ไพ่
“ไพ่” (пхай) — playing cards in Thai. Noun, level A1. One syllable, the same sound as "pie" but a different tone. Cards in Thai are always this one word, with no "playing". In a live sentence: “เล่น ไพ่ กับ เพื่อน” — Play cards with friends. Written with the characters ไ, พ, ่. A word from the everyday Thai course, level A1.
In short
| Written in Thai | ไพ่ |
| Read in Latin letters | пхай |
| Translation | playing cards |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | A1 |
Why it looks that way
One syllable, the same sound as "pie" but a different tone. Cards in Thai are always this one word, with no "playing"
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- เล่น ไพ่ กับ เพื่อนлен пхай кхап пхуанPlay cards with friends
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “playing cards” in Thai?
«ไพ่», read “пхай”. In a live sentence: “เล่น ไพ่ กับ เพื่อน” — Play cards with friends. Noun, level A1; written with the characters ไ, พ, ่.
How is “ไพ่” written in Latin letters?
пхай. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
One syllable, the same sound as "pie" but a different tone. Cards in Thai are always this one word, with no "playing". A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.