as รื้อ. (Similar situation as เขา (they), which is pronounced as เค้า)

So says Miss Texting.

But she may be alone in saying so.

If only she would read the thread before commenting she would realize that a lot of people suggest the pbeutd laew young เปิดแล้วยัง.

They can't all be dreaming it up on their own in their farang minds.

It is not what I recommend that a beginner learn first.

But it's certainly not incorrect under appropriate circumstances.

[Richard W]

My attitude is im not thrilled with people that try to teach thai to others incorrectly, <snip>

Well, let's look at your English then:

<snip>

"People that" shoud be "people who."

You slipped up there. It's "people which" that would be wrong, not "people that".

แล้วยัง is just wrong!

Forgot to mention that even though it's gramatically correct to write หรือ but when we say it, it's colloquially pronounced with different tone as รื้อ. (Similar situation as เขา (they), which is pronounced as เค้า)

So says Miss Texting.

But she may be alone in saying so.

(I've enlarged the Thai text because some of our older readers have difficulty reading Thai in the usual font size.)

I hope I've isolated the right text. I think you will find that หรือ, at least as a mark of interrogation, is frequently (I believe usually, but I may be wrong) pronounced with the high tone. Indeed, it sometimes gets written รึ,

Are we perhaps using too different senses of the word 'wrong'? There's 'wrong' as in Thais don't do it, and there's 'wrong' as in Thais shouldn't do it. We were recently treated to a heading saying something like '65% of Thai texting is wrong'. Seeing how easy it is to make typing mistakes, and how often predictive text has to be fought against, '35%' being correct might actually be a good performance.

[tgeezer]

Tahnil, you prove my point which is that there are many variations in language and this is more apparent now due to the Internet. We don't criticise, we call it spoken language.

When people say เปิดยัง I believe that there is a little pause, ng, or something suggesting that they are saying เปิดหรือยัง. If the correct form is not taught this little sound or pause will not be there when speaking quickly.

เอาหรือเปล่า after time, easily becomes เอา'ป่าว without native speakers input, but if เอาป่าว is taught, it is much more difficult to say and may never be understood. It could lead to misunderstanding the meaning of words like เปล่า and ยัง.

If you are for brevity and succinct speech, Thai is a good forum to promote that aim. Recognising the redundancy in English and not duplicating it in Thai has the effect of preserving the language and incidentally making Thai easier to learn.

You could take the English: have you opened yet? reduce it : Are you open? and translate it: เปิดหรือ

The ? Is redundant here because of the syntax, but Thai needs it : หรือ=?

To avoid an English dictionary you could leave it there if you believe that the questioner didn't intend to convey anything by 'yet'.

The kernel of truth I see in the official Thai dictionary here, is in the definition as a verb. Although 'spoken' ยัง is dutifully recorded: จะไปหรือยัง, ยัง*กินอยู่ etc. the definition of ยัง as a Verb: คงอยู่ มีอยู่ is the kernel of truth. eg. หมดแล้วหรือ> ยังมีอีก,กระทำให้ eg. ยังชีวิดให้เป็นไป ,ยังใจให้ชุ่มชึ่น. Preposition: ถึง, eg. แจ้งความมายังท่านทั้งหลาย สุ่: ไปยังบ้าน, ตลอด วันยังค่ำ คืนยังรุ่ง .

As preposition I think that the original meaning คงอยู่, มีอยู่ is probably lost in the mist of time, but perhaps you can enlighten me.

The obvious criticism คนไทยไม่พูด could be countered in your case with, ผมเป็นคนไทย.

What I am getting at is that if the fundamentals are learned first, the 'dross' can be seen for what it is and needn't be included. However we are where we are and there is no harm in what is "The phrase-book approach" but there is no need to be pedantic and try to enforce it.

* edited (predicted text) อย่าง to ยัง.

[tgeezer]

My attitude is im not thrilled with people that try to teach thai to others incorrectly, <snip>

Well, let's look at your English then:

<snip>

"People that" shoud be "people who."

You slipped up there. It's "people which" that would be wrong, not "people that".

แล้วยัง is just wrong!

Forgot to mention that even though it's gramatically correct to write หรือ but when we say it, it's colloquially pronounced with different tone as รื้อ. (Similar situation as เขา (they), which is pronounced as เค้า)

So says Miss Texting.

But she may be alone in saying so.

(I've enlarged the Thai text because some of our older readers have difficulty reading Thai in the usual font size.)

I hope I've isolated the right text. I think you will find that หรือ, at least as a mark of interrogation, is frequently (I believe usually, but I may be wrong) pronounced with the high tone. Indeed, it sometimes gets written รึ,

Are we perhaps using too different senses of the word 'wrong'? There's 'wrong' as in Thais don't do it, and there's 'wrong' as in Thais shouldn't do it. We were recently treated to a heading saying something like '65% of Thai texting is wrong'. Seeing how easy it is to make typing mistakes, and how often predictive text has to be fought against, '35%' being correct might actually be a good performance.

Richard, my era distinguishes between the pronoun for things as which, and the pronoun for persons as who. 'That' was not a pronoun in that sense. That determines the subject 'in my book' : That man... rather than, ... man that... .

As I said, why bother with English to justify Thai if it entails employing the Oxford Eng. Dict. only to find that the word was misused in the first place according to that source. Translating English can produce bad Thai, better to stay in one language. I don't say that there is bad English because there is no official English dictionary so it is possible that much thought incorrect can be proved correct!

I was discussing the need to write phonetically with a friend and he described it as having a bit of fun with the language. I would be shy of writing 'gonna' (my favourite gripe) even if I actually said gonna, which I don't believe I do.

I can't see the need to mess around with หรือ.

[Mole]

Tahnil, it was you who erroneosly suggested "แล้วยัง" and all this BS snowballed from here and all other people who you said also suggested "แล้วยัง" are also foreigners who appears to be just following your original erroneos suggestion.

So, I merely came along to get things straight. The reason why I'm alone in saying so is probably I'm the only native Thai in here. I suggest you go and check with some native Thai, such as your girlfriend, boyfriend, or something in between, then you can silently leave the room with the tail between your legs...

It's actually quite unfortunate that this thread has snowballed so far with the erroneos แล้วยัง.

People who probably won't be bothered to read through it all will only read the few first posts and thinks that แล้วยัง may be correct.

I also did read through the BS written in here, and was hoping that somebody surely would quickly come along and correct or at least suggest หรือยัง, but to my surprise and horror, nobody has yet. I'm starting to wonder of the level of proficiency of you people in here now...

We Thais don't say "แล้วยัง" but it's "หรือยัง". Often when spoken, it may sound like รื้อ or รึอ.

Often we even just skip the หรือ and simply say เปิดยัง, มายัง, กินข้าวยัง, but this require that we are already a bit acquainted with the person we speaks to, for example when talking to a neighbor or relative, or friend.

It's also OK if we say "เปิดยังครับ" to complete strangers. By adding ครับ at the end makes it more polite, so even though we skipped "หรือ" it's still perfectly understood.

To be really really polite, one can also say it fully "เปิดหรือยังครับ", but this would usually be said in a very formal setting, for example asking somebody at the bank or something like that.

[tgeezer]

Mole, you can also say เปิดไหม if you want a straight answer, can't you?

What do you see หรือยัง adding? It says: Open or staying the same(closed). Answer ยัง >staying the same.(closed) to me,

[Mole]

To get things straight again, แล้วยัง is incorrect no matter context or circumstances. PERIOD!

When to use ไหม or หรือยัง and the different meaning of these 2 words, think about this for example:

กินข้าวไหม and กินข้าวหรือยัง

Do you see the different meaning in those 2 examples?

That's the same with เปิดไหม and เปิดหรือยัง

เปิดไหม means: "Would you like to open?"

while เปิดหรือยัง means: "Are you open yet?"

So in any context, one use หรือยัง to ask if something has happened yet. แล้วยัง is just wrong.

[bearpolar]

unsurprisingly, when thanhil fails at making sense with his "bert" he attacks a dyslexic that wasn't exposed to english early on on a subject that has nothing to do with what is being discussed here(english grammar).

Mole, i just said that i hear แล้วยัง very often between friends. Do you mean its not used for people you've just met? That would make sense as its not formal, its slang.

[Mole]

You're merely hearing รึอยัง said and you think you hear แล้วยัง. Because people don't say หรือ but in another tone รื้อ which is the same tone as แล้ว.

Often when spoken fast, it may even sound like ละยัง เลอะยัง etc. But trust me, it's หรือยัง.

I suggest you ask your friend exactly what they're saying, or have them write it down to you and you will see that they'll write หรือยัง.

Trust me man, it's not even slang, I talk slang all the time. I am native Thai...

[Richard W]

For many men, that stumble at the threshold, are well foretold - that danger lurks within.

Can't say I like the punctuation, though.

Richard, my era distinguishes between the pronoun for things as which, and the pronoun for persons as who. 'That' was not a pronoun in that sense. That determines the subject 'in my book' : That man... rather than, ... man that... .

When was your era? Usage and Abusage, written in 1965, seems to prefer 'that' for restrictive clauses, seemingly on the basis that the text is better protected against bad punctuation.