thial and error

Yes, I have been working on my Thai. Oddly, being married to a Thai native for 18 years hasn't helped me speak or read Thai, except in very specific circumstances. It's not her fault. One of the foundations of our initial romance was actually my tutoring her in English. I guess that explains why I'd rather spend time teaching her English than having her teach me Thai. However, she might soon regret it. It depends how deeply we try to immerse ourselves here, in Thailand.

If you've never thought about it, you might not know how confusing fonts are. Ohh, how cute, all those different fonts we have for our alphabet! It's not cute. It's evil. Even having narrowed it down to 2 primarily used Thai fonts, I am dreading the prospect that I will basically have to learn 2 new alphabets! None of the Learn Thai videos make any mention of this thorn in one's side.

And no, this is not my first attempt to learn Thai. I just have no retention, it turns out. I have probably tried to learn some permutation of basic Thai about 15 times since I met Khwan. I have dug into the language to differing degrees, but it never takes very long for the info to emerge out the proverbial other ear. My hope is that I have certain mitigating factors in my favor this time around:

Pressure) There will come a moment, I don't know when or where, that I will be required to fend for myself in Thai. Either reading it, or speaking it, or understanding it being spoken to me, or, god forbid, writing it. At that instant, I have to be ready. Khwan hasn't taken on the mantle of my official translator. And nor should she. She is my partner. That's a different role altogether.

Repetition) The longer I am in Thailand, the more opportunities there will be to use Thai. And I will be here a lot longer than on previous trips. Being married to a Thai person in the US is nothing like living in their country 24 hours a day.

Feeling Stupid/Awkward) I'm not the most social creature, but this is taking it to new heights of speechlessness. I really don't like having no basic skills in smalltalk, conversation, niceties, retorts, etc. Maybe this will be the kick in the butt that I never had in my English-centric country.