Thailand is a land of smiles. And the Thai people are easy to approach, you will see they will be all smiling when you try to speak to them in Thai, which will add to your pleasure during your stay in Thailand.

If you want to learning to speak Thai, there is one important thing you should remember that is the Thai language has five tones with four tonal marks. They are the mid tone, low tone, falling tone, high tone and rising tone.

There are many groups of words which have the same sound but with different tones and meanings. For example, the word suai can mean bad luck (suai), bribe (suai1) or beautiful (suai4), the words meaning is depending on the tone.

To prevent you from pronouncing with the wrong tone and unintentionally cause misunderstanding to the listeners, Thai teachers will use four numbers to represent four tones: 1 = low tone, 2 = falling tone, 3 = high tone and 4 = rising tone. The mid-level tone syllable will be unmarked.

By official system, the Thai language has 8 vowel and 14 diphthong phonemes and 19 consonant phonemes. The Thai language has fixed tones like many oriental languages. Foreigners who are interested in learning the correct tones are advised to learn from a native speaker.

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Following are some facts should keep in mind if you are planning come to travel in Thailand.

Temperature - In Bangkok, the temperature sometimes gets up to 40 degrees with high humidity especially during Jan-May (summer time). If you’re sightseeing, remember bring plenty of bottled water (never never drink tap water in Thailand) to avoid dehydrating. Sunglasses and sunscreen are a must have at all times.

Because the hit, you may like to drink cold drinks with ice inside, just be careful, those ice are often comes from unhygienic sources and if you can and don’t want to get sick, the best way to do is to avoid it.

Rains and floods - When you see it rains in Bangkok, don’t bother putting on a heavy raincoat because the rain will over fast after 10-20 minutes, just wear like Thais - slip on something light and cool, wear a pair of plastic shoes and take your umbrella, that’s it.

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Songkran is a Thai traditional New Year which starts on April 13 every year and lasts for 3 days. Songkran festival on April 13 is Maha Songkran Day or the day to mark the end of the old year, April 14 is Wan Nao which is the day after and April 15 is Wan Thaloeng Sok which the New Year begins. At this time, people from the rural areas who are working in the city usually return home to celebrate the festival. Thus, when the time come, Bangkok temporarily turns into a deserted city.

Songkran is a Thai word which means “move” or “change place” as it is the day when the sun changes its position in the zodiac. It is also known as the “Water Festival” as people believe that water will wash away bad luck.

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Why yellow polo shirts, you ask? In Thailand each of the days of the week is assigned a color. The tradition originated with astrologically-divined battle tunics. Later it was taken up by the court and those who could afford a diverse wardrobe.

This tradition lives on. I could usually tell what day it was at the office by the prevailing color of the staff’s clothes. A surprising number of people still wear the color of the day at work.

Some senior Thai’s know the year and month but not the date of their birthday but they do know the day and the color.

Read the full article at: Sea Of Yellow Polo Shirts

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