Lost in Translation

Having spent a number of years in Thailand, learning the culture and grappling with the language, I really empathise with people who have to communicate in a language other than their own. I am deeply grateful for my Thai friends who patiently smiled and nodded, and gently corrected me, as I massacred their language over the years. There were a number of embarrassing moments when I said things that came out wrong, or that just didn’t make any sense at all. These were all very frustrating at the time, but one thing that helped me to keep things in perspective, and to see the funny side of language study, was when I came across some equally horrendous English translations.

I once got involved in an online debate about the effectiveness of Google Translate. I argued that it was only of value if one was able to speak a moderate amount of Thai or English and that it could never be used to converse with people in Thai if you were English, or in English if you were Thai. The reason is that it provides a direct translation of a sentence word for word and is not (yet) capable of translating an entire concept captured in a sentence. This is patently clear from the examples below of menus that were clearly translated using something like Google Translate - broken up into its component parts, each of these translations are correct, but as you will see, the overall result is less than satisfactory.

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Development

I’m in Lampang at the moment. A largish town in North Thailand, about 100km south of Chiang Mai. We moved here from Chiang Mai in 2008 and I must admit, at that time, it was quite a shock to the system. You see, Lampang was rather, shall we say, ... rural. It has the unique, if somewhat dubious, distinction of being the only town in Thailand that still uses horse-drawn carriages. Well, the tourists use them anyway. The reason it was a shock to the system is because the entire town, with a population of approximately 160 000 people, had but one large supermarket, which stocked very basic goods. I had business in Chiang Mai about once a month and I would use that opportunity to stock up on “luxury” goods, such as chocolate that was made from milk, not wax, baking ingredients such as vanilla extract, jelly beans, and from time to time, clothing. On the rare occasion that the whole family went, we would splash out and go to a restaurant that served Western food (the closest thing that Lampang had in that department was a Pizza Company, which was more Thai than Western). Going to Chiang Mai always made me feel like a country bumpkin going to the city for the first time. I used to walk around with my eyes bulging and mouth hanging open at what the “big city” had to offer. If time allowed, I would go for a really big treat — an English movie at the cinema! And it was always with a sense of relief that I would retreat to the quiet country backwaters of Lampang after a hectic few hours of retail therapy in Chiang Mai.

But that has all changed! In the 2 years since we left, Lampang has shaken off its sleepy hollow image and has become a retail mecca to be reckoned with. There is a new, ultra modern, 3-story mall, complete with Starbucks, high-end clothing stores, numerous restaurants and even a 5-theatre state-of-the-art cinema, with English movies. But thats not all, in addition to the high-end mall, other large shopping centres have sprung up. A Macro, a large warehouse hardware store (my favourite kind of shop) and a few others. Lampang has rushed headlong into the 21st century at a dizzying speed, and in the process has lost something of the charm that it had before.

Now, far be it from me to deny the denizens of Lampang the pleasure of first-world shopping experiences and Starbucks coffee, but as far as I can see, there are no new corporations, factories or office buildings in Lampang. So I cannot help but wonder where these simple, country people have suddenly got the money from to spend at these high-end malls and shopping centres. I’m sure the marketers have done their research, but I sure do hope that the malls, the clothing stores, the restaurants and the coffee shops are sustainable in the long run, and I hope that hard-earned savings aren’t being frittered away, drawn by the lure of materialistic hedonism. And I hope that credit cards aren’t being maxed out in pursuit of worldly delights.

Sadly however, I suspect they are.

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Beginning of a new year

The Roman poet, Virgil, once wrote

fugit irreparabile tempus

which when translated from the ancient Latin vernacular means, "time flees irretrievably”. More commonly, we tend to say “time flies”. I guess its a shared experience between those of us who are older than 35 to be alarmed at the speed with which each new year comes by. In my experience, the extent of that alarm is directly proportional to one’s age. By the time I’m 60, I’m going to have take Valium with my breakfast come January 1. Now don’t get me wrong! I’m not old, nor do I feel old, but time does seem to be speeding up the older I get.

There are a few interesting theories that try to explain that effect. One is telescopy - this is simply the underestimation of time. Just as things look close when viewed through a telescope, so past events are seen as having occurred more recently than they actually did. Then there is the reminiscence effect - when we’re young, we’re doing new things for the first time, but as we age, we fall into routines (ruts sometimes) and what used to be new and exciting becomes mundane. I would have thought that would make time drag, but according to scientists, regular events tend to pass by in a blur because they are not emotionally charged. The third theory has to do with the ageing of the suprachiasmatic nucleus, or the brain’s biological clock - this has something to do with circadian rhythms and the ends of one’s DNA strands fraying like shoelaces...?

Anyway, it would appear that the perceived speeding up of time as we age is a scientific fact, not merely a sneaky feeling. And here we are, having sped, at a dizzy speed, through the first month of yet another year. I have a feeling though, that this year is going to be a significant one (not that previous ones were insignificant). Its just that this year will see me turning 47. It will see the wife of my youth turning 46, 44, er...45ish. It will see our 12th year in Asia (our 3rd in Singapore). Most significantly, it will see our return to South Africa in December.

This is significant because when we left SA 12 years ago, I thought that I would go back in order to retire. Happily, or maybe unhappily, I will not be going back to retire. Instead, I will be going back to start a new chapter in my life. A new work with OMF, done in a new way, in a new era. I am very excited about going back although I do expect things have changed a lot in the past 12 years. I know I have changed in terms of my thinking and expectations. My personal circumstances have also changed in that I will be going back with 3 children, having left 12 years ago with none. When we left for Thailand in 2003, we had to learn a new culture and a new language. We had to learn to live in a different country. The same when we moved to Singapore. I suspect, apart from having to learn the language, our move back to SA is going to require a similar learning curve to the one we went through when we moved to Asia.

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Bureaucracy

Bureaucracy sucks wherever you may find it, but when faced with a sea of bureaucrats in a country and language other than one's own, its that much harder to maintain one's sense of humour. I recently faced that here in Thailand.

I purchased a new motor vehicle in Chiang Mai towards the end of April. Part of the deal was that the dealership would, at no extra cost, register the vehicle in my name- i.e. no red tape to deal with. I provided the dealership with all the documents they needed and they told me it would take a week or two to have the vehicle registered in my name. In the meantime, I was given a temporary red number plate (paay deang) to use. One week after purchasing the vehicle I moved to Lampang, a town 100km south of Chiang Mai. Biiiig mistake!

After I had moved to Lampang, I was told, via the car dealership that the authorities in Chiang Mai wanted proof of residence and that I should go to the Immigration Office in Chiang Mai to apply for the necessary document providing proof of residence. So I made the journey, only to find out that the Immigration Office had stopped issuing these documents months ago. I was told to contact my embassy in Bangkok. Fortunately, I had business to attend to in Bangkok, so I picked up the necessary document (which was full of typo's!). Another trip to Chiang Mai, to the vehicle dealer to provide proof of residence. When the vehicle registration authorities in Chiang Mai saw that I was resident in Lampang, they informed me that I had to register the vehicle in Lampang. So I had to make another trip to Chiang Mai to collect all the registration documents from the dealer. It was now up to me to register the vehicle myself in Lampang. It took me 3 days to find the relevant authorities in Lampang, and when I submitted the documents to them, they informed me that one of the pages (in a bundle about 10 pages thick!) needed to be stamped by the Chiang Mai office. So back to Chiang Mai to have a jolly rubber stamp put on a page.

Finally! All the documents stamped and signed and ready to go, I went to the Lampang vehicle registration authorities. After standing in 3 queues I was rudely told that my vehicle needed to be inspected first and that I was to join the queue of vehicles. This queue went halfway around the building, so I gave it a miss and went home. This happened twice more and finally, the 4th time I go, I decide to brave the queue, which is about 10 cars long (at 8am!). 2 hours later my brand new vehicle is "inspected". I am given an extra wad of papers and told to report to counter 4. Counter 4 signs and stamps some of my papers and sends me to counter 11. Counter 11 peruses my documents for 10 minutes and sends me back to counter 4. Counter 4 doesn't know why I'm back, but I refuse to leave until they clarify with counter 11 what the problem us. Counter 4 phones counter 11 and tells them off. Back to counter 11 I go. They take half an hour to process my forms. They take my money and I start to see a light at the end of the tunnel - or maybe its just the train! Counter 11 sends me to counter 15. After an hour-long wait at counter 15, I finally get my new registration plates. Yippee ! I'm outa there, but no! wait! Gotta go back to counter 11 to get the blue registration book. After another 1 hour wait I finally get my blue registration book and this time I really am outa there before they find some other problem.

Mission accomplished. Final score = Total distance traveled in getting all the necessary documents to register my new car that I paid cash for - 1900km. Total time taken from date of purchase to date of registration -3 months. Total mileage on new vehicle before its finally registered - 8000km. Now you can't beat that for an exercise in bureaucratic inefficiency and patience stretching!











Before and After

Rice Planting

July is the beginning of the rainy season in Thailand. That also means that its time to plant rice. Everybody clubs together to help with the planting and its an interesting time in rural Thailand as all available hands head out to the rice paddies. Suddenly finding a builder or a handyman, or even a mechanic, becomes impossible and little odd-jobs are put on the back burner for a while.

The whole process starts with seed beds that have been prepared in advance. These are harvested and the rice seedlings are bundled.

(The ladies in this picture are harvesting and bundling rice seedlings to be replanted in prepared paddies).



At the same time, paddies that have been lying fallow are prepared by pumping water into them. Thailand literally has thousands of water canals (called khlongs) which are used for this purpose.

(Water being pumped out of a khlong into a paddy - note in the background the 2 dry paddies)


After the water in the paddies has made the soil soft and mushy, its time to dig it up, or plow it. For this they have a fancy contraption that looks like a generator on 2 big wheels.

This is what they used in the good old days and will probably revert to if fuel prices keep going up!











Once the paddies have been plowed, they are ready to be planted. Now the back breaking task begins as rows of people stand shin-deep in water, bent double, as they plant the rice seedlings. (Aaagh! It hurts my back just looking at them!)
In a few months time the rice crop will be ready for the harvest.