Talk:Songkurai

Name

Songkurai seems to only be used in WW2 contexts. If the article scope is primarily meant to cover the place up to the present, Songkalia (ซองกาเลีย)/Songkaria (ซองกาเรีย) might be more representative, though I'm not sure which of these or the spaced variants is the more common. Even the Thai spelling is inconsistent (though the river is almost always Songkalia River). --Paul_012 (talk) 18:53, 31 January 2022 (UTC)

@Paul 012: Sorry, didn't see your post. I think that the camp (and the former bridge) is the main part of the history. Songkurai seems to be the most common name although there are many variants. The original title of Sonkrai was probably taken from a list of trainstations. According to Openstreetmap the name is Ban Song Karia. Very little is known about the village in English sources (only newspaper reports about illegal border crossings), and by the looks of things it is probably less than 100 people. Therefore, I think that the current village is a secondary topic. The river was another source of confusion, because it can't be the Kwai even though it usually is in the articles... KittenKlub (talk) 08:37, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

Sorry for the confusion, I didn't mean to say that the identification of the river in the article was incorrect—I only mentioned it as an example of how the name can be Romanised. Since it's brought up now though, from what I've found it seems that the Ro Khi is one of the two main tributaries of the Songkalia, and the name Songkalia is sometimes used to apply to both branches as well as the main river, so either should be fine. The confusion caused by the Bridge on the River Kwai's inaccuracies is quite known. This Facebook page mentions that Bridge No. 290 over the Songkalia is probably in fact the inspiration for the bridge depicted in the novel, seeing as the conditions at the Tha Makham Bridge were nowhere nearly as bad. Fair points about the camp being the main topic. (I think "Songkuria" in the section heading should be "Songkurai"?) --Paul_012 (talk) 09:06, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

Corrected Songkurai (for some strange reason Songkuria is easier to type).KittenKlub (talk) 09:15, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

I've adjusted the opening sentence to better show the name origins and which corresponds to which. Having the official name appear first even when it's not the article title is quite standard and I think should be okay here? --Paul_012 (talk) 10:30, 2 February 2022 (UTC)

I think it looks fine. Also the village is still there, and maybe one day somebody will add some background on the village. KittenKlub (talk) 10:41, 2 February 2022 (UTC)