Interesting facts about languages: what Thai has that English and Russian doesn’t

Today we are going to talk about Thai and I will tell you what bits the Thai language has that English and Russian doesn’t have. Of course there are many more of these things but let’s divide the new knowledge into portions, shall we? Here are a few interesting facts about languages that I have been learning: Russian, English and Thai. Here are five of them.

1. Ok, let’s start with siblings. 

When we say in English (the same in Russian) ‘I have a sister’ what is the most common question we receive in return? Yes, that’s right – is she older or younger? Thai is much more specific about this: there is a special name for an elder sister – ‘peesao’ (that sounds funny, I know) and a special name for a younger sister – ‘nongsao’. It is the same with brothers – ‘peechai’ which is an elder one, ‘nongchai’ – a younger one.

My husband and my nongsao)))

2. Another ‘family’ moment. When we talk in English or in Russian to someone about our granny, we tend to specify whether she is on our mother’s side or father’s side. ‘A granny who is my mum’s mum’ – something like that. Why don’t more languages think up separate names for granddads and grandmas on mother’s and father’s side? That’s exactly what Thai people did! A grandma on mother’s side is called ‘yaah’ and on father’s side is called ‘yaai’. Granddad is either ‘paw’ if he is on mother’s side or ‘taah’ if he is on father’s side.

And it’s much more fun when it comes to aunts! You can have an aunt both on mother and father’s side, and your aunt can be either a younger sister to one of your parents or an elder sister. So in Thai there are four separate words for each case – ‘aah’, ‘naah’, ‘yim’, ‘paah’! Just imagine how convenient it is, and still we don’t have it either in Russian or English.

3. Next example of specifying things is about numbers. We call the number 10000 in words ‘ten thousand’ and the number 100000 in words ‘one hundred thousand’. ‘Oh, that’s too long!’ Thai people thought, and made up separate words for these numbers! They are ‘muen’ and ‘san’.

If you add 4000 Thai baht you’ll get the whole ‘muen’.

4. Going further. What would you do if you forgot how many days there are in June, for example? Or in November? Would you use the famous English rhyming verse (30 days has September, April, June…) like English speaking people do, or would you count using your knuckle bones like Russians do? Thai people would do none of that. Every month apart from February has ‘yon’ or ‘khom’ at the end. The months that have 30 days end on ‘yon’: ‘mesa-yon’ – April, ‘meetoona-yon’ – June. The months that have 31 days end on ‘khom’: fasebook-khom, ‘garagada-khom’ – July, ‘tula-khom’ – October, ‘pruesapa-khom’ – May.

5. But on the other hand, the Thai language offers you a very knotty system of addressing other people. If you want to address someone in the street, you can go with ‘khun kha/krap’, which literally means ‘you’. By the way, that’s exactly the reason why those Thais who don’t speak good English may address a foreigner ‘you’. If you are unaware of the reason, it may sound extremely rude.

So, let’s get back to the point. ‘Khun kha/krup’ is the most common way to address unknown people. But educated Thais address strangers depending on their… age! (In Russian people address strangers depending on the sex and do it very clumsily.) For example, if you want to talk to a person who looks older (and higher in status) than you, you say ‘pee kha/krup’. If you want to talk to someone who is younger than you, you should say ‘nong kha/krup’. If a person is about your parents’ age, then you say ‘naah kha/krup’. If a person is about your grandparents’ age, then you say ‘yaai’ for females and ‘taah’ for males.

So that’s probably all. What do you think of these interesting facts about languages? What other interesting facts about languages do you know?