I am curious how people approach learning the Thai tones.

[เอริก บรัดลี่]

So then some farang comes and reads the sign and goes back to his English-speaking friends and wants to say "I went to the temple and saw the ched-ee" but ends up saying "I went to the temple and saw the jed-eye" so then instead of thinking he was merely sight-seeing, they think he was getting schooled in light saber technique.

[Loving J]

As a whole, "ch" is probably one of the hardest sounds for Thais to produce correctly - certainly harder than either of the "th" sounds in English, as they have it in their heads that ch=ช, which is, as best I could describe it in English, a cross between ch and sh or a staccato version of the ch in German 'ich." I do agree that most Thais who can speak English well do know how to produce a proper "ch" sound...

[เอริก บรัดลี่]

When it appears on the front of a word it usually is not too much of a problem, but on the end of the word it doesn't work because I think there are no native Thai words that end with a "ch" sound.

Tennit mash, anyone?

[Loving J]

I've heard a lot of people pronounce "chew" as "shoe."

[เอริก บรัดลี่]

That's because their teacher teaches them the word "machine" etc

[Sean H]

คช = elephant

[เอริก บรัดลี่]

"machine" + "mechanic" + "Michael" + "Michelle" + "marching" + "matching" + "inches" + "tachometer"

[เอริก บรัดลี่]

is that Issan dialect? Because in normal Thai would be "chang".

[Loving J]

Wouldn't Isaan dialect be "saang?"

[เอริก บรัดลี่]

No idea. I was asking Sean because the word he used for elephant is not familiar to me.