1776 meets 1972 meets 2023

As a tail-end baby boomer, a reliable source of entertainment here in 2023 is listening to 30-something (or even 20-something) experts explain to me what life was like in the 60's. Among other things, this comes up in the context of Critical Race Theory (CRT). I don't intend to opine on CRT as such in this post, partly because so far any explanation I hear suffers from such obvious fallacies that I think I must be hearing wrong. (Feel free to try explaining it in the comments, anyone who can refrain from ad-hominem attacks.) 

However, part of the background to the CRT discussion is the assertion that hitherto history education in the U.S. has glossed over slavery and racism. This is just wrong. As someone who grew up in the south in the 60's, who went to lily-white schools with some of the most smugly racist people you could want to meet, I can assure you that we did learn about slavery, we did learn about Jim Crow. And the message was clear that racism was bad, Jim Crow was bad.

That was in history class. We were also required to read and discuss Huckleberry Finn in English class. In this respect I think our education on racism might have run considerably deeper in the 1960's than now in the 2020's---I'm not sure that students today still have this requirement. This may have less to do with glossing over racism than protecting tender young minds from the burden of reading an actual book.

Now this is all according to my recollection. Recently, however, I realized we have proof in plain sight that in the 60's people were quite aware of the role of racism in U.S. history and took it seriously. 

That is the movie 1776, released in 1972. Actually it was based on a stage musical that opened in 1969, which is why we can consider it as a data point from the 60's. The movie is rather like an earlier version of Hamilton, although 1776 aims for historical accuracy rather than race-swapping and employing hip-hop idiom. Most of the story takes place within the meeting room of the Continental Congress (which you can visit, looking more or less exactly as in the film, if you visit Philadelphia). It describes the surprisingly difficult process of coming to a consensus among the American colonies on declaring independence from England.

I like the movie. It's both fun and educational. 

When I was in college, I found in the library a copy of the libretto for this show--a small book which listed all the dialogue. At the end was an appendix--an excellent idea--which noted the historical accuracies and inaccuracies of the story: this really happened, this we made up, this we surmised etc. One particular point I still recall; I'll come back to this later.

So, interesting fact which you can learn from this movie: the original draft of the Declaration of Independence included a paragraph on the evils of slavery. You don't see it now because the southern states, enthusiastic slave-holders that they were, insisted it be removed as the price of their support for independence. This is a huge plot point, the major crisis of the story. There's even a dark dramatic musical number, pointing up the hypocrisy of northerners who were also profiting from the slave trade.

This was in 1969.

Now what I learned from the appendix to the libretto: The main characters of the film are John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson; and John Adams is the first among these. The writers took the license of merging the character of John Adams with his brother Samuel Adams.

During the forementioned crisis our three protagonists are arguing over whether to strike the slavery paragraph from the Declaration of Independence. John Adams says: "If we give in on this issue posterity will never forgive us." This is an actual quote, from a letter of Sam Adams--almost an exact quote.

Actually what Sam Adams really said was: "If we give in on this issue, there will be trouble a hundred years hence; posterity will never forgive us." (italics mine) And the authors explain that they had to take out this prescient phrase, which was just waaay too on the nose.

Anyway, don't trust anyone who tells you that the role of slavery and racism in U.S. history was somehow covered up until just recently. It wasn't. 

Hacking reminiscence

...as in how to trigger and improve your reminiscence of a pleasant experience. (You could do the same for an unpleasant experience, but why?)

Certain stimuli are known to trigger reminiscence. The most well-known is scent. Decades ago, my first job was at a fence company. I spend hours in the shed out back, putting pointed tops on picket boards, using a specially-designed power tool as scary as any chainsaw used in a massacre. To this day, when I smell freshly-cut lumber, it instantly takes me back to that shed.

Then again, one of my first posts here noted how the scent of wood pervaded with incense smoke takes me to a Japanese temple.

Theoretically you can stimulate a reminscence by (1) identifying a relevant scent to the experience and then (2) deliberately exposing yourself to the scent later. The problem with this is that if you leave step (1) to chance, step (2) is likely to be hard to pull off. My suggestion is to artificially associate an unusual but easily obtainable scent with the initial experience, so that you can later expose yourself to the scent at will. 

What kind of scent? Perhaps an herbal oil. These come in small convenient vials. But choose a scent you are not already overly familiar with.

I haven't tried this yet.

A second trigger for reminiscence, as everybody knows, is music. Everyone has songs that trigger memories of a certain time and place, or even a particular experience. Often the experience itself provides the musical trigger. Visit Disneyland, and when you come back you can find the ambient music loops on YouTube. Sometimes the connection is more complicated---I recently wrote about how a certain Quincy Jones song reminds me of walking in Tokyo at night.

But here again you can forge an artificial connection. On my trip to Myanmar some years ago (incredible bit of fortuitous timing), I made a point of listening to the Double song Rangoon Moon repeatedly.  And now listening to it takes me back to that trip.

So next time you are planning a happy experience, design a soundtrack for it ahead of time. Then use your music player while the experience is happening, or on the way there and back.

Transistorpunk

This post is primarily a prediction, and secondarily a rant. 

When I was a kid growing up in the 60's and 70's, the future looked awesome. Flying cars, moving sidewalks, cities on the Moon.... Now of course we have none of that. The technology of real 2022 is no match for what was envisioned.

This however is not what I choose to rant about today. No, my complaint is that the technology of 2022 is bland compared to what we had already in the 70's. 

Hollywood knows this already, which is why the John Wick series, The Mechanic, the Loki series, etc. use retro technology.

Technology has become more capable but less beautiful, and frankly less cognizant of human needs.

Example. 1964 versus 2023:

1964 Studebaker Avanti interior. Photo by dave_7

Tesla Model 3 interior. Photo by Leo Nguyen

The Studebaker interior is carefully designed. Every element has a specific purpose and a specific stable and predictable haptic design. One can reach and manipulate any control without taking eyes off the road.

The Tesla has a cheap tablet glued to the dashboard.

Some call the Tesla design elegant. No it isn't. No design is elegant which functions poorly. Make no mistake, the driving factor in this design choice was cheapness. But I don't need to dive deeper into the particular case of Tesla, which has been and continues to be well commented on elsewhere.

So I call your attention to this strange discrepancy---it doesn't mean I'm the first to catch on to it. As noted above, Hollywood is wise to it. One more example: in the James Bond movie Spectre:

When Bond gifts Moneypenny with an "untraceable" phone, it's not another featureless rectangle but actually has physical, touchable buttons. This was an older Samsung model that was already obsolete when the movies came out. But a contemporary phone would have been just too bland.

You've heard of "steampunk" I hope? Appreciating the beauty and elegance or steam-era technology. The best example I know is Disney's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, 

although I'm pretty sure the term "steampunk" didn't exist when this movie was made. Perhaps less well known is "dieselpunk"

which celebrates the aesthetic of World War II-era technology. Note that both of these are rather fuzzy terms, and the elements "steam" and "diesel" refer more to an era than a literal energy source. 

And so it would seem to be time to coin a new term Transistorpunk. Celebrating the aesthetic of technology from the 60's and 70's more or less. Not limited to transistors, but including vacuum tubes, nixie tubes, definitely tactile push buttons.

You're welcome.

Update: I see HP has re-released a lovely programmable calculator from 1982.

Reminiscence and free association: Japan, harmonicas, and Quincy Jones

"If you don't do something about it, you're going to have taco trucks on every corner." --Marco Gutierrez, 2016.

I'm one of those who likes to say "there are two kinds of people," although what two kinds those are may vary from day to day. Today I'm here to tell you that people can be divided into novelty seekers and novelty avoiders. This difference illuminates a lot of what we see in life, including our politics. (This post is not about politics, but there are many serious researchers [which I am not] who could tell you much about the connection.) I find the quote above (meant as a serious warning) a perfect illustration. Gutierrez clearly is not only a novelty-avoider but apparently cannot imagine that some people (novelty-seekers) find the prospect of a taco truck on every corner rather enticing.

As is often the case, I myself am a particularly interesting example.

I say this because over the arc of my life I have transitioned from being a novelty-avoider to a novelty-seeker--proof that we are not born destined to be one or the other. As a small kid, our family went to eat very occasionally to a Chinese restaurant. I was the one who insisted on ordering from the "American" section of the menu and would sit there eating a hamburger while the rest of the family gorged themselves on Chinese food. This, by the way, was the only time that I would have any interaction with Asian people, limited to looking at the waitress in the Chinese restaurant. Our environment was just extremely homogeneous.

I stubbornly refused to even try Chinese food until the age of fifteen, when I was finally coaxed into eating a bit, and it quickly became my favorite. A lesson to be had there.

My friends and I had only the vaguest concept of differences between countries of East Asia. We were really only aware even of the existence of China and Japan--and Vietnam as well, since there was a war going on there. But in our minds they were essentially indistinguishable. When it came to Japan, we could have named two special characteristics--they took off their shoes inside the house, and they ate raw fish (which in those days seemed incredibly bizarre).

That was a long time ago. Now I have a considerably deeper understanding and interest in things Japanese, which has enriched my life in many ways, some not at all obvious. Thinking back, I have realized that my first impressions of Japan came from the movies--from two particular movies. I have since rewatched both of these many times, and recommend both of them to people who enjoy low-key comedy.

The first is Teahouse of the August Moon (1956). Perhaps I'll have more to say about this one in the future.

The second is Walk Don't Run (1966), a unique kind of three-sided love story which takes place in modern-day (1964) Tokyo. It also happens to be Cary Grant's last movie, and it's good to see he was a smooth as ever.

In those days we had no VHS, no DVD, no streaming on demand, which means the only way I would see this movie is being taken by my parents to the movie theater. As a kid, I completely ignored the main plot of the movie, but some of the broader moments of comedy made an impression on me that I can still recall today--for example the romantic lead Jim Hutton taking a flying leap into a public bath. Those scenes are what I consciously recall. 

Several years later, in adolescence, other minor events triggered a serious fascination with things Japanese: the butterfly effect in action. It was then that I started studying the Japanese language. These two movies had vanished from active recall by then--I could not even have told you the titles.

Next event in the story: in 1983 I visited Japan for the first time. Yeah, it was great, and it fleshed out all kinds of rather superficial knowledge I had from books and photos. Fragrances, the feel of the air, all kinds of things you can only get from being there.  (Ah, here is the exception that proves the rule.)

And then in 1984: I hear Quincy Jones' song Velas on the radio for the first time. Super-mellow R&B, with the legendary Toots Thielemans on the harmonica. But I'm hearing something else in the music. To me this sounds like Tokyo--like walking on one of the urban backstreets at night. These are not the vast neon jungles you see in the movies, but tranquil, a mixture of shops and homes, passers-by but not crowded, with a balmy summer breeze. It's not the kind of place that tourists take pictures of, but in retrospect it's a fond idyllic memory. I did find one 1983 photo, and put it at the top of this post.

I couldn't account for this effect of the music--not yet. 

But one day shortly thereafter: I was browsing in a used record store. Once again, in those days we had no MP3's, no music streaming. Acquiring music depended on having the luck to come across it in a store. On that day I came across this:

As I have said, by this time I no longer remembered the title of this movie nor had thought about it for many years. So my first thought looking at this was: Hey, I know this movie! 

And then the next thing I noticed: It's Quincy Jones! 

And later I found: and Toots Thielemans!

Naturally I bought the record and listened--music I had heard just once eighteen years earlier, and never once thought about. 

Breezy cheerful R&B. That whistling is Toots Thielemans again. Not at all "Oriental" sounding, but it was embedded in my subconscious as "Japan" since age eight.

The Tarot system of tactical time-management

 

I am recently retired.

For many years now the list of things I want to do has far outstripped the time I have available (you too?). Retirement alleviates this situation but by no means eliminates it.

I've also long been interested in "time management," both for practical, selfish reasons and as a theoretical concept. 

In recent months I have been using a new system I developed to help me prioritize my time. I started doing this before retirement. More available time allows the system more room to play but I found it equally useful when free time was scarce. I only wish I had figured this out years ago.

Because the system uses index cards, I call it the Tarot method as a catchy name. Actual Tarot cards are not used.

This system stands on the shoulders of the giants--or at least the fat people--who went before me. Some important perspective can be gleaned from the Eisenhower Matrix. You can visualize this matrix as a sheet of paper divided into half both vertically and horizontally, thus with four quadrants. Each of your obligations goes into one of the four quadrants. 

The left half of the page is for obligations with high urgency--that need to be done soon--and the right half is for obligations with low urgency. Examples: cooking today's dinner is high urgency, since it needs to be done today; starting an exercise program is low urgency, since in the long run it makes little difference whether you start today, tomorrow, next week, or even next month.  

The upper half of the page is for obligations with high importance--feeding the baby, while the lower half is for obligations with low importance--rearranging your sock drawer. (Caveat: what is important or unimportant often depends on your own subjective priorities.)

So the four quadrants we could describe as HIHU (High Importance, High Urgency), HILU (High Importance, Low Urgency), LIHU (Low Importance, High Urgency), and LILU (Low Importance, Low Urgency). The problem many of us have (as Eisenhower described it) is that LIHU obligations tend to take attention away from HILU obligations, which are all too easy to postpone until tomorrow. Generally HIHU obligations get done, and presumably it's ok to ignore LILU obligations altogether (though I'm not sure I agree with this--subject for a future post). The Eisenhower matrix is not really a method so much as a way of looking at things.

(One can refine this matrix by allowing more than two columns or two rows--although understanding the concept might be more important than actually writing down the matrix.)

One of the major benefits of the Tarot system is ensuring that low-urgency obligations are not starved for attention--especially the high-importance ones.

The second pre-existing building block for the Tarot system is the Pomodoro Technique. This is a particular system of timeboxing, based on units of 25 minutes. 25 minutes seems to be a good length of time for maintaining focus on a given task. The standard Pomodoro Method consists of 25 minutes working, 5 minutes rest, 25 minutes working, 5 minutes rest, etc. There are many enhancements but I won't go into those here. A unit of 25 minutes spent on a single task is called a pomodoro. The Tarot method operates in units of pomodoros.

Step 1 of the Tarot method is listing out your priorities. Make a list of the activities you would like to be doing with some regularity. The list should not include anything that is non-negotiable for a given day--getting up and going to work, feeding the baby. You do these outside of the Tarot system. Limit the list to activities to be done in your negotiable time--that gray area between daily obligations and daily leisure time (everyone needs some leisure time).

Some examples of items on my own list (yeah really):

Studying Burmese;

Studying Cantonese;

Studying quantum mechanics (yeah, yeah, I like studying)

...etc... but also:

Playing chess;

Going through my CD collection; making sure I have ripped each one, and deciding whether to dispose of it;

Scanning documents;

Reading a book;

Writing this blog;

Shining my shoes;

...and so on. Currently my list has 35 items on it.

Step 2 of the Tarot method: for each activity on your list, decide what percentage of your negotiable time you would like to devote to that activity. Make this an even percentage--no fractions of a percent. The total percentages for everything should add up to 100%.

What if you have more than 100 items on your list? It could happen. Then you will have to make some tough choices. I suggest keeping a second list of things to work on at some future time. It's also possible to merge two extremely low-urgency items into one and assign that one a 1% priority.

Different items could have very different percentages, but no single item can be less than 1%.

Examples again: the largest percentage on my list is Cantonese, which is 16%. At the 1% level are things like shining shoes and scanning documents.

Step 3 of the Tarot method. Now the cards come into play. Get a stack of 100 index cards. For each item on the list, write that item on the number of cards equal to the percentage given to that particular item. Each card gets just one item. So in my case, "Cantonese" gets written on 16 different cards, while "shine shoes" gets written just one card. Now I have a deck of 100 index cards, each with a single task.

Shuffle the deck well. (It's possible to mix the cards more evenly than a random shuffle, but just shuffling is a lot easier.)

Thereafter you will use this deck to plan your negotiable time. When you have an available pomodoro of negotiable time, take the first card off the deck and do what it says. Move the card to the bottom of the deck. When that pomodoro is finished, take another card off the top and do what it says. Repeat whenever you have a pomodoro of negotiable time.

If you get a card and just can't deal with that particular task at the moment (maybe mowing the lawn, but it happens to be raining), take the second card of the deck and keep that card on top of the deck, so that you will deal with it at the earliest opportunity.

How long will it take you to get through the entire deck? That depends on your life and how much negotiable time you have available. For example, suppose you have an average of 2.5 hours of negotiable time each day--that translates into five pomodoros. So it would take about 20 days to get through the entire deck. Your very low-urgency (1%) tasks would get about one pomodoro of attention in those 20 days. But that is way better than zero.

As life evolves, you can let your deck of cards evolve with it. Take out some cards, add some new cards. It's a rewarding feeling when you wrap up a project and can pull those cards from the deck.

To be honest, there is nothing sacred about the number 100. You can add a card to the deck without subtracting one, so the deck now has 101 cards (or 102, 103...). Be aware, however, that there is always a trade-off. When you increase the number of cards in the deck, each pre-existing item loses a proportional amount of time. So I suggest being honest about these trade-offs by adding and subtracting at the same time.

One aspect of the Tarot system I have come to enjoy is as an approach to handling unpleasant but necessary tasks--like doing your taxes, for example. When the task first arises, I simply put some cards for it into the deck--enough to be sure the task will be completed by the deadline. (For example, doing my taxes takes about four pomodoros. Just a single card is enough to complete them by the deadline, since I go through the whole deck at least four times before then. And putting the card(s) in the deck, I immediately forget about that task for the time being. When the card comes to the top of the deck, I then spend a pomodoro on it and then forget about it again until the card comes around again.

The original Pomodoro method was extremely rigid as to schedules. Each pomodoro is 25 minutes, no more, no less. No interruptions allowed--an interruption immediately cancels that pomodoro. However, I have decided that allowing each pomodoro a little flexibility in reaction to circumstances makes it possible to fit more into a day--more precisely, to have more productive time in a day. So sometimes I keep working on a task for a few extra minutes if it means I can reach a milestone or even finish the project. If I get interrupted, I stop the timer and come back and restart it when I can. 

Emotionally I find that using the Tarot method has freed me from nagging anxiety or even guilt about the various low-urgency tasks that were so easy to neglect. All I have to do is make sure each of these gets at least one card in the deck and progress (may be slow but) is guaranteed.

The big lie. I have described the Tarot method in terms of a stack of index cards because I wanted the simplicity of the underlying principles to come through, and because I wanted to make it clear that the ideas do not depend on technology. However, I actually don't use cards; I use a spreadsheet that I have programmed to emulate the deck of cards. Actually, it's a little more powerful because I can in fact use fractions of a percent, and it distributes the tasks more evenly than pure randomness. But the card method described here works just fine and is easy to get started.

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.