We’re always thinking about language, talking about languages, interpreting languages and learning languages as we migrate around during our winters. In fact, one important reason to learn Spanish in America is that most likely our end-of-life care-givers will be native Spanish speakers and it would be good to know what they are saying about you.

Unfortunately Americans don’t put enough emphasis on learning a second language and when we do, it’s in high school when kids are already too embarrassed to speak in front of classmates, let alone speak in a new foreign language. There just isn’t enough reason to speak French, German or Chinese yet in America. But there could be an excellent case for Spanish since we border on, trade with and travel to Mexico and Central America, not to mention the always growing population of Hispanic neighbors and co-workers in the States.

Thai’s have a much bigger problem and an opportunity to learn a second language, And that language is English.  Right now most of the private schools and many of the public schools in urban areas have native English speakers as teachers. (They are mostly recent university graduates from English-speaking countries who, while traveling over here, find that they can extend their stay, earn some money and postpone returning to the inevitable: a job search in their home country.)

This program has been good for many Thai students as well as the travelers, but there are too many shortcomings in the system.  Primarily the teachers are more transient than is good for the students, because those native-speaking teachers may only “teach” for a couple of months or a contract year at best.  And every teacher speaks a different dialect of English (which we found almost comical when talking to, or trying to understand, the Irish English teacher here in  Wassana guesthouse last year).  And lastly, the entire emphasis is on passing a written test, not on simple conversation.  The average grammar school graduate speaks no better English than an American high school student who has taken one semester of Spanish:  Hello or Where you from? in Thailand, or Buenas Dias or ¿Como Esta? in the States.

Certainly there are many, many Thai’s that speak passable English and we appreciate each and every one of them, but they are few and far between.  We’ve turned down, every year, the opportunity in Trang to teach an English class for business professionals and more specifically the Provincial Court employees. (We don’t want to be on a schedule.)  Our best friend here in Trang is a Court Mediator who speaks English and they feel it’s mandatory for at least two of the rotating Mediation team members to speak English.

What has really struck home this last week was learning that Thailand’s participation in the recently formed ASEAN Alliance of 10 countries in Southeast Asia, means that they are economically binding with a population of 600 million people: twice the population of the US, and probably the size of the US and Europe combined.  This is now an Asian “Euro Zone or a Union” where the only Lingua Franca between all these disparate countries is English.  All the trade, commerce, tourism and business needs to be done in English.

And this is where Thailand is aware of their shortcoming.  Not enough of their students are learning sufficient English to supply the managers, directors, salespeople, engineers and workers to fill all these new employment positions that the ASEAN Alliance and the global business world demands.

How do we convince our young US students to learn Spanish, but more urgently how will Thailand improve their younger generation’s English language skills to compete with Malaysia, the Philippines, Myanmar and Indonesia who can easily migrate to fill those positions?

We’re so fortunate that we don’t have to struggle with a Global Lingua Franca.  Every tourist that comes to Thailand has to communicate in English, and most often their proficiency in English is far better than the hotel desk clerk or the bar tender servicing the tourist needs for a room or a beer.  My favorite story is listening to a Korean scientist and a French physicist discuss over coffee scientific theories at a level that we could only identify as English words, their Lingua Franca.

I thought this was my Lingua Gastronomica:

Thai’s like theirs with sticky rice and peanuts topped with condensed milk.

But after seeing a text photo of Captain Al spinning on Dragonfly.  I realize that my Lingua Franca has been bicycling here in Thailand.