Learn Khmer Script the Lazy-Ass Way: Part Two: The Vowels

 

Photo by Holger Wirth

After long delay (sorry) here is Part 2 of my system for learning the Khmer script. Part 1 was the consonants. Part 2 is vowels. 

Disclaimer. You should be using other materials and methods to study Khmer if you want to make use of this system. The system itself is only a memorization aid. I am assuming you have some basic familiarity with the script.

One of the issues noted with Khmer consonants is that they come in two families. The "A"-series has an inherent "A" vowel; whereas the "O" series has an inherent "O" vowel. This means that if you write just a consonant by itself--no vowel--it will be pronounced with either an "A" sound or an "O" sound, depending on which series it belongs to.

However... the Khmer script also has plenty of vowel symbols as well. Depending how you count them, individual symbols can be combined to make new compound symbols with new pronunciations. In English, for example, we could consider "ea" to be a new vowel formed by combining "e" and "a", so that beat is pronounced differently from both bet and bat.

And moreover, each vowel symbol, whether individual or combined, has two pronunciations, depending on whether the attached consonant is "A" series or "O" series.

Interesting fact about Khmer script: the vowel sound following the consonant might be written to the left, right, above, or below the consonant. Sometimes on several sides at once. Examples;

ជា is the consonant ជ followed by the vowel ា. The dotted circle is something you never see in actual Khmer, and you never see this vowel standing alone either. The circle indicates that the vowel needs a consonant to the left of it.

ពី is the consonant ព followed by the vowel ី. This time the circle shows that the consonant goes under the vowel.

នៅ is the consonant ន followed by the vowel ៅ. The circle shows that the vowel is written on both sides of the consonant.

So to help me remember the pronunciations of the vowels, I needed names which would represent both the "A"-series pronunciation and the "B"-series pronunciation. (Some exceptions are noted below.) 

Each name encodes the pronunciation using the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). I can't give a complete breakdown of every IPA symbol, especially as it applies to Khmer pronunciation, but I'll try to provide a few pointers. 

The important letters of each vowel name are capitalized. To find an appropriate English word containing a given combination of letters required me to reach for some pretty exotic vocabulary. Look them up.

So we start. All in all, there are thirty-seven different vowel symbols in Khmer (most of which have two different pronunciations). Our list of vowels runs as follows:

1 ា AdAmantine IRis. The name has two words, which is typical. The first word AdAmantine encodes the A-series pronunciation, which is æː. In the IPA, æ is a wide "a" sound like "cat" and ː shows that the vowel is stretched out in time. I use A to represent æ and I use two of them AA to indicate the prolongation. This is a general rule of the system: where the IPA uses : to show that a vowel sound is stretched out, my system doubles the letter that encodes the IPA symbol.) The second word IRis encodes the O-series pronunciation, which is iːə. I represents the IPA i, which actually sounds like the "i" in "pizza" and R represents the schwa ə, which is a neutral vowel . I skipped the prolongation symbol for this one.

2 ិ Ebon Ink. The letter E of the first word Ebon encodes the A-series pronunciation e. The letter I of the second word Ink encodes the O-series pronunciation i.

3 ី RIch megatherIId. The letters RI of RIch encode the A-series pronunciation əj. (This is a diphthong, a combination of one vowel sliding into another. English has a lot of these, for example the "oi" in "coin".) Once again the letter R represents the IPA symbol ə. In the IPA the symbol j represents the sound "y" as in English "yes"; notice that this is very close to the IPA i, so I use the letter I to represent IPA j as well as IPA i. The double II in megatherIId represents the O-series pronunciation iː (prolonged i).

4 ឹ     RYe. I used a single word for this one because both pronunciations are simple vowel sounds. Once again the letter R represents the IPA letter ə. The letter Y, used here for the first but by no means the last time, represents the IPA letter ɨ, which can be described as a back unrounded vowel, and sorry, no, I won't explain what that means.

5 ឺ RYpophagous flYbY. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters RY, representing a diphthong composed of the two vowels əɨ (compare to the two separate pronunciations of the previous vowel. The O-series pronunciation is represented by YY, encoding a long version ɨː of the vowel ɨ 

6 ូ OUtsized UkUlele. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters OU, a diphthong rather similar to the "ow" in English "low." The O-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters UU, a long version uː of the vowel u, rather similar to the "u" in English "rule."

7 ួ URethane. I used a single word for this one because the A-series and O-series pronunciations are identical. Both are encoded by the letters UR, a diphthong uːə, prolonged u followed by ə.

8 ើ ARmored oRRery. The A-series pronunciation æːə is encoded by the letters AR. The O-series pronunciation əː is encoded by the letters RR.

9 ឿ hYRax. Once again, I used a single word for this one because the A-series and O-series pronunciations are identical. Both are encoded by the letters YR, a diphthong ɨːə, prolonged ɨː followed by ə.

10 ៀ IRon. Once again, I used a single word for this one because the A-series and O-series pronunciations are identical. Both encoded by the letters IR, a diphthong iːə, prolonged i: followed by ə.

11 េ EIghtfold EEl. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters EI, a diphthong eːi of prolonged e: followed by i. The O-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters EE, a prolonged eː.

12 ែ AErosol Egg. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters AE, a diphthong æːe. The O-series pronunciation is encoded by the letter E , a prolonged ɛː (more like the "e" in English "bed").

13 ៃ AIry YIeld. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters AI, a diphthong aj. The O-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters YI, a diphthong ɨj.

14 ោ AOrtal OOze. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters AO, a diphthong æːo. The O-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters OO, a prolonged oː.

15 ៅ AWned YUrt. The A-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters AW, a diphthong æw. The O-series pronunciation is encoded by the letters YU, a diphthong ɨw.

16 ុ OUtrigger. Once again, I used a single word for this one because both pronunciations are simple vowel sounds. The A-series pronunciation o is encoded by the letter O. The O-series pronunciation u is encoded by the letter U.

17 ំ ALUminum. This letter starts a new series of special nasalized vowels. All are distinguished by the little bubble mark above the consonant (this letter indeed consists of nothing but this bubble). and all are pronounced with "nasalization" like you find in French, for example; i.e., some of the breath is directed through the nose rather than the mouth. For this first one, I used a single word for both A-series and O-series pronunciations. The letters AL encode the A-series pronunciation ɑm. As a rule the system uses the letters AL for this variant of the ɑ-sound. The new combination AL shows the vowel sound ɑ, which is rather like the "a" in English "father." The m here does not indicate a sound like "mama" but marks the nasalization of the vowel. The letter U encodes the O-series pronunciation um, which is a nasalized version of the vowel u.

18 ុំ Marble OUtrigger. Here the word Marble shows that this is a nasalized vowel. The letter O encodes the A-series pronunciation om (nasalized o). The letter U encodes the O-series pronunciation um (nasalized u).

19 ាំ Marble Ashen ORange. Again the word Marble shows that this is a nasalized vowel. The letter A encodes the A-series pronunciation am (nasalized a). The letters OR encode the O-series pronunciation  oəm (nasalized oə).

20 ះ  Hairy Ashen ERaser. This letter starts a second series of special aspirated vowels, each marked by the two bubbles on the right. This indicates that the vowel is pronounced with sort of an "h" sound at the end of the syllable (which is the opposite of where it always comes in English). For all of these vowel names the word Hairy indicates this "h"-sound. Here the letter A encodes the A-series pronunciation aʰ (the small "h" coming at the end of the syllable). The letters ER encode the O-series pronunciation eəʰ.

21 ិះ  Hairy EpIcycle. Again the word Hairy indicates the "h" at the end of the syllable. The letter E encodes the A-series pronunciation eʰ. The letter I encodes the O-series pronunciation iʰ.

22 េះ  Hairy EIghtfold Éclair. Again the word Hairy indicates the "h" at the end of the syllable. The letters EI encode the A-series pronunciation eiʰ. The letter É encodes the O-series pronunciation eʰ.

23 ោះ Hairy ALbino URchin. Again the word Hairy indicates the "h" at the end of the syllable. The letters AL encode  the A-series pronunciation ɑʰ. The letters UR encode the O-series pronunciation ʊəʰ.

24 ុះ  Hairy OUtrigger. Again the word Hairy indicates the "h" at the end of the syllable.  The letter O encodes the A-series pronunciation oʰ. The letter U encodes the O-series pronunciation uʰ.

We come now to the final series of vowel symbols. These differ from all the others in that they are written as independent symbols rather than attached to a previous consonant sound. So far as I can tell they are used only when a vowel sound comes at the beginning of a word (although you can imagine having a word consisting solely of several vowel sounds).

Actually it is technically incorrect to say the vowel does not follow a consonant sound, because in fact it is preceded by a glottal stop--a catch-in-the-throat sound which you do hear in English but is not meaningful. In some other languages (like Arabic, for example) it works as a consonant sound on an equal basis with the others. This glottal stop is represented in the IPA by the symbol ʔ (like a question mark with no dot). This glottal stop is not represented in my names for the symbols.

Since these letters come only at the start of the word, and are not attached to any consonant, they do not have separate A-series and O-series pronunciations; each has a single pronunciation encoded by a single word.

25 ឥ Elephant. The letter E encodes the pronunciation ʔe.

26 ឦ RIxshaw. The letters RI encode the pronunciation ʔəj.

27 ឧ Ocean. The letter O encodes the pronunciation ʔo.

28 ឪ YUppie. The letters YU encode the pronunciation ʔɨw.

29 ឫ RYa. The letters RY encode the pronunciation ʔrɨ. Notice that here the R represents an actual r sound rather than the shwa as hitherto.

30 ឬ RYdberg. The letters  RY encode the pronunciation ʔrɨː. This is like the preceding, except prolonged, and so this one has the longer name. Once again the R represents an actual r sound rather than the shwa as hitherto.

31 ឭ LYceum. The letters LY encode the pronunciation ʔlɨ.

32 ឮ LYme grass. The letters LY encode the pronunciation ʔlɨː. This is like the preceding, except prolonged, and so it gets the longer name. 

33 ឯ AEpyornis. The letters AE encode the pronunciation, which I found described variously as ʔæe; or ʔɛː or ʔeː.

34 ឰ AIrship. The letters AI encode the pronunciation ʔaj. 

35 ឳ AUnt. The letters AU encode the pronunciation ʔaw. 

36 ឱ AOudad. The letters AO encode the pronunciation ʔaːo. 

37 ឩ Udder. The letter U encodes the pronunciation ʔu.

And that's it. This system helped me, taking the problem of learning Khmer script from impossible to merely difficult.

France 2022

 A whirlwind trip for a family wedding. For me it went so fast that afterwards I could imagine I had dreamed being there. This was my first trip post-pandemic. I was a lucky one but many others  encountered major disruptions. I think I'll avoid flying overseas again for another year or more.

Click on any photo for a larger version.

This last is a scene from Charles de Gaulle airport. What struck me is that the seating is designed so you can lie down and take a nap if you wish. ...Whereas in the US any public seating is designed with spikes, knobs, or whatever so that at any costs one cannot lie down.

My Dopp Kit

 

Zoroaster said that possessions are our baggage on the journey through life and we should therefore be wary of carrying too much. (In the "can't make this stuff up" category, I found just now trying to verify this that there now exists a "Zoroaster" brand of luggage.) How much more true this is when applied to literal baggage and literal journeys.

I myself am towards the "travel light" end of the spectrum (though not so far out as some). This requires more than the mere intention of traveling light but is a skill that can and must be learned. I have taken trips of a week in temperate climes with only a single carry-on bag and a briefcase. In this I am influenced by my history of dabbling in ultralight backpacking, perhaps a subject for a future post. 

On the other hand, when traveling I often like to live with a little more luxury than in my day-to-day life. In this I am significantly influenced by Paul Kyriazi's James Bond Lifestyle seminar. This is reflected both in my choice of accommodations and activities and in the selection of gear that I take along.

In this particular post, I look at the comments of my shaving kit. In these 108 cubic inches, I can aim for a level of luxury perhaps not practical for my everyday life. (And by the way, nothing feels luxurious when you are staggering along with too much luggage.) The most luxurious option is not always the most expensive (shaving cream, for example).

And in both respects, when I travel, I think of the items I choose to carry as my team. And I want my team to be an elite team. Every element is chosen for peak performance. I've made many adjustments to the team over the years. This is where the team stands as of today.

Osgood Marley Dopp Kit: While there are several crafters of high-quality leather goods offering a wide variety of fine kits, my choice  was determined by compactness: this kit is a mere 3x4x9 inches. 

Homemade ultralight first-aid kit: sewn by yours truly from velcro and silicone-impregnated nylon back when I was doing ultralight backpacking. I haven't been backpacking in several years, but there are a few items of ultralight gear that I continue to find useful in daily life.

Panasonic Men's Card-type Compact ES518P-S Silver (Japan Model): chosen both for slick design and ultra-compact design. Another plus is uses standard AAA batteries.

Adoric Life digital thermometer

The Art of Shaving cross-knurl safety razor

The Art of Shaving classic horn 3-blade razor: Yes, I actually do travel with two razors sometimes, because I find them useful for different purposes.

antique toothbrush bottle: took me the longest time to track this down on eBay

Fendrihan handmade fine-tooth metal comb: because I'm tired of teeth breaking off of plastic combs

Hudson Trail Outfitters LED flashlight, Photon LED flashlight: another holdover from my LWB days. Because a hotel room with closed drapes is the darkest place on the surface of the earth. In line with my backpacking philosophy, these provide minimal illumination to relieve absolute darkness at minimal weight.

HQY heavy-duty nail clippers

Brilliant Beauty brand precision tweezers

Astra double-edge razor blades

In addition to the foregoing there are the usual miniature shaving cream, toothpaste, cotton swabs etc. In every case I have found my favorite brand to be something available at the local grocery.

Music for working out--some favorites

Choice of music for working out is perhaps a type of personality test. If the piped music at the gym is any guide, most people seem to go for your standard up-tempo pop music--at least that's what they play in the gym. This never appealed to me. It's bland and uninspiring. I prefer music with the promise of something heroic and extraordinary. This to me is the point of working out in the first place, not to mention most other things I do.

So herewith a selection of some of what I listen to when exercising. May some of them inspire you.

1. "What Are You Going to Do When You Aren't Saving the World?" from Man of Steel (2013). Like many of my choices, this is movie music. In general I find movie music is often more willing to commit to a concept. This piece starts good but builds up to a couple of great climaxes. Great for pushing through he last couple of sets of an exercise.

2. "The Great Race March" from The Great Race (1965). In the movie, this song serves as the theme song for the always white-clad Great Leslie, the story's hero---polymath, daredevil, and unflagging good sport. This song is lighter in mood, but I like how apparently every patriotic song in the world was stolen from the great Leslie. 

3. "Bim Bam Smash" from the Bourne Supremacy. Bourne soundtracks are admittedly all rather similar but Supremacy has more "flavor" to my ears and is my favorite. This track is from the big chase scene at the end of the movie. It has a high-speed energy to it--better for running than heavy weights.

4. "The Ecstasy of Gold" from The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly, by the great Ennio Morricone. This is another good song for running (there's actually a lot of running in this scene).

5. "No Rest for the Weary" from In Like Flint. More likely than not, you have never heard of this movie. It's my favorite among the James Bond imitators. For my lucky readers I found both the music track and the scene from the movie. Flint is very 60's--and yet his athleticism is more like Daniel Craig than Sean Connery.

6. "Chevaliers de Sangreal" from The Da Vinci Code. Another great tune that gradually builds in energy, great for doing several sets of an exercise or pushing through the last half-mile of a run.

7. "Setting up the Lair" from the TV show Arrow. Once again, I provide both the scene and the music track, because I think visual context is essential for appreciating this track. Stephen Amell is one of the buffest guys ever to appear on TV. This track accompanies him setting up his lair (a strenuous activity in its own right), culminating in the most badass workout ever.

8. "His Name is Napoleon Solo" from The Man from U.N.C.L.E. One of my disappointments in life is that this film seems not to have spawned the franchise that was clearly intended. If it had done so, this track could have become a theme song. It's more about attitude than energy.

9. "The Pines of the Appian Way" by Ottorino Respighi. Okay, not a soundtrack; in fact this one is classical. Another great piece that steadily builds to a climax.

10. Finally: "Big Right" from Cinderella Man, by Thomas Newman. Newman also did, for example, the soundtrack for The Shawshank Redemption. He makes an interesting choice in moments of triumph: contrary to what almost anyone else would do, he takes the mood rather dark. The message that I take from this is that it's a bit scary what human beings are capable of achieving in their peak moments.

Practical Joke #16 (Coronavirus edition)

photo by _Teb

1. Go to a grocery store that has those "One Way" stickers on the floor.

2. Peel up the stickers and rearrange them so that shoppers are inexorably led into an inescapable vortex.

Peru 2019

(click on any picture for a larger version)

This report comes late, seeing as this trip happened approximately a year ago. But 2019 was a busy year... Visiting Peru marked several personal "firsts" for me: my first visit to the continent of South America, my first time to cross the equator (though just barely), the highest altitudes I have experienced.

We followed a complicated itinerary: Lima to Puno to Cusco to Machu Picchu back to Cusco to Lima and then home. Lima is at sea level whereas the other locations are at considerable altitude.

The weather at Christmas in Lima resembles summer in Maryland. The hill in the background oddly resembles Diamond Head.

A Peruvian Christmas tree. I much prefer this approach of decorating a native species to the obviously fake evergreens I have seen in other tropical locales.

After a couple of days in Lima, we flew to the city of Puno, on the banks of Lake Titicaca. For the first time in my life I experienced the effects of altitude. Puno lies an an altitude of 12,556 feet (3827m) above sea level, slightly higher than Lhasa, Tibet.

From the airport we took a rather lengthy taxi ride, through a town that looked pleasantly strange and unlike any place I had been before, and then across a quasi-rural landscape that reminded me of part of Texas where I grew up, to the town of Puno proper. We exited the taxi and went into the hotel lobby. Mrs. Gorodish then informed me that she wasn't feeling well. And, like Wile E. Coyote looking down to find empty space beneath his feet, I felt it too.

The first sensation is the obvious one of having not quite enough air. One should be able to compensate, I would assume, by breathing deeper and faster. Whether I didn't apply the theory properly, or it's just wrong, shortly there followed effects I had heard about but never experienced before: headache and nausea. We tried the local remedies: coca tea (which had no effect that I could feel) and then a local pharmaceutical (about which more to say later).

I had heard that sleeping is difficult at high altitude, and I now understood why that is true. It seems that when your autonomous breathing takes over as you fall asleep, you aren't getting enough air. So you wake up and breathe heavily. And the cycle starts again....

After two days in Puno, we took the train to Cusco. Here I admire the shrewdness with which the Peruvians are leveraging their major resource of natural beauty for the tourist trade. Peru has no high-speed rail (nor, I suspect, even medium-speed rail). High-speed rail might well be impossible on routes that climb up and descend at significant grades. 

Perurail makes a virtue of necessity by rebranding the Puno-Cusco train (which apparently runs at an average speed of 24 mph/40 kph) as a ten-hour luxury experience---deluxe food, entertainment, etc. 

I missed a good shot here. Open space is such a premium here (not sure why--there's plenty of empty land) that the market is set up next to the train tracks and even on the tracks. Merchandise is spread out across the tracks, low enough that the train can pass over, and people scramble out of the way when the train passes by.

The highest spot on the route is the La Rava pass at 4338 meters (14232 feet). The thinness of the air was a remarkable sensation. But locals (of course) had no problem with it.

An interesting feature of this trip was the gradual change of the landscape from reddish-brown and arid around Puno, gradually greener, and extremely verdant in the area of Cusco. The mountains, too, became more rugged, extremely steep, almost vertical in places. Some of the train cars had domed observation roofs---this was one place with truly a lot of interesting things to see overhead.

For the latter part of the journey the track ran along the Urubamba river, which consisted of nothing but rapids for miles and miles and miles---which just goes to show how much we descended on that leg of the trip.

Cusco is at an altitude of 11,200 feet (3400m) so a little milder then Puno. By this time we were getting a little used to the altitude---at least the headaches and nausea were gone, though sleeping was still an issue. We felt good enough to scamper up some of the many hills. Cusco is a charming city, layered with pre-colonial, colonial, and post-colonial architecture.

And now we interrupt this program for a commercial announcement. It may or may not be the placebo effect, but this little pharmaceutical made us all feel significantly better with respect to the altitude. I swallowed it, but I have no idea what's in it--frog's eyebrows, leftover guinea-pig fragments, whatever.

Two more notable features of this advertisement. I love the lack of subtlety exhibited by the ailing gent on the far right. And this font, complete with outline, is apparently the official national font of Peru. 

From Cusco we proceeded to Machu Picchu. This is one tourist attraction which is definitely worth the hype. Photos can't capture it. Breathtaking, jaw-dropping, verdant jagged mountains in every direction. 

We were there at the beginning of January, which is supposedly the rainy season. Friends told me it would be disappointing because Machu Picchu would be shrouded in fog. As it turned out, everything was great. We had a little rain to deal with--not much. And the fog was merely some lovely wisps clinging to the mountainsides. 

What's the opposite of "bucket list"? A list of the things I will never regret wimping out on... at the top would be visiting Huayna Picchu, which is the peak visible in the background of all the Machu Picchu photos. While I was there I noted outlines of domes, stairs, and other architecture at the peak. Incredible--like something out of a fairy tale.

Only later did I learn that--incredibly--they take tourists up to the top. If you want to see insanity in picture form, Google "Huayna Picchu hike". One sneeze, and it's all over...

Many people don't care for the modern town of Machu Picchu, which exists purely as a staging point for tours of the historical site. I found it rather charming, backed up against these fairy-tale mountains. Note the huge missing chunk of rock that fell down some time in the past.

The train back from Machu Picchu again featured scenic windows in the roof. Unlike most such trains, there actually is a lot of scenery overhead on this route.

On the way back to Cusco, we stopped at Ollantaytanbo, a small town notable for more Inca ruins, Inca construction still in use, and the inherent charm of the town itself. I must admit that by this point everyone in this group was experiencing high-altitude-Inca-ruin-climbing fatigue, so we eschewed visiting the spectacular fortress (the stairs to which we could easily see zig-zagging up the mountain).

Either you get this joke, or you don't. The men in our group all got it. None of the women did.

This explains why no one knows what state Springfield is located in.

Some of the Inca stonework is still in use in Ollantaytanbo. The trapezoidal doorway is a characteristic feature (poorly suited to the use of actual doors).

We see here once again the Peruvian national font, which are these outlined balloon-animal characters. It's everywhere. 

And to wrap up, a visual aid. We carried this empty Coke bottle from Cusco back to Lima. The collapse indicates the difference in available air between Cusco and sea level.