THAI LANGUAGE LESSONS
L31 - Jokes
Just a few jokes for a bit of fun but also useful vocabulary and examples of sentence construction.
The Thai word for joke is poot len, literally 'speak play'. You migt also hear lor len which is more of a tease then a joke. The Thai word for comedy is dtalok.
koon hen fai daeng mai ? ( did you see the red light? )
hen krup, pom mai hen dumruat. ( I did, I didn't see the policeman )
Thais quite like this one. It is not running the red light that was the mistake, it was getting caught. Note that hen is 'see'. So the question sentence is literally 'you see light red?' The affirmative answer is done by the typical Thai construction of repeating the verb hen krup. And then literally 'I didn't see policeman'.
meu-a wan pom soo yah, bpen pairng mahk ( yesterday I bought medicine, it was very expensive)
bpen yah arai ? ( what medicine was it? )
yah ma-ha ? ( Yamaha )
This joke is a silly little play on the Thai word yah which means medicine. meu-a wan (yesterday) pom soo (I bought) yah (medicine), bpen (to be) pairng (expensive) mahk (very).
So when you tell this one you hope the other person responds with something like bpen (to be) yah (medicine) arai (what).
And then you deliver the hilarious punchline yah maha - like the motorbike, see? You didn't buy medicine at all, you bought a yamaha.
First man: meu-a wan pom chon rot, pom mai kao jai tammai ( yesterday I had a car crash, I don't understand why )
Second man: koon mai kao jai arai ? ( what don't you understand? )
First man: rot korng pom mee pra yeuh ( my car has many buddha images )
Second man: koon kap rot bpai kwarm ray-oh tao rai ? ( how fast were you driving? )
First man: roy ha-sip gilomet ( 150 kilometers )
Second man: pom kao jai. way-la kwarm ray-oh gern roy ye-sip, pra ork rot ( I understand. When your speed goes over 120, Buddha gets out. )
Thais often carry Buddha images for good luck so in this joke a Thai man wonders why he crashed his car when he has so many Buddha images inside. So the first two sentences are straghtforward but note that chon is to crash or collide.
Then we have rot korng pom (my car) mee (has) pra (buddha image) yeuh (many). Note the pra in this case is a shortened form of pra poot om (buddha image) but can also be a shortened form of pra poot (buddha) or pra song (monk).
So the second man asks koon kap rot (you drive car) kwarm ray-oh (speed) tao rai (how much). The first man replies '150 kilometers an hour'.
So now the second man understands, pom kao jai (I understand). way-la (time) kwarm ray-oh (speed) gern 120 (more than 120), pra (Buddha) ork rot (leaves car).
Try them out on your Thai friends. They might laugh at your Thai more than the jokes but it is all good practice.