Sticking My Tongue Out

Burmese language isn’t like Thai. It has a sing-song rhythm that generally makes the end of a sentence obvious. Verbs always come at the end, so that’s another clue. Puffs of air appear where I’m not used to hearing them, and it’s OK to stick out your tongue when pronouncing “th,” something the Thais never do. (Think of the UN Secretary-General during the ’60s, U Thant, whose name sounded roughly the same as the final syllable in the English word “marathon.”)

In my three jampacked weeks here, people have been very patient with my attempts to talk. They don’t interrupt me as I struggle with the new sounds, but neither do they usually understand much of what I try to say. The intensive course I took in Chiang Mai last month serves me very well for reading and numbers. Unfortunately, the risk with learning intensively is that it goes downhill just as intensively if you don’t maintain it. I’ll have to carve out time for that amid the whirlwind of all the other newness here in Yangon. Others graduates of the course have been talking about studying together. I’ll need that motivation, considering that earlier this week I signed a contract for a short-term writing job with a NGO funded by the Norwegian government. The group is involved with democracy promotion and livelihood assistance. I’m learning lots here about more than just language.