As expected for a week or so now, my townhouse in Beungkum (Nuanjan) has been isolated. Everyone I know has left, not because the water's there, but because they have to cross water to get out. Hopefully it will stay as dry as it is now, but, again, one never knows, do one?
Tee says there are lots of crocodile stories (she told me the one about the kid). I asked why they weren't on the news, and she has this conspiracy theory that there's a blackout on them. Well, some of you know what I think of conspiracy theories in general, but I also believe that just becuz yer paranoid don't mean they ain't out ta getcha. Question authority, but be skeptical of the answers.
I'm still in Bangna, near Sukhumvit, a few minutes from the Chao Phraya River by bicycle, no less. But I'm still dry. Must have been the softest hand of fortune that led me to purchase down here.
Since I don't really have any substantive information to give, and my own life hasn't changed much, let me give you a puzzle. Here's what I'm dealing with every day. Understand first of all that Thai has no singular or plurals, no tenses, no gender, no cases (nominative, dative, ablative, etc) and a few other things. Ah, also no punctuation or capitalization. So, assuming you get the vocabulary right (which itself isn't always easy, as there are usually no spaces between words), the main problem in translating into English or another European language is to twist the original somehow so it fits into forms which do have those things, or at least some of them. So here is my puzzle, from something I was just working on. Can anyone make sense of this?
This time when spiritual guide praise host and invite come up and say something word two word Pa get up there he hold microphone center hand in middle many people at fair voice of he resound go generally big room and spread out get outside far general district temple pass speaker amplify sound in feeling me like Pa not get be of us family one only but become be person of community go too he get obtain acceptance from every person already in day that and this become be temporary time most big high most which Pa shall have get in life one of he.
I already did most of the heavy lifting here by getting the words. But if you can make it sound nice, now! That's what really counts. I wonder if your version will be better than mine.
No prizes, but I would like to see if anyone else can have fun with this kind of stuff. Put in a comment, if you like.
Till tomorrow, still avant le déluge . . .
Next notes: où est le déluge aujourd'hui?
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All right, we've had a couple of days, no takers on trying to reinvent the stream-of-consciousness translation above. Here's what I did with it, and it probably will change yet, but here it is:
ReplyDeleteAt that point the Abbot, spiritual leader of the community, spoke in praise of the person who had organized the event and invited him to come up and say a few words. Pa got up there, and all those people who had come to the fair stood and listened to him. He held the microphone in his hand and his voice resounded, deep and strong, filtering through the amplifiers, through the speakers, even reaching the people who stood outside the great room. I felt then that Pa wasn’t just a family member, but an important figure in the community as well. In that moment he was accepted by everyone who was there. This brief time was the pinnacle of Pa’s life, the very best it would ever get for him.
Congratulations! ... and is it any wonder that we Westerners have difficulty wrapping our minds around that Thai way of thinking ...
ReplyDeleteYeah, I tried. Your translation was WAY better. Gack. You have a seriously difficult job with that translation project!!! (but I know you're the perfect person for the job).
ReplyDeleteThanks, SuperM! It is actually serious fun in a very weird way. I keep kicking myself for being slow, but as you can imagine, even though I see what he's saying, it's hard to figure out how to say it in English.
ReplyDeleteOn the "spiritual leader" thing, I am actually not sure if it's the Abbot or not, it might be some sort of deacon. I'm waiting for the author to correct me on this, and he will, if it's wrong.
Now go one step back, and leave spaces out between words:
thistimewhenspiritualguidepraisehostandinvitecomeupandsaysomethingwordtwowordpagetupthereheholdmicrophonecenterhandinmiddlemanypeopleatfairvoiceof . . . and so on. This is more like what I'm seeing, only in Thai writing, which has 44 consonants and 33 vowels and sometimes the vowel is in front of the consonant, sometimes above, sometimes below, sometimes over, and sometimes on both sides and/or above. Then there are the tone marks, and the inherent tones that occur depending on whether the consonant is high, mid, or low, the vowel is long or short, and the syllable is "live" or "dead." That's just for starters. I think the people that are born into a Thai-English bilingual family have it way too easy!