Tongue Thai'd - the Mai pen rai approach

By Seymour Cumming

Heck, I've been here nearly two years now, suppose I'd better learn to speak a bit of Thai. Sure I know how to negotiate a bar fine in Thai and chase away those pesky flower seller children, but I figured not everyone's gifted enough to speak English, so thought I might have a bash. Just the other day I went into a McDonalds and, could you believe it, they couldn't speak English. My god, I'm going to write to the Thai tourist Authority and ask for my money back.

Well, I've got this private teacher, she's quite beautiful, and just what she's teaching me hasn't been properly established yet. Man I've tried learning but it's just too damn hard, it's them tones, erm...I mean, her sulky tone of voice. Gets me every time.

Anyways, I've been here long enough to figure out a few things. Firstly there's 'mai pen rai' , everyone knows this one. Things seldom go as planned in Thailand. They have a wonderful expression to deal with this. It goes ' mai pen rai' - which can mean 'no worries mate' or 'never-mind' or 'excuse me' or 'sorry, I screwed up, you're now booked on a train to Phnom Penh, but we'll get you there in the end' or an excuse for any disastrously disorganised event. Yup! If you only learn one Thai expression, this is it. Usually 'mai pen rai' is accompanied by a variety of different smiles, added as a nice touch of body language' to help interpret which 'mai pen rai' they're actually using.

There's the smirk 'mai pen rai' which I've interpreted to mean; 'another impatient farang getting all hotheaded over our carefree attitude and service'. There's the 'embarrassed giggle', meaning 'sorry my careless riding habits caused you to swerve into a pole and bang up your expensive bike, but shit happens'. There's also that 'sulky smile' which suggest you're overreacting, and my favourite is the sultry 'mai pen rai' which my girlfriend often uses when she shows up two hours late, usually it means 'sorry darling, I'll make it up to you later in the bedroom, and I won't insist we go shopping tomorrow'.

My favourite is the 'have pity on me smile' you get from those rich old mamas in their CRVs attempting a six point turn in the face of busy traffic. Often you'll also encounter the 'indifferent smile, with a shrug of shoulders' which suggests that although you've just been blatantly cheated out of your abundant farang money or received terrible service and the bloody thing they just fixed is even more broken than before, its too bad, life's like that. Mai pen rai. Life is fun, don't spoil it by getting angry, just say 'mai pen rai'.

Then there's 'mai mee', possibly the second most used phrase in Thai. It means 'not have', buggers use it all the time. At a restaurant they often use 'mai mee' for the first thing you choose off the menu, accompanied by a smile and a 'mai pen rai'. At the supermarket they'll answer 'mai mee' when you ask for something popular and essential, like a can opener. The other day I was in a huge appliance store, they had dozens of models of rice cooker in a variety of colours, but when I asked for plain old white I got a little embarrassed smile and...'ah mai mee ka'. You could be in a bookstore that has OS maps of every square inch of Thailand but try asking where the ones of Chiang Mai are and... you guessed it, you'll get a 'mai mee'. Of course you can use 'mai mee' yourself. At the immigration office they'll ask you for a photo and you can reply 'sorry, mai mee' (and smile of course), and when you ask if there is a photo booth nearby you'll get 'mai mee'd' back. And then there's the civil service. They spend all day saying 'mai mee' or a nice variation 'mai dai' (cannot). Property registry: mai mee, car registration forms: mai mee, 'receipt for monies paid: mai mee, guarantee: mai mee...

The other morning I was rudely awoken by my girlfriend demanding money. I squinted at her, half asleep and unable to think properly, but I was at least able to muster up 'mai mee', and promptly went back to sleep. I like this language, so expressive!

Investigative-journalist-at-large, Seymour Cumming has previously been a used car salesman, fruit picker, 'shock jock' and newsroom war correspondent. He has written for Farmer's Weekly, Nyet!, Chessworld and Cross-stitching Magazine.

He's been to more than 50 countries, some for less than a day, and is currently working on a travel novel, but he's written the author's biog, and not progressed much beyond that. His controversial commentary on ex-pat life in Thailand appears in Chiang Mai City Life Magazine.