Username Taken wrote:

Jaap N. wrote:

sanjuro wrote:^I thought that was "ba" & "cha"...

Misinformed you: 'nung-ai' is for both man and women.
'Baat' is for men and 'cha' for women. Sorry for the confusion.

'nung-ai' is not interchangeable with 'baht' or 'ja/cha'.

'nung-ai' does meant 'yes', but, as in 'yes I agree with you'.

I think OP is hearing 'neung haeay.' It is an affirmation and its meaning is akin to 'absolutely,' 'exactly,' 'surely,' 'positively,' 'for sure,' 'that's it,' 'right on,' 'hell yeah!' etc.

CKDewey wrote:

Username Taken wrote:

Jaap N. wrote:

sanjuro wrote:^I thought that was "ba" & "cha"...

Misinformed you: 'nung-ai' is for both man and women.
'Baat' is for men and 'cha' for women. Sorry for the confusion.

'nung-ai' is not interchangeable with 'baht' or 'ja/cha'.

'nung-ai' does meant 'yes', but, as in 'yes I agree with you'.

I think OP is hearing 'neung haeay.' It is an affirmation and its meaning is akin to 'absolutely,' 'exactly,' 'surely,' 'positively,' 'for sure,' 'that's it,' 'right on,' 'hell yeah!' etc.

Thats it! exactly right on...hells yeah.

StroppyChops wrote:

Rama wrote:And I don't expect StroppyChops will ever have to read or talk about any of the above. You might as well scribble it out of the alphabet it's an obsolete letter you'll never encounter, except during the first few months of learning the alphabet.

So effectively the word is used to demonstrate a letter that is no longer used, to children that will never use it? Cambodia.

The letter is archaic, yes. You won't encounter it in everyday language, except maybe in words with ancient roots and proper nouns. Although words that start with this letter are very rare as pointed out by Rama, I'm pretty sure I have encountered that letter in the middle of words.
So it is still used but very, very rarely.

Same deal with ឋ (ancient thor) though it is used more often than ឍ (ancient thô).

CKDewey wrote:

Username Taken wrote:

Jaap N. wrote:

sanjuro wrote:^I thought that was "ba" & "cha"...

Misinformed you: 'nung-ai' is for both man and women.
'Baat' is for men and 'cha' for women. Sorry for the confusion.

'nung-ai' is not interchangeable with 'baht' or 'ja/cha'.

'nung-ai' does meant 'yes', but, as in 'yes I agree with you'.

I think OP is hearing 'neung haeay.' It is an affirmation and its meaning is akin to 'absolutely,' 'exactly,' 'surely,' 'positively,' 'for sure,' 'that's it,' 'right on,' 'hell yeah!' etc.

CKDewey got it right.

The written and properly pronounced phrase is "neung haeay" (with an aspirated H) but slang and lazy tones make it sound as "neung-ai".

Joon wrote:The letter is archaic, yes. You won't encounter it in everyday language, except maybe in words with ancient roots and proper nouns. Although words that start with this letter are very rare as pointed out by Rama, I'm pretty sure I have encountered that letter in the middle of words.
So it is still used but very, very rarely.

Same deal with ឋ (ancient thor) though it is used more often than ឍ (ancient thô).

Thanks. Actually our tutor made a relevant comment yesterday when demonstrating "the old way" to write the Khmer for 'give' - that the grandparent generation use some characters, words and expressions that the youngest (literate) generation can't read. Thanks significant change - for obvious historical reasons - in just two generations.

I love the Cambodian language, but it is becoming too archaic (as shown by the abandoned usage of some letters) and a little bit of a mess!

For instance, the alternate ways to write the SAME word: Samlor (soup) can be written សម្ល and សំឡ or the preposition "for" can be written សម្រាប់ and សំរាប់.

While I've been told that the "proper, official" way of writing is to use Ven. Choun Nath's rule of spelling (សម្ល and សម្រាប់ type of spelling), a lot of people says it doesn't matter as long as you keep consistent in your writing.

Yeah, this is the age old grammar versus communication debate. All (currently spoken) language is fluid and evolving, so where's the line between formal and too informal?

Joon wrote:I love the Cambodian language, but it is becoming too archaic (as shown by the abandoned usage of some letters) and a little bit of a mess!

For instance, the alternate ways to write the SAME word: Samlor (soup) can be written សម្ល and សំឡ or the preposition "for" can be written សម្រាប់ and សំរាប់.

While I've been told that the "proper, official" way of writing is to use Ven. Choun Nath's rule of spelling (សម្ល and សម្រាប់ type of spelling), a lot of people says it doesn't matter as long as you keep consistent in your writing.

I wish English had this kind of flexibility, it would keep the spelling Nazis on this board in check.