"Madame Lonely?"

I mentioned in an earlier blog entry the many challenges we face here every day in trying to communicate with Thai people, whether it’s in English or in Thai. We’ve had many funny experiences. Some seem funny only much later, after our frustration subsides and we regain our perspective and sense of humor. This past weekend, some Filipino friends of ours told us a thoroughly enjoyable story about their own difficulty in trying to transcend the language barrier.

The husband of the couple was out of the country on business, which the couple’s usual driver knew about, because the driver had taken the husband to the airport. One morning while the husband was gone, the wife of the couple got into the car and settled into the back seat. She got the usual “Good morning, Madame.” Drivers here have a variety of names for their male customers, such as “Mister,” “Boss,” or even “Master.” A woman customer, on the other hand, invariably seems to get called “Madame,” with a posh accent on the second syllable of the word.

So, after being greeted with “Good morning, Madame,” the wife noticed the driver intently looking at her in the rear-view mirror. The driver then said, “Madame lonely?” She found this a bit too personal a question and a serious intrusion on her privacy, so she decided to ignore him. He continued looking at her, though, and then expanded his question: “Madame lonely? 750 baht.” (The baht is the unit of currency in Thailand, and 750 baht equates to a little more than $20.) At this point, the wife became quite incensed at just what kind of proposition the driver was making. As she sat there fuming, unsure what to say or do next, the driver turned around in his seat, repeated his question and then produced for her examination a bill for 750 baht from a nearby laundry. It was only then that the wife realized he was trying to say “laundry” instead of “lonely," and was simply asking whether she wanted to go pick up and pay for her dry cleaning!