ศาลาชุมนุม

[David and Bui]

Friends,

One of the entries in Lexitron for สู้ is:

สู้ /sûː/ [V] be not better than
Example : อยู่ที่ไหนก็สู้อยู่ที่บ้านไม่ได้
Related word: ฟัด, ฟาดฟัน

I have a question. "be not better than" seems to take into account the negative ไม่ as well as the verb สู้. Thus the definition seems to encompass "สู้ . . . ไม่ได้".

Would a better definition in this context be, "is better than", "to overcome"? And the sample sentence be rendered as,

"Living anywhere [else] can never be better than living at home." "There is no place better than home." Or, in the immortal words of Dorothy, "There's no place like home."

What do you think?

[Tgeezer]

Friends,

One of the entries in Lexitron for สู้ is:

สู้ /sûː/ [V] be not better than
Example : อยู่ที่ไหนก็สู้อยู่ที่บ้านไม่ได้
Related word: ฟัด, ฟาดฟัน

I have a question. "be not better than" seems to take into account the negative ไม่ as well as the verb สู้. Thus the definition seems to encompass "สู้ . . . ไม่ได้".

Would a better definition in this context be, "is better than", "to overcome"? And the sample sentence be rendered as,

"Living anywhere [else] can never be better than living at home." "There is no place better than home." Or, in the immortal words of Dorothy, "There's no place like home."

What do you think?

'Cannot compare' in the home context.
สู้ไม่ได้ = not capable of achieving the aim. (?)
This ฟาดฟัน should be ฝ่าฟัน I think.

[claude06thailand]

Friends,

One of the entries in Lexitron for สู้ is:

สู้ /sûː/ [V] be not better than
Example : อยู่ที่ไหนก็สู้อยู่ที่บ้านไม่ได้
Related word: ฟัด, ฟาดฟัน

I have a question. "be not better than" seems to take into account the negative ไม่ as well as the verb สู้. Thus the definition seems to encompass "สู้ . . . ไม่ได้".

Would a better definition in this context be, "is better than", "to overcome"? And the sample sentence be rendered as,

"Living anywhere [else] can never be better than living at home." "There is no place better than home." Or, in the immortal words of Dorothy, "There's no place like home."

What do you think?

thai2English dictionary has this definition and I have heard it in this sense quite often :

สู้(...)ไม่ได้ > can't beat (something) ; is no match for (something)

I think "There's no place like home." is perfect.

[David and Bui]

'Cannot compare' in the home context.
สู้ไม่ได้ = not capable of achieving the aim. (?)
This ฟาดฟัน should be ฝ่าฟัน I think.

I think you have a good point, Tgeezer. It sure appears that the usage of สู้ is closer to ฝ่าฟัน than ฟาดฟัน. Here are the sample sentences from both:

มิตรแท้แม้เคยอยู่ร่วมกันก็สามารถฟาดฟันกันได้
[Even] close friends who used to live together are capable of fighting with each other.

เราจะต้องฝ่าฟันอุปสรรคกันมากมายหลายอย่าง ในการที่จะสร้างพลังร่วมกัน
We need to struggle against many different obstacles in building our combined strengths.

The RID has the definition of ฝ่าฟัน as: "ก. ต่อสู้กับความยากลําบาก", "to struggle against difficulty and adversity". (I can't find ฟาดฟัน in the RID.) I wonder whether the usage of ฝ่าฟัน is limited to the abstract meaning, rather than to physical fighting. Any thoughts?

Thanks.

[Tgeezer]

The RID has the definition of ฝ่าฟัน as: "ก. ต่อสู้กับความยากลําบาก", "to struggle against difficulty and adversity". (I can't find ฟาดฟัน in the RID.) I wonder whether the usage of ฝ่าฟัน is limited to the abstract meaning, rather than to physical fighting. Any thoughts?

Thanks.

Not really, I assumed it was a typo. ฝาด is the feeling in the mouth you get when eating something which dries your mouth, raw tamarind for instance.

[montyb]

Hi David,
Let me put it in this way: “สู้” in this context (which had nothing to do with “fight”) means “to compare.”
อยู่ที่ไหนก็สู้อยู่ที่บ้านไม่ได้ = อยู่ที่ไหนก็ไม่ดีเท่าอยู่ที่บ้าน (compare “somewhere else” to home)
So, all of your translations are good.

"Living anywhere [else] can never be better than living at home." "There is no place better than home." Or, in the immortal words of Dorothy, "There's no place like home."

สู้เราทำเองดีกว่า (We’d rather do it ourselves) (compare what someone did/do to what we did/do.)

Another meanings of “สู้” are:
ไม่เต็มที่, ไม่มาก เช่น ไม่สู้จะมีทาง (ไม่มีทางมากนัก/มีทางไม่มากนัก)
ไม่สู้เค็ม (ไม่เค็มมาก)
ไม่สู้จะดีนัก (not quite good)
Or “สู้” (หน้า) is “เผชิญ” (to face/confront) เช่น ไม่กล้าสู้หน้าเพราะอายที่ทำผิด


Hope this helps.
P.S. Edited some lines.