The Epiphany of Language- It’s Only a Medium, Neither Rare nor Well Done

The American lady got on the Taiwan to US leg of my trip, where I stopped to change planes. She spoke fluent Chinese, even reading it in her spare time, which there’s plenty of from Asia to the US, even with a tail wind. If you were blindfolded I doubt that you could’ve picked out the non-native speaker from the group. I felt sorry for her. She may have even been a native speaker, for all I know. That would be insult to injury, because no matter how good she spoke, the flight attendants would always switch back to English the first chance they got, even though they probably knew no more than a hundred words of English each and the American lady probably had a Ph.D. in Chinese language. That’s just what they do. Welcome to Thailand. A South American flight attendant once explained to me, in Spanish, that they’re trained to look at people to make a determination of what language needs to be spoken. She did that after telling me, “I assume you don’t speak Spanish,” to which I promptly answered, “porque no?” Of course she was right if referring to native language, which does tend to follow traditional racial and facial patterns, which works until someone finds himself on the wrong side of a line, or until a person speaks multiple languages, the more diverse the more bizarre. I felt sorry for the American lady regardless, Chinese to the end, making calls in Chinese while the plane was still taxiing on the runway. I would’ve liked to have gotten more of her story but wo bu shi zhongguo ren.

Would multiple languages imply multiple personalities? Could you invest your identity in more than one or two languages even if you wanted to? Score one for Chomsky. French-speaking Belgians like to refer to the Flemish (Dutch)-speaking areas as something totally distinct culturally, though as a matter of historical fact, the ‘Dutch’ are merely Franks who remained un-‘Romanized,’ in a poorly-documented process that continues to this day, though Belgium itself was born in the early 1800’s European confusion of Spanish succession and Napoleonic conquest. If there is indeed a cultural difference between Germanic Franks and Germanic Dutch, then it could certainly be reflected in the language whether or not a direct result of it. Score one for Sapir and Whorf. Notwithstanding their linguistic imaginary Maginot line against the creeping onslaught of English in Quebec and elsewhere, the French are guilty of the same in Belgium where the line of ‘Romanization’ crawls northward, claiming Brussels already with no end in sight. What would Chomsky say about that? Feel free to comment, Noam, or I’ll vent my spleen about you making me parse sentences as a grade-schooler. How many of you even knew that Chomsky used to be a linguist? I suppose political commentary pays better, considering that foreign language is more typically the realm of hotel clerks, taxi drivers, and ladies of the evening looking for pick-ups with stick-shifts. Thus some of the best-educated people in the world know the fewest languages, it being a muddy field without even the most rudimentary maintenance, while a tribal person may know five or six, being largely unconcerned with technical perfection, and more focused on the means to an end. Certain sounds bring a certain result; that’s the important thing.

Thais seem to think language is a racial thing, largely disallowing it in a person of foreign extraction unless it appears that they may be ‘half-breed Thai.’ Not only do they allow that, but revel in some of the unique combinations that might arise. Those chosen many, both bastard and legit, find ready work in the entertainment industry, singing and dancing and acting in soap operas. In a sense Thailand is almost like a giant breeding experiment, not unlike the produce section in your local ‘fresh market’ or Big C. There you’re likely to find at least three or four varieties of ordinary fruit like papaya, orange, banana, pineapple, and mango in addition to exotic mangosteen, jackfruit, guava, tamarind, custard apple, durian, litchi, and others, some of which you might find in Spanish or Latin American markets, but likely never in the ‘super’ markets of Northern Europe or the USA. Top-of-the-line oranges are invariably the ‘honey’ line, juicy and thin-skinned with no fiber but very sweet, like honey I suppose, until they go bad. Any comparison to Thai women would probably be inappropriate here. If faced with a foreigner speaking Thai well with no obvious genetic relation, Thais will even be satisfied conceptually if the foreigner has a Thai wife, as if traits that couldn’t be passed along blood lines might instead be passed along in other bodily fluids. In reality the typical Thai woman is frequently hostile to her partner speaking the local language, as inexorably linked with status as it is and the Thai obsession with such. Even when sympathetic the Thai woman herself might hardly qualified to teach beyond the elementary level to which she herself has probably studied, maybe not enough to satisfy a Westerner truly looking to master a language. Modern ‘pop’ Thai has so much English in it that speaking Thai correctly frequently involves learning how to speak English incorrectly.

I’ve often wondered if my slowness in picking up the French language was because I just wasn’t ‘French’ enough. In reality it probably has more to do with finding a French-speaking place that I like enough to hang around and learn the language. It’s hard to learn the language of a place you don’t especially like. There are very few places in the world where French, and French only, is spoken, especially since its quirkiness inspires simplified pidgins around the world, not necessarily mutually intelligible. French-as-a-second-language is only partially effective, also, since it’s the ability to comprehend the speech of others that is the true measure of one’s progress. Speech fluency itself is totally subjective, and subject to shifting motivations. If a Thai bar girl decides she doesn’t want to condescend to speak Thai with old man Chomsky, then he effectively can’t speak Thai, no matter how much he may indeed know, no matter that he may indeed be the ‘smartest person in the world.’ Many women also may see it as their duty to adopt the language of her husband when they’re from different backgrounds. Maybe that’s the ‘something borrowed’ being talked about. In Thailand if a girl has a checkered past and would rather play chess the acquisition of a foreign husband and/or some English language is one way to turn a pawn into a queen in a country where such things carry high status. In many other countries it would carry low or no status. In Asia ‘marrying up’ seems to have a long history which remains unchallenged to this day, whereas in the West such notions are largely discredited. About the time American women were declaring that they don’t want to be sex objects any more, Asian women were declaring, “We do!” The rest of course is history.

It’s hard to shut a foreigner out verbally, of course, when he can understand every word the locals say and jump into their conversation any time he wants. I personally like to watch the evening news to test myself and my comprehension in countries where I want to learn the language. The language of news is correct, well spoken, and getting the content itself is a motivation factor. The scuttlebutt was that Margaret Mead in fact couldn’t speak Samoan worth a damn, so what does that say? If true does that diminish her work? Do the sexual mores of Samoa depend on her command of the language? Take a lesson from the taxi drivers- if you see a short cut, then take it. What the American lady maybe didn’t realize is that to a Chinese person all languages are Chinese, whether the words are or not, nouns and verbs like meat and vegetables prepositioned into word-ordered recipes, chopped and stir-fried in a blazing hot wok, sparks gently slapping your face in light hot licks, and then emptied in front of your face on to the plate, a little pool of oil draining off to lubricate the rice. It’s all digital now; anything is possible when you can count to ten in base two and get 1010 without a bunch of ritualistic magic squiggles intervening. The complicated old conjugations and declensions are a thing of the past, outmoded formulas ‘going Chinese’ for greater speed and adaptability, isolating and analytic, every word equal and multi-tasking. English has long led the Germanic languages in this direction, as French has somewhat less for the Romance, coincidentally each the strongest nation in its linguistic family. Does heterosis, hybrid vigor, occur in language? Let’s ask Noam.

Flagstaff: Might as well be Chiang Rai or Huaraz or TJ

Welcome to the new era of the generic ex-pat. It used to be that people would ‘end up’ in remote corners of the world because of some curious connection- marriage, work, research, ethnicity, or such. The highly motivated immigrant would likely be well-versed in local lore and quite proficient in the local lingo. He had to be. He might even ‘go native’ and adopt the local garb and hang out with the local residents. All that’s changed now. These days the connections are more spurious than curious, and the local garb is Kmart classic. The only question facing the would-be ex-pat now is “Which country?” as though the only differences were quantitative, particularly financially. Though many countries are wary of casual ‘unofficial’ immigrants like me, there is a plethora of those courting the retiree trade, especially those with a surplus of nurses, like Thailand. These guys usually are largely ignorant of the local culture and rate their experience by its similarities to ‘back home’. Similarly, they rate locals by how Westernized they are, particularly linguistically. Thais even rate each other by how well they speak English, as if any of them were qualified to judge. The Mexican border area also rates well in this area of service and, accordingly, those areas have their fair share of retirees and weekend adventurers, Americans usually, of course. But you can go to the Dominican Republic, Philippines, Morocco, Guatemala, Brazil, Bali, India, or many others, and find similar situations. This is a growing trend, pasturing the herds. What they all have in common are low prices (relatively), nice weather, appropriate services, and a reasonable level of safety.

‘Convenience’ ex-pats like this tend to follow geographic and linguistic lines. So Spaniards, Portuguese, and especially, Italians, tend to gravitate toward Central and South America, linguistically and culturally similar. French can go both ways, of course, but heavily support their cultural and linguistic cousins in North and West Africa. Au contraire that they are, they tend to grant higher status to black Africans in France itself than they do to Arabs, different from most other ‘high’ cultures. Familiarity breeds contempt I guess. If they hurry they can still find some francophones in old French Indochina, that is Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, though those numbers are fading fast before the onslaught of English. Englishmen and northern Europeans tend to prefer those who prefer them, cultural pragmatists like Thailand that prize the English language above all else, and the genuine English speakers like the Philippines, India, and Anglophone Africa. Southern Europeans are conspicuously absent in Southeast Asia and the ones who do wade through the mental confusion might wish they hadn’t. Once I was summoned to translate for an Italian who found himself lost in my neighborhood. He and I had a nice conversation in Thai while a group of Thais stared on dumbfounded, finally ‘getting it’ toward the end. He spoke no English. We didn’t get around to Spanish.

Many times I’ve spoken ten or fifteen minutes in Thai with Thais when they suddenly felt inspired to ask, “Can you speak Thai?” What can you do? Patience, patience, suffer it gladly; or suffer it still, whether gladly or not. Still the pragmatism and wifely flexibility shine through. One prominent Thai web dating service has information in eight languages, including Dutch, Norwegian, Japanese, and Swedish, none of them major languages, but excluding Chinese and Spanish, the world’s first and third most-spoken languages in the world. They know where the bread is being buttered. It even has Thai language; what the Hell, why not? It’s surprising how many Western men in the Thai dating service are in their thirties. The women are overwhelmingly in their twenties. That may be more the medium than the message, youth being more ‘net’-oriented. The reality ‘in-country’ is certainly toward older foreign males. Maybe the new generation of Thai females doesn’t want to wait around to be dumped by their Thai husbands as they turn thirty.

Then there are the ex-pats like me, long-time travelers and avid adventurers, imbued with ethnicity and in love with language. It’s not necessarily like we could be anywhere, though we almost could, it’s more like we want to be everywhere. We don’t look for the easiest places to be, the paths of least resistance; we look for challenges. We look for authenticity. Personally I wouldn’t be in Thailand if I weren’t inextricably involved at this point and a bit over the hill where oats are usually sowed. Thailand’s really almost TOO easy, too willing to emulate the northern European model to the point that authentic Thai culture has to be searched for at deeper levels, with mixed results. You can avoid the interface people and the interzone girls, refusing to speak English, but ultimately you can only do that effectively by moving to areas where that is minimal, and those are few. Everybody wants the new hybrid reality, almost in direct proportion to the extent that they celebrate their ‘Thai-ness.’ It’s always been that way, the Siamese being a hybrid Chinese blend long before they ever thought about affiliating themselves with their tribal ‘Tai’ and Lao cousins. The word ‘Tai’ entered the English lexicon in 1895. The word ‘Thai’ followed in 1902. Siam changed its name to Thailand in 1939, under an onslaught of Chinese immigration.

This is similar to the Irish celebrating their Gaelic ‘Irish-ness’ while following customs and language that are generally English. The English and Americans do it, too, ‘Celtic’ traditions apparently being transmitted through Irish pub culture and traditional music. In reality the last stronghold of Celtic language in the British Isles is in Wales, though it’s not Gaelic, and it’s hardly acknowledged. Nobody goes to Welsh pubs. The language closest to English language itself is to be found back across the channel in the Frisian islands, those who never left with their Saxon and Jute cousins, speaking another modern tongue whose ancestor was Anglo-Saxon, just like ours. It’d be interesting to hear how intelligible it is, if at all. Do the French celebrate the same thing as the Irish when they remember their Roman-era ‘Gallic-ness’? I wonder. Do modern Turks celebrate their Roman-era ‘Galatian’ roots, now long assimilated? I doubt it. They aren’t usually kind toward minor cultures within their boundaries. Ask the Armenians and Kurds. The Celts, probably one of the earliest of Indo-Europeans to break away from the pack, seem to have abandoned their language at every juncture. I suppose it wasn’t a very good one. They were better at applied mechanics, and beer. The culture hangs on precariously. Score one for Sapir and Whorf. Pragmatism loses a point.

So where do you go if you want the third world without leaving your modern developed country? After all, that’s what people like me are after, regardless of where we actually find ourselves. We’re culture jocks looking for culture shock, in the downtown slums and in the remote border areas. If you’re European, you head for the far reaches of the Carpathians and the Pyrenees, and even then you might not be satisfied. Cost is a factor, after all. You’ll do better in America. There are still ethnic enclaves in Cajun Louisiana, the Mexican border areas, and Indian country, especially the southwest. When I first came to Flagstaff twenty years ago, you could still see Navajo women on the street in full silver-and-turquoise regalia, not to mention street drunks frequenting several Indian bars. They’ve long been replaced by lawyers and dentists, Deadheads and Trustafarians. The ethnicity may still be there, or out at the WalMart, at least, but the scene has been sanitized. That random element of disorder is priceless. It can’t be mocked-up at tourist-oriented ‘Indian villages.’ That’s what the Third World is all about, and to some extent, any place will do. When I’m stuck in the States, I found solace across the border in Ensenada. If I’ve got a month to kill, hardly enough time to go back to Asia, I’ll catch a cheap flight to Peru and a seven-hour ride to Huaraz- instant Andes (and no jet lag). Or maybe go to Guatemala and hang with the Mayans in Quezaltenango or the Garifuna at Livingston. The possibilities are endless. The flights are cheap, probably cheaper than living in the US full-time, certainly Europe. Of course, there’s always Alaska, where you can kill two birds with one stone, ethnicity and the elusive Arctic Circle. I saw the northern lights at Fairbanks in my first hour there. It’s like Flagstaff twenty years ago, Indians and college students. Athabascans across the border in Canada even call themselves Dene’. It’s a small world… and a narrow strait. Is Tijuana really any different from Tangier (Tanjah), the ‘other TJ’? When you get the itch, head for the border, any border.

Thailand’s F***** word

Farang: 1) person of European extraction, 2. anything of European extraction, 3. guava. So here in Thailand potatoes are man farang, white people are khon farang, and Christmas is trut farang, ad infinitum.

So go the Thai dictionaries, talking much and explaining nothing, not least of which is the origin of the f****** word. It follows you around like a bad smell if you’re a white person in Thailand. It speaks volumes if you’re Thai. It explains why the weather’s hot and the food is not. It explains why some cars are big and so are some bellies. In fact, there’s not much that can’t be described as either Thai or Farang, or maybe sometimes Chinese, but that’s a sore subject, because Thais are sure of nothing so much as that they’re NOT Chinese, even though, genetically, well, you’d be hard-pressed to find the chromosomal difference and in raw immigration figures, well, that’s OK, because they ‘become’ Thai, if not in the first generation, then at least by the second or third. That’s convenient, since their features are largely indistinguishable facially and racially. It’s even more convenient since they run the country. Chinese names are forbidden to be used by Thai citizens and Chinese language is only recently making a comeback because of its obvious commercial utility and the success of the China Dolls’ song ‘Wo Ai Ni’ across the sub-continent in both Thai and Mandarin languages. Thais are nothing if not pragmatic. The number of pragmatists walking the streets of Pattaya after midnight would shock the socks, and maybe more, off Jesus, Muhammad, and Hasan-e Sabbah, too. The Buddha just smiles. He’s seen all this before.

Farangs are different, regardless of what you call them, be it Gringo, Gaijin, or Lao Wai. They have to mess with everything, sticking their big noses where they don’t belong, Africa, Asia, and America, building factories and building fences, drawing lines and claiming countries. The last Mexican governor of California Pio Pico probably said it best as he saw his state being overrun by Yankees “cultivating farms, establishing vineyards, erecting mills, sawing up lumber, building workshops, and doing a thousand other things which seem natural to them, but which Californians (i.e. Mexicans) neglect or despise.” And he was Spanish, a European mind you, so the distinction is as much cultural as racial. This has always been my objection to the term ‘Farang’, in that the white skin itself means nothing, and says much more about the person using the term than the persons referred to. Does a Russian really have anything in common with a Portuguese person? In most cases the people referred to are northern European of course, they of the Industrial Revolution and the Big Bang for your buck, the same ones who forced China and Japan’s ports to open at gunpoint. Farang. They mess everything up. The nay-sayers have a point to be sure, the list of transgressions easily filling the narrow zone between Iraq and a hot place. But Farangs also brought “liberte’, egalite’, and fraternite’”, democracy and doughnuts, on their wish list. So the problem, if there is one, is largely academic, and depends on the tone of voice to establish its intent. Any word can be insulting if it’s said in an insulting way, and of course if I want to use the word, then that’s fine, just as any black American feels free to use the ‘N’ word.

My objection to the term ‘pahsah Farang’ (Farang language) has been especially vitriolic, objecting to the former Premier’s use of the term as especially misguided. “There is no such thing as Farang language! It’s English,” I would object. On this I concede defeat. There is a ‘pahsah Farang’ and long has been, likely even being the origin of the term in Asia. It started in the Crusades, when all Europeans were considered ‘Franks’ by the homies, and their language was the ‘Frankish language’ or lingua franca, literally ‘pahsah Farang’. This was not French, mind you, but a mixture of French and Italian and anything else handy in the Mediterranean region, maybe a final attempt to re-unify Latin. Marco Polo wrote in it, or something like it, it being fluid by definition. The term now means ‘compromise language, used when there is no common language’. The common jargon typically spoken by Thais with foreigners would hardly qualify as real English, but it would certainly qualify as Farang language. It’s as though nothing has changed except that Pidgin English has supplanted Pig Latin as the axis of Western civilization moved west, and the rest is history. And so is the mystery also solved as to where the term ‘Farang’ comes from. Most have assumed a derivation of ‘France’. Well, close, but not exactly, for those were the days of the Holy Roman Empire and nationalism was still but a racial wet dream. Thus those Romanized post-Gallic Germanic Franks left their imprint on the footnotes of history. They must have had a lot of gall.

Of course the issue is not so academic when you have to hear the word all the time, usually directed at you, if you’re of European extraction. It’s not so insulting as it is tiring, until somebody gets the bid idea to charge you ‘Farang price’. Now we’ve got a problem, and it’s hard to avoid when the government itself does it, as in Laos. Well, OK, maybe foreigners shouldn’t get the socialist subsidized rate on public transportation. I doubt they’ve signed on to the WTO. Vietnam even charges three rates, one for locals, one for foreigners, and one for returning overseas Vietnamese. Communist Vietnamese don’t miss too many tricks at turning a buck, usually at your expense. If the street vendor smiles too largely, beware! He’s probably ripping you off! Thailand should be beyond such nonsense, but don’t be too sure. Prejudices die hard, even petty ones. The local ChiangMai-ChiangRai bus at one point printed on the ticket, in Thai of course, that ‘full Farang price’ was paid. Huh? (I don’t make this stuff up btw.) Interestingly, I never found any proof that there was an actual price differential, so the issue, as usual, was one only of principle and symbolism and good manners. These things matter. Ask Kramer. The blurb was eventually removed at someone’s behest other than my own btw. I persevere, and have developed a non-responsive psychological ‘blocking mechanism’, which is basically a way of ignoring problematic speech and behavior. Ignore the ignorance! Now there’s some useful symmetry for you.