Photo: Takeaway / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Phi Sao Khrap: Kham Mueang from a Jaran Manopetch Song
Phi Sao Khrap ("Hello, Older Sister") is a song by Jaran Manopetch in which a shy young man greets an older girl, a senior he admires, and confesses his love. The lyrics mix central Thai with simple Kham Mueang that sticks after one hearing, above all the word for an older sister, pi พี่ (Kham Mueang reading pi). This article uses the song to teach forms of address (older sister, older brother, younger sibling) and the small words such as ko and bo that make a sentence sound Northern.
This is part of the series Kham Mueang through songs and literature. The song is still under copyright, so we quote only short lines where needed to explain them, and invite you to hear the full song from the official channel.
Listen to the song first
According to the list of Jaran's works on Wikipedia, Phi Sao Khrap is on Folk Song Kham Mueang, Set 2 (1976), which Wikipedia counts as his unofficial first set, and again on Folk Song Kham Mueang, Immortal Set (1977). Bon Borapet (Manager Online, 2012) also places it on the Immortal Set, together with Sao Motorcycle and Khong Kin Khon Mueang.
This is the official video from the Nititad AOA Official channel. Listen once, then read on.
The story and where the song came from
The singer is a young man who greets an older girl politely and asks whether she still remembers this little brother. He tells her he is a grown man now, with young women chasing him. Two or three years ago he was still a child and a bit of a tease, and she loved him like a younger brother. Now he loves her seriously and no longer wants to be her younger brother. This is our own summary.
A study by Kritin Wongtharicha and colleagues (2018) from Bangkok University describes the song as light, country-style, using simple Northern speech to tell of a young man's shyness as he secretly likes an older girl. Bon Borapet (2012) says Jaran wrote it from the stories of his college friends, as a song for a college cheering group, before reworking the melody to make it easier to listen to, and that Jaran himself said he wrote it just for fun, yet in the end it became a timeless hit.
Pi, ai, nong: Kham Mueang words for older and younger siblings
The song opens with a greeting that goes straight to a form of address.
สวัสดีครับปี้ครับ — Phi Sao Khrap, words and music: Jaran Manopetch
("Hello, older sister.") In the dictionary pi means older sister: a woman older than you. An older man is called ai อ้ายฯ (Kham Mueang reading ai). So a form of address depends on the sex and age of the person you speak to.
| Word | Kham Mueang | Who it is used for (dictionary) |
|---|---|---|
| pi | พี่ | older sister, a woman older than you (also oei; Phrae Province says nyai) |
| oei | เอิ้ยฯ | older sister; in the old days the eldest daughter was called oei, paired with ai |
| nyai | ไห้ยฯ | older sister, used in Phrae Province |
| ai | อ้ายฯ | eldest brother, an older man, and the pronoun a man uses for himself when speaking to someone younger |
| pi ai | พี่อ้ายฯ | eldest brother |
| nong | น้อฯง | someone born later; also the second-person pronoun for someone younger |
| pi nong | พี่น้อฯง | older and younger siblings, relatives, people who respect each other like kin |
| po chai | พํอฯชายฯ | a male person of any age, from baby to elder |
| sao | สาวฯ | an unmarried woman, a woman aged 15 or over, paired with the man called bao |
| num | ห่นฯม | not old; young |
The word ปี้สาว (pi sao) sung in the song is not a headword in the dictionary. We read it as "older girl": pi plus sao. For other kinship words, read on at Kham Mueang family words.
Kham Mueang words, line by line
The lyrics are short but hold several Kham Mueang words worth learning. We explain three lines.
จำน้องชายคนนี้ได้ก่อ — Phi Sao Khrap, words and music: Jaran Manopetch
The ko กํอฯ (Kham Mueang reading ko) at the end of the line turns it into a question. The dictionary gives the example ไปก่อ, "will you go?", so the line means "do you remember this little brother?" The word for "remember" in Kham Mueang is cham จำ (Kham Mueang reading cham), "to keep in the mind, to recall", which the song writes the central Thai way.
จะฮักปี้บ่มีหน่าย — Phi Sao Khrap, words and music: Jaran Manopetch
hak รักฯ (Kham Mueang reading hak) means "to love"; the dictionary describes it as caring and being attached, and fondness out of affection. The bo ... nai pattern means "not ... bored of", where nai ห่นฯายฯ (Kham Mueang reading nai) means to be tired of or to fall out of love. The whole line means "I will love you and never tire of it."
บ่อยากเป๋นน้องจาย — Phi Sao Khrap, words and music: Jaran Manopetch
("I no longer want to be your younger brother.") This line has three Kham Mueang words together: bo บ (Kham Mueang reading bo, "not"), pen เปนฯ (Kham Mueang reading pen, "to be") and nong. Different versions of the lyrics write เป๋น or เป็น; that is only spelling.
| Word in the song | Kham Mueang | Meaning in the dictionary | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| bo dai | บได้ | cannot, did not; goes before or after a verb | in the line "bo dai mao ao pen faen" |
| mao | เมัา | to be infatuated, absorbed in a person or thing (another meaning: dizzy from drink or drugs) | we read the line as "I wasn't yet in love enough to take you as a sweetheart" (our own reading) |
| yap | ยัปฯ | to grab, to hold | the line "ja yap ao phom pai pen faen" means "will grab me to be a boyfriend" |
| la-on | ลอ่อฯร | a child (a distortion of "luk on") | the line "phom yang la-on" |
| phom | ผ฿มฯ | first-person pronoun, a male speaker | same as central Thai |
Speaking politely like a Khon Mueang
The young man ends his sentences with the central Thai khrap, which is not a headword in the Moradok Lanna dictionary. Kham Mueang has its own polite ending, chao เจั้า (Kham Mueang reading chao). The dictionary explains it as a sentence ending that shows humility, nowadays mostly used by women, for example กิ๋นแล้วเจ้า, "I've eaten (ka)", and in the past men also used it with nobles and senior monks.
| Central Thai | Kham Mueang | Note |
|---|---|---|
| สวัสดีครับ | (a central Thai greeting) | the dictionary has neither สวัสดี nor ครับ as headwords |
| กินแล้วค่ะ | กิ๋นแล้วเจ้า | example in the dictionary |
| ไปไหม | ไปก่อ | example in the dictionary |
| ไม่ได้ไป | บ่ได้ไป | example in the dictionary |
Read the full set of endings at Kham Mueang sentence endings and the polite words that are easy to misread at Kham Mueang false friends.
How the lyrics differ between versions
We compared the lyrics from three sources: (a) the video description on the Nititad AOA Official channel, (b) the lyrics page on Meemodel, and (c) the on-screen lyrics of the RMS Karaoke lyric video from the rights holder. The text agrees almost everywhere; the only differences are in spelling.
- เป๋น (a, b) / เป็น (c)
- น้อง จาย written with a space (a) / น้องจาย (b, c)
- ปี้สาว ครับ written as separate words (a, b) / ปี้สาวครับ (c)
Summary
- Jaran Manopetch's Phi Sao Khrap tells of a shy young man who greets an older girl politely and confesses he no longer wants to be her younger brother.
- pi is an older sister, ai is an older brother, and nong is someone younger: Kham Mueang forms of address depend on the sex and age of the person you speak to.
- Words to remember from the song: ko (a question ending), bo (not), yap (to grab), hak (to love), nai (tired of), la-on (a child).
- nong chai means "younger sister's husband" in the dictionary, not "younger brother", and son kaen in the song is central Thai that differs from Kham Mueang.
- To speak politely like a Khon Mueang, end a sentence with chao.
Look up more forms of address in the Moradok Lanna dictionary (in Thai), and read the courting language of young Lanna men and women at Kham U Bao U Sao.
More in the same series: Sao Motorcycle · Sao Chiang Mai · Khong Kin Khon Mueang, or see the whole series at Kham Mueang through songs and literature.
Sources
- Moradok Lanna dictionary (dict2), entries ปี้, เอ้ย, ไหย้, อ้าย, น้อง, น้องจาย, ก่อ, ฮัก, หน่าย, ยับ, เมา and the other words in this article. In Thai.
- Nititad AOA Official. (2015). พี่สาวครับ - จรัล มโนเพ็ชร (ภาพคอนเสิร์ต) I ราชาโฟล์คซองคำเมือง [Phi Sao Khrap – Jaran Manopetch (concert footage)]. YouTube (lyrics in the video description).
- RMS Karaoke. พี่สาวครับ - จรัล มโนเพ็ชร (Lyric Video) [Phi Sao Khrap – Jaran Manopetch (Lyric Video)]. YouTube (on-screen lyrics, used to check the quoted lines).
- บอน บอระเพ็ด [Bon Borapet]. (4 April 2012). โฟล์คซองคำเมือง ชุดอมตะ “อุ๊ยคำ-สาวมอเตอร์ไซค์-พี่สาวครับ” เพลงดังอมตะ ของ “จรัล มโนเพ็ชร” [Folk Song Kham Mueang, Immortal Set: the timeless hits "Ui Kham, Sao Motorcycle, Phi Sao Khrap"]. Manager Online. In Thai.
- กฤติน วงศ์ถริชา [Kritin Wongtharicha], ธรรญธร ปัญญโสภณ [Thanyathon Panyasophon], ปีเตอร์ กัน [Peter Kan] and ชัยฤทธิ์ ทองรอด [Chairit Thongrod]. (2018). เนื้อหาและการสื่อความหมายของเพลงโฟล์คซองคำเมืองของ จรัล มโนเพ็ชร เพื่อกลุ่มผู้ฟังสมัยใหม่: กรณีศึกษาเพลง “พี่สาวครับ” [The content and meaning of Jaran Manopetch's Kham Mueang folk songs for modern listeners: the case of "Phi Sao Khrap"]. Ph.D. in Social Sciences Journal, 8(2), 265–279. In Thai.
- วิกิพีเดีย [Wikipedia]. จรัล มโนเพ็ชร [Jaran Manopetch] (album and song list, used as a lead). In Thai.
Practise the words from this article
Flip through 25 flashcards of the Lanna words used in this article.
