Tangled up in Thai

So this blog entry might indeed be the first one that really reflects the title of this blog.

We knew when we started that the language was going to present special challenges. While on the one hand I’m very pleased to say we seem to be doing pretty well with speaking, writing, and reading; we are encountering some idiosyncrasies that we could not have foreseen.

Thai has 44 consonants and 32 vowels. The vowel sounds are pretty straightforward and pretty consistent. The “ee” sound is always “ee”. The “oo” is always “oo”. There are also compound vowels: “ai”, “aow”, “ooah”, and “eeah” among others. The problem is not consistency. The problem is identifying which letter they modify. Vowels are not letters so much as they are symbols. An “m” consonant with an “ai” becomes “mai”, with “eeah” it becomes “meeah”. And they can be a variety of places; some vowel symbols appear over the letter they modify, sometimes behind, sometimes in front of, and sometimes surrounding the letter (front, back, and above all at the same time). But their sound is consistent.

The consonants, however, aren’t always so. 25 of those 44 consonants have a different sound when they appear at the end of a word than they do when they are at the beginning of a word. Fifteen of them – including various “s”, “t”, “sh/ch”, and (admittedly) “d” – have the ending sound of “d”. There are eight letters that have some initial form of “t”.

But the letter that confounds me the most is ร. It’s letter name is pronounced (more or less) “rraw” (like a hard rolled German “r”), and that is it’s sound in the word. Except… when it’s not.

When ร has ท (“t”) in front of it, the two – what you would think would render “tr” – actually become an “s” sound. When ร follows ศ, ส, or จ; it becomes silent and has no effect on the word whatsoever. When two ร ร are clustered together between two consonants, they become the vowel sound “aw”. If there is only a leading consonant and the ร ร is at the end of the word, they become “ahn”.

Any questions?

Like Cirque de Soliel meets Night at the Improv

I’ve said it before. “If we’ve learned one thing on this journey it’s this: nothing is set in stone until after it happens. God likes to keep us on our toes.”

We have now been on the field in the ever-changing world of overseas ministry for two months. Yesterday was our fourth English teaching session at the village school, and might I say the most successful thus far. It was successful largely because we have learned enough Thai vocabulary (complete with tones) to begin to throw some of them into the teaching mix. Conveniently; we’re now teaching the words for the very same items to the kids that we are learning the words for in our classes. We have both a formal language teacher and a less formal language tutor. But the ages of our village students continue to descend. Yesterday was fourth grade, next week is third grade. Maybe they’re trying to find a class that we are smarter than…

A stateside friend of mine asked recently how we knew that coming to Thailand was really a call from God and not just (apologies to Charles Dickens) “an undigested bit of beef”. I’m going to repackage below what I wrote in response. More than anything; for us, it’s a matter of faith.

Do we ever doubt? Sure, but not the call. We doubt our ability to fulfill it, we question our sanity in coming here, but we don’t doubt that God has put us here for a specific purpose. We might wonder occasionally what that will turn out to be, but we don’t doubt that there is a purpose. It’s like being in love. There is no specific list of symptoms, you just know. But then, it’s also become more of a journey than a destination. This all started when we thought God was leading us one place. He was, but what we thought was the endpoint was just a milepost. Our job has changed even since we arrived. For us, the call has very seldom turned out to be to anything specific. It’s more a journey of being exactly in the place where God wants us. And yeah, that’s scary. It’s frightening, but it’s also freeing.

What we’ve learned over time is this: If it’s supposed to happen, it probably will. If it’s not supposed to happen, it probably won’t. But… just because it does or doesn’t is not supposed to mean that God isn’t using it or directing it. If it doesn’t, don’t give up because it simply means that God has something else. And if it does… be aware that it might be nothing more than a springboard to something else. It’s a bit like Cirque de Soleil meets Night at the Improv. You plan and practice and choreograph your moves, all so that you can change and adapt without a net in the middle of the trapeze act. Maybe it’s God checking if you’re really sincere in wanting it. And it’s when we are our weakest that God is strongest. It’s when we realize that we simply can’t do it that God steps in and shows us tools we didn’t know we had.

We’re happy to be finally learning the language, and receive the gratification that people seem to understand the limited words we use. We’re happy that God has chosen to serve a portion of the world through us. And we’re happy that there are still folks stateside who believe in our call and in the God who issued it.

We're not in Kansas anymore...

When I restarted the blog a couple of months ago, I said that it was going to be more or less… “a tally of lessons learned (both in and out of the classroom), and the joys and trials of following God to a vastly different side of the world.” Since we’ve now been here for four weeks (five if you count our time in Bangkok), I thought I’d put together a few observations of life in Southeast Asia. I’m hoping that these bring a smile to your face; feel free to laugh along with us.

One of the things I was most concerned with was learning to drive on the opposite side of everything. I am happy to report that it’s going well. Terrified screams are no longer coming from the passenger seat. It almost feels normal. And I’m getting used to people (cars, scooters, bicycles, pedestrians) just merging without warning; from the shoulder, from the next lane, from blind alleys. Lanes are interesting phenomena too. Standard operating procedure is that you have all of your lane, but you are also free to use up to half of each lane on either side of you. Just bear in mind that the person next to you has the same rough boundaries.

We will begin learning Thai mid-August. Right now, we’re in the midst of learning Australian. It’s actually harder in a way, because it is so similar to English. And prior to our Thai classes beginning, we will be starting to teach English to a class of 6^th graders in a nearby Isaan village. The goal will be teaching them conversational English. The kids know some vocabulary (it’s required learning) but they don’t necessarily know how to use it properly. We’ll be using role play and songs to help them become more conversational, we’ll be telling and acting out Bible stories, and we’ll help them get ready for 6^th grade English testing. Still, their English is already better than my Thai. That’s what you call ironic.

But perhaps the thing that has struck me the most over the past few days is that we are really here. It’s taken us so long to make this happen that the realization has been gradual. We’ve been sitting in meetings at our Area Retreat for the past few days, sharing what is happening in our lives. And it has struck me more than once that we’re really in Thailand. And… we’re going to be here for the next few years. We have finally realized the call that God placed on our lives almost four years ago. It’s actually sort of surreal.

Our Team Leader checked in with us the other day on how we’re doing. I admitted that I was both excited and terrified about teaching, about home schooling, and about learning. And I am: excited and terrified. But that’s good, because it means that I know I can’t do it all on my own. We need the Holy Spirit, and we need your prayers. Thank you for sticking with us.

Lost in Translation

It has been a challenge to get around these past several days. Spending a week “alone” in Bangkok was a very enlightening experience. For me it was motivational.

I have spent the majority of my professional career communicating with a wide variety of people. Pastoring, counseling, speaking, consulting, teaching, writing; I have become pretty skilled at being understood. For most of the last two weeks I have struggled just buying dinner. The majority of my interactions have been nothing more than a smile, a few gestures, a confused expression, and a half successful attempt at the few Thai phrases we have picked up.

I understand and ultimately agree with the notion that we needed to wait until we arrived to truly begin language learning. I would hate to learn wrong and have to try and re-learn. And again, for me, this has been a motivating time. I really want to learn Thai well, for a few reasons.

The first is practical. I can’t communicate with the world around me. I feel like a toddler; pointing and grunting and hoping the sales person has some idea of what I am asking for. Example: I went in last evening to pay the water bill at 7-11 (that’s where you pay some bills here, how cool is that?). The interaction consisted of me handing the clerk the bill, her telling me in Thai how much to pay (I already knew but I still didn’t understand a word she said), handing her a few Baht, and getting the receipt. I muttered ‘Kap cuhn krap” (“thank you” in Thai) and left.

The second is relational. Of course, this piggybacks on the first. I want to be able to have a conversation with the people, to learn about them and their culture. In fairness, many of the local Thai people – even in Ubon – speak decent English. Their English is far better than my Thai. But it’s deeper than that. Part of me I feels like I need to hide, to just keep my mouth shut. And I don’t want that. I want this to become a part of who I am.

The third is deeper still; I want to honor the people whose country I am living in. In those rare times that I was able to utter my pidgin-Thai and be understood, where I was able to assimilate a cultural act and not look clumsy; in those times the people responded very favorably. They responded with a lot of grace. And they seemed to genuinely appreciate that I had at least tried.

I have said all along that my goal is to learn the language well enough so that I don’t embarrass my kids. They have assured me that’s an impossibility. So that’s not my goal anymore. Now… my goal has become to learn the language well enough that I can truly honor our host country, well enough so that I can make the people feel like I feel their language and their customs are important. I want to learn well enough to make them feel like I feel they are important. 

Melancholy Excitement

Next week will begin many “firsts” for us. We’ll be living in another country, learning a new language and culture, and dealing with embassies on a regular basis. We’ll be in a different climate and a different time zone.

This week we have run across several “lasts”; the last time we will be able to do certain things for a very long time. Things such as:

• ·         take a ride on a Washington State ferry,
• ·         see our granddaughter in person,
• ·         complain about being too cold,
• ·         drive on the right (hand) side of the road,
• ·         be able to read a menu,
• ·         go to an English-speaking church…

      the list goes on. Pretty much every activity now brings reflection on whether it will be our “last” for a while. It’s causing a condition I’m calling “melancholy excitement”.

This is something we’re been planning and looking forward to for a few years. And it’s a good thing. But it’s also a realization that life is changing. We’re saying goodbye to friends, but we’re also saying goodbye to a way of life. We’re saying goodbye to comfortable.

There’s exhilaration. It’s a new adventure. But there’s also sadness and closure. 

Melancholy excitement. 

Transitions

We’ve gotten our stuff packed into our suitcases. We’re not shipping anything (a friend had asked me how many crates we were shipping… none). We’re not taking any shoulder bags (another friend asked if we were carrying anything beside the rolling bags… nope). All of what we’re taking has been stuffed into six checked rolling bags and four rolling carry-ons. The rest has either been left with friends or donated to someone with more need for it than we have.

I know that sounds sort of harsh, but we learned a lot on our Survey Trip. Among other things… when traveling through Customs – multiple times – don’t carry anything you don’t have to. It gets heavy. I almost think we might have brought more stuff on our Survey Trip. Just kidding. We have decided that most of what we will need we can get once we arrive, and most of the stuff we would have to ship really isn’t worth shipping.

It’s frightening, but it’s freeing.

Tomorrow – 19 June 2015 – we will drive out of Eugene for the last time for a long time. A week later we will be heading to Thailand with what we have deemed as the most necessary of our worldly possessions; most of our clothes, computers, one guitar and a mandolin, some Christmas decorations, and a few other things to make life in another world just a little more familiar. It’s a very exciting time, to say the least.

Unless something significant comes up, the next time I update this we will be in Bangkok. See you on the other side.

Bringing Back the Blog

"It's a dangerous business, Frodo, going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to." – Bilbo Baggins

When I originally began this blog almost four years ago, the idea was to keep a running commentary on our preparations for going overseas. We had recently joined Pioneers and were anticipating launching into Southeast “SoFarAwAsia” pretty soon after that. That’s not how things have worked out. Over the past three-and-a-half-plus years, we’ve learned that God’s timing is not always our timing. And quite honestly, we were beginning to wonder if it was ever really going to happen.

Slowly, over the months, the blog become more of a commentary not of our preparations, but of our attempts at self-encouragement. It became a tally of the ways we were telling ourselves that it surely had to be happening soon. But as time wore on, that became more and more difficult. And so, eventually, I stopped updating it entirely.

Here we go again.

Our tickets have been purchased. Our visas have been activated. We’re now (finally!) scheduled to land in Bangkok in the early morning hours of 28 June 2015, and then to Ubon on 3 July. The first few weeks of July will be orientation to the Team, then a Team Retreat, then back to Ubon to begin language and cultural training.

It’s time to bring back the blog.

“Tongue-Thai’d” was intended to be a play on words: exploring the joys and pitfalls of learning a language and culture that are so vastly different from what we’re used to. We chose that because we were going to begin learning language prior to departure. Yeah… that didn’t happen. But it’s about to begin, so we’re keeping the title.

I’m hoping over the next few weeks to share some of the processes we have gone through recently; getting our visas (a great story of the hand of God), saying final goodbyes, condensing our belongings into just a few suitcases. And then once we land in Thailand it will become a more of a tally of lessons learned (both in and out of the classroom), and the joys and trials of following God to a vastly different side of the world.

"I think I’m quite ready for another adventure!" – Bilbo Baggins