Hey Guys! Welcome back to the channel
Today I bring you my guide to Thai names and Honourifics
for the casual BL fan
Today I'm going to be explaining Thai surnames,
first names and
nicknames
as well as commonly used Thai Honourifics such as
khun
Phi & Nong
Loong & Ba
Hia & Je
and Ee & Ai
Of course you don't need to be a BL fan to understand what I'm explaining
but I will be using some examples from BL and in my real life to explain
Let's start with Thai surnames
I'm sure you've seen your favourite Thai actor's surname and thought
Damn!
That's a long ass name!
There's a reason for this
but to understand we need a little history lesson
The surname and family registry system
wasn't adopted in Thailand until the early 1900's
up until that point people only had first names and nicknames
so most surnames in Thailand
have only been around for 3-5 generations
The reason they're so long is to make sure they're all different
because in Thailand unless you're blood-related
you're not allowed to share the same surname with other families
by keeping them long you can have more variations in surnames
It's a lot different to Western and Japanese culture
You can meet someone in the same or even a different country
and they have the same surname as you
but you're not related
but in Thailand if you ever meet someone with the same surname
You're most likely related
Another reason why you can't share the same surname with other families is
Is they also function as social indentifyers
for example people from the royal family, rich families or people in power
You can identify them or their children just from their surname
Now let's move onto first names
Just like most countries, first names are chosen by our parents
or because Thai culture is very auspicious
sometimes parents will consult a monk
and ask them to design a new name for their child
or choose one that already exists that will bring them good luck
One thing that's different from Thai first names to Western culture
is all Thai first names have meaning
Even though in Western culture our names may have meaning
I feel like most of us don't know what our name's mean
It was kind of funny when I first moved to Thailand
I would introduce myself to friends at University
and say 'Hi my name's Stewart'
and they'd say 'That's a nice name, what does it mean?'
and I was like 'UHHHHHHH'
GOOGLE!
Then I searched my name to find out what it means
'Uhh, it comed from the word 'Steward'?'
Which is like a butler
but my parents weren't thinking of that when they chose my name
they chose it because they like the way it sounds
but in Thai culture all first names have meaning
if you ask someone what their name means they can probably tell you
for example a really common name for boys in Thailand is
Somchai
and Somchai means 'the man who is worthy'
Now let's move onto nicknames
Like I said before, before surnames there were just first names and nicknames
In general, most people were called by their nicknames
which is still really prevalent
surnames are mainly used when signing official documents
or if your name pops up in the credits of a tv series
It's actually quite common for friends to not know each other's surnames
and in some cases some friends don't know each other's first names
because they always call each other by their nicknames
In some cases parents choose their child's nickname based on physical appearance
If the baby's born and is a little chubby
It's not uncommon for that baby to be called 'Uan'
which means fat
or 'Uab' which means chubby
It sounds quite strange in English espcially when translated directly
and someone's name is fat or chubby
but in Thai it sounds really normal
or in some cases parents just choose words from other languages that they like
Having lived in Thailand for a while now
I've come across
For example Oreo,
Ice cream,
Porsche,
Rolex
If you like the sound of it you can pretty much use anything
A really common guy's name in Thailand is 'Bank'
like the bank where you keep your money
The reason people might use Bank
is because that's where money is kept and by naming their child bank
It's going to make them wealthy or come across money in the future
I know it sounds strange, especially for native English speakers
but in Thai there's no set rules
If you like the sound of something you can just take it and make it your nickname
In Thailand people occasionally change their nicknames
if they want a fresh start to life
because your nickname isn't recorded on official documents
It's really easy to change
you just go and tell your friends, 'My name is *this* now'
Now let's move onto Thai honourifics
For those who don't know
Honourifics are the words that appear before someone's name in Thai
These are usually used depending on someone's age,
gender
or a combination of both (or neither)
The first one we'll be discussing today is 'khun'
When translated into English it means something like
'Mr, Mrs or Miss'
It's a very formal and respectful way to address someone'
It is also gender neutral
and age-free
so you can be any age and use 'khun'
It's usually used in business settings
For example if you're a guest at a hotel
Then the staff will call you 'khun+first name'
or if you're in a business meeting people refer to each other as 'khun+first name'
but in some cases, couples like to use 'khun' as a pet name for each other
Let's take a look at this example
You can see that the main characters refer to each other as 'khun'
as opposed to words such as 'Phi' and 'Nong'
The reason they might use 'khun' to address each other
is because it's a gender-free, age-free honorific they can use
in my experience I haven't come across many couples that use it
but when I have it sounds a bit 'cute' when they use it
so if you're a couple and you want to try using 'khun'
then go right ahead
The next honorific we're covering which I'm sure you've heard a million times is
'Phi' and 'Nong'
'Phi' is used to refer to people older than you
and 'Nong' is for people who are younger than you
and they are both gender neutral
In Thai culture age is quite important
we respect people who are older than us
that's because people who are older have more wisdom and life experience
If you meet someone older than you it's polite to call them 'Phi'
and then their name
but there are exceptions
sometimes people don't like you to call them 'Phi'
because it makes them sound older
and they don't like the age distinction
this is an example from my life
recently I shot a TV series called 'Cutie Pie'
I play a pretty charismatic
and dare I say sexy bar owner named 'Gemini'
If you're intereseted you can watch it for free on the 'Mandee' YouTube channel
In this series I work with another actor named 'Zee'
and Zee is two years older than me
When we first met I asked him
'Should I call you P'Zee?'
and he was like 'No, no just call me Zee'
and I said 'No worries!'
In this case because we're only two years apart
He said it wasn't necessary to call him 'Phi'
and he wants us to kind of be on the same level
but as a general rule if someone's older than you, you should call them 'Phi'
If you're not sure whether to call someone 'Phi' or not
The best way to find out is to just ask them
moving onto 'Nong'
'Nong' has very young and cute connotations to it
Usually after you get past the age of around 15 or above
if you're talking to someone who's just a few years younger than you
then you don't really call them 'Nong'
You just call them by their nickname
but if you're talking to/about a really small child
or if there's a really large age gap
for example if mother's are talking about their children
or if grandmothers are talking about their kids
even if their kids are 50 or 60 years old
they might still call them 'Nong'
In this example from 'My Engineer'
King's older sister refers to Ram as 'Nong Ram'
this is because she's a lot older than them
and also Ram is her younger brother's friend
so if you look at it from the sister's point of view
Ram is kind of like her little brother
He's a lot younger than her
and she's already a Mum so that's why she calls him 'Nong Ram'
It also makes it sound cuter and more endearing
One of my favourite things about the words 'Phi' and 'Nong'
is you can use them to call people if you don't know what their name is
For example in English if you want to get someone's attention but you don't know their name
you might say 'excuse me' or 'hey'
but in Thai you can use 'Phi' and 'Nong'
You might be wondering, how do Thai people know if someone is older/younger than you
You just look at their face
In Thailand, like most Asian cultures
it's rude to ask someone's age if you're not close to them
so Thai people just look at faces and make an estimate
The next honorifics are 'Hia' and 'Je'
These are actually loan words from a dialect of Chinese
known as 'Tae Jiw'
There are a lot of families in Thailand who have Chinese ancestors
who immigrated to Thailand over a hundred years ago
a lot of those families still uphold Chinese traditions
such as use of Chinese terms in the household until today
'Hia' literally means older brother
It's used to refer to males who are older than you
and 'Je' literally means older sister
and is used to refer to females who are older than you
but the big difference between 'Hia' and 'Je' from other honourifics
is that they're only used to refer to people of Chinese descent
or at least look like they're of chinese descent
so how do you know if someone's of Chinese descent?
You might have noticed there's a bit of a recurring theme here
You just take a look at their face
It might be a bit harder for Western people
to discern whether someone has Chinese ancestry or not
but for people living in Asia or Thai people
they can tell pretty accurately by looking at someone's face
whether they have Chinese ancestry or not
Let's have a look at an example
In this example the main character's name is 'Hia Lian'
So, 'Hia' is not actually his name
His name is 'Lian'
'Hia' is the honourific that comes before his name
Lian's full name in the series is
Lian Kilen Wang
Thai people can recognise straight away that that's a Chinese name
That's why he's referred to as 'Hia'
instead of 'Phi'
Also you need to be careful with the pronunciation of 'Hia'
It's just a neutral tone
If you get the intonation wrong and say
'Hia' (hightone)
It's actually really rude
It's like the equivalent of the 'F word' in Thai
so make sure you're careful with your pronunciation
Let's take a look at one more example
You can see that King refers to his older sister as 'Je'
so this implies that King's family comes from Chinese ancestry
The next honourifics are 'Loong' and 'Pa'
'Loong' means uncle
and 'Pa' means Aunt
Loong refers to males who are around 50 years and older
and Pa refers to females who are around 50 years and older
So just like in a lot of Asian cultures, even if somone's not your blood relative
as long as the person you're talking to meets that age range
we just call them Uncle or Aunty
but you need to be careful using these words
because sometime, especially
the women
don't want to be called 'Pa'
because it makes them sound really old
if you're wondering how do I tell how old the are?
You've just got to use your eyes and look
if you're worred about calling someone 'Loong' or 'Pa'
you can just use 'Phi' instead
it's the safe option
let's take a look at an example
In this example when King is chasing after the ice-cream man
he calls "LOONG, LOONG!'
and you can see that the guy is probably over 50 or 60 years old
so it's completely safe to call him Loong
if King called him 'Phi'
there's nothing wrong with it
but culturally it sounds more natural if you call him Loong
The final honourifics of the day are 'Ee' & 'Ai'
so these two honourifics if you can call them that
are actually quite rude
the word 'Ai' is used for guys
and 'Ee' is used for girls
when you put these before someone's name
it sounds very rude and confrontational
but when these are used amongst friends
they can be used almost like terms of endearment
similar to Western culture
especially in Australia and the UK
sometimes we don't use the most flattering words to refer to our friends
it's kind of like a sign of how close we are
let's take a look at an example in Thai
In this example my character Gemini
he refers to 'Guea' as 'Ai Guea'
This isn't because he's mad at him
They're actually close friends
and it's a display of their friendship and how close they are
if you call a stranger or someone you're not close to like that
it's definitely not a good idea
If you're going to use these words when talking to friends
make sure you're really close to them first
and if you're not sure then just don't use them
thank you very much for watching today's video
I hope you found it fun and educational
if there are any other topics you'd like me cover about Thai language or culture
in future videos
please leave a comment down below
and I'll see you in the next video
see ya