Farang Khi Nok

Call it a preemptive strike.  That may be harsh terminology for language acquisition, since we usually talk about such things with terms like "broadening horizons," or "becoming more cultured", more "well-traveled."  Then again, I don't know that I can call this "language acquisition"; it's more akin to grasping at straws, clinging to a life preserver on a choppy sea, covering oneself with a fig leaf.

My particular fig leaf? I've purchased a set of three "Lao for Beginners" CD's and have been memorizing--er, learning Lao on the drive to and from Dordt. 

But it was on the internet that I came across the phrase farang khi nok, or--let the record here show my growing expertise--the more distinctly Lao pronunciation falang kee nok, a phrase which confirms my "preemptive strike" theory.

I've been adrift in other languages before.  In the Philippines we learned a song in Tagalog, had no idea what it meant but used it to some acclaim as we presented in churches and schools.  Most everyone we talked to in the Philippines spoke English to us.  In China, a set of translators did everything for us.  We "communicated" to the people in drama, but what we said was at least twice removed from us.  Our strength was in numbers, foreignness, and translators. 

Once, in Germany, I actually got into a telephone conversation with someone who didn't speak English.  It was the type of conversation that rudimentary German classes dream about, that high school textbooks prepare you for.  The situation was this:  we wanted to move up the Rhine to a new hostel since the one we were staying at was hosting a youth retreat that threatened to stampede us.  It was mid-winter so there were no other travelers about and, no doubt, no English speakers on hand to treat tourists. 

In absolutely measured, halting German, I dived into the conversation: 

Hallo (To make a good impression, always start with the language's corruption of "hello"). 

Sprechen sie Englisch. (The most important phrase to know is, "Will you speak English to me?  I'm an American."  This used to be my preemptive strike)

The answer came back, clear as an interlanguage bell:  Nein.  It might have been "nyet," "nej" (Danish), "bau" (Lao), or any other language.  The meaning was unmistakable.

I was not prepared for this; nor was I "ready" or any other synonym for "prepared."

Haben sie ein zimmer for heute? I managed to spit out, in pulses, certain that somewhere, my high school German teacher had a warm feeling in her heart right then.

Nein again--and then something unintelligible, fast, not like the school recordings of German at all.  Was this some other language entirely?  Was this an East German Commi on the other end, perhaps even a Russian? 

This was a crisis--we needed a place to stay and it was up to me to arrange it.  Then it came to me, from some remote, verbal part of my brain.  Idiot!  I had asked for a room for today! I fixed my request. 

Haben sie ein zimmer for morgen?  Dramatic pause, for effect.

Ja...then that unintelligible Russian-German again.  I was speechless.  He bailed me out:  Comst du morgen? (Will you come tomorrow?)

My relieved response:  Ja.  Auf Wiedersehen.

Worse than Germany was France, where I was told to expect stuck up people who--horror of all horrors--often wouldn't speak English to Americans even if they knew it!  The gall--or, "the Gaul," as the case may be.  On the train in the "chunnel" going into France, I had tremendous anxiety that I was going to hate France, hate the French and their language arrogance.  In actuality, however, being adrift in a new language for the first time was one of the most freeing experiences of my life.  Even the one occasion where a ticket agent made me struggle through asking for tickets, then commenced to lecture me--in English--on how I would expect someone in my country to speak my language so why shouldn't I speak hers? left me not frustrated but comfortably humbled, made to feel appropriately small and dependent upon the kindness of others in a large world.

Which returns us to farang khi nok.  Farang comes from "Frank," the French, those ancient meddlers in "Indochina," but the term has come to mean "westerner" in general.  Language has a way of doing this, of stamping unlike people alike, just consider the broad term "Hispanic" that roots Latin-American cultures in Spain and blankets a wide variety of peoples.

Khi nok, you ask? 

Bird shit.  Farang khi nok--western bird shit.

"Yes," my mother-in-law confirms, "you will be falang khi nok, and your kids, too, falang khi nok."

And so I've spent hours with my "Lao for Beginners" CD, but still can't get tonality right, still confuse words, still can only pick about 6.32% of words out of my mother-in-law's conversation.  Truly, my acquisition of Lao is a fig leaf.  A tiny, tiny fig leaf.

But scratch that "preemptive strike" bit.  No doubt that's the way falang khi nok would think.  Instead, I'm ready to embrace falang khi nok, ready to surrender myself as "western bird shit" to a culture that cares not for me and my arrogant western ways, ready to embrace my fig leaf of language acquisition. 

Or rather, I'm ready to pull away the fig leaf and to use it as an olive branch instead.