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Tibetan phrasebook Voyage Tips and guide

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    The Om mani padme hum mantra in Tibetan

    Tibetan (བོད་སྐད་ / ལྷ་སའི་སྐད་) is the main language of Tibet, and its accompanying regions and among overseas Tibetan communities around the world. Tibetan is spoken by several million people in the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR) of the Chinese People’s Republic, the Chinese provinces of Gansu, Qinghai, Sichuan and Yunnan, as well as the neighboring countries Bhutan (around 4,000 speakers), India (over 124,000 speakers), and Nepal (around 60,000 speakers). Written Tibetan is used as the religious language in the countries where Tibetan Lamaistic Buddhism is practiced (e.g. in Mongolia and parts of China proper). Tibetan communities also exist in Taiwan, Norway, Switzerland and the United States of America. It is an official language in Tibet, as well as in the Tibetan autonomous prefectures of Qinghai, Sichuan, Gansu and Yunnan, and all road signs in this region are bilingual in Chinese and Tibetan.

    This phrasebook is based on the Ü-Tsang dialect of Tibetan, which is the dialect spoken in Lhasa, and the officially-recognised standard version of Tibetan. We have a separate Amdo Tibetan phrasebook for that dialect.

    Pronunciation guide

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    The Tibetan script is an Indic script related to those of many South and Southeast Asian languages. Like other Indic scripts, it is an abugida, meaning that each letter represents a consonant, and vowels are indicated by modifications to the consonant letter.

    While Tibetan spelling in the written language is fairly standard throughout the ages and regions, spoken pronunciation is very diverse and there are many, often mutually incomprehensible, dialects.

    In recent times "Lhasa dialect" has been taught to foreigners as a standard. However, there is neither an easy nor a widely agreed standard on how to indicate the phonetics of speaking Tibetan using the Latin alphabet. So be prepared for confusion and fun as you try to pronounce these phrases and hear many different pronunciations from the locals.

    Vowels

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    Like "a" in "alone"; like "a" in "cat" (a).
    Like "aw" in "paw" (å).
    Like "e" in "bet" (e).
    Like "i" in "in" (i).
    ཱི
    Like "ee" in "seen" (í).
    Like "o" in "so" (ó).
    ྲྀ
    Like "e" in "father" (ö).
    ཱུ
    Like "ue" in "glue" (ú).
    Like "oo" in "soon" (ū).
    Like "ee" in "seen" but with rounded lips (ü).
    Like "ay" in "day" (ą).

    Consonants

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    Like "k" in "skill" (k).
    Like "g" in "garden" (g).
    Like "ng" in "sing" (ng).
    Like "ch" in "charge" (ç).
    Like "j" in "jar" (xh).
    Like "ny" in "canyon" (nj).
    Like "t" in "stop" (t).
    Like "d" in "drop" (d).
    Like "n" in "never" (n).
    Like "p" in "spot" (p).
    Like "b" in "beat" (b).
    Like "m" in "mighty" (m).
    Like "ts" in "weights" (c).
    Like "ds" in "adds" (x).
    Like "y" in "you" (j).
    Like "z" in "zoo" (z).
    Like "s" in "treasure" (zh).
    Must be trilled - just like Italian "r" (r).
    Like "sa" in "sand" (s).
    Like "sh" in "shut" (sh).
    Like "l" in "lonely" (l).

    Common diphthongs

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    Like "k" in "kill" (kh).
    Like "ch h" in "punch hard" (çh).
    Like "t" in "time" (th).
    Like "p" in "pit" (ph).
    Like "ts h" in "fights hard" (ţh).

    Phrase list

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    Some phrases in this phrasebook still need to be translated. If you know anything about this language, you can help by plunging forward and translating a phrase.

    Basics

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    Common signs


    OPEN
    ཁ་ཕྱེ། kha chad
    CLOSED/SHUT
    ཁ་རྒྱག་པ། kha gyabpa
    ENTRANCE
    འཇུག་སྒོ། jug go
    EXIT
    ཐོན་སྒོ། thön go
    PUSH
    བིགྱར་གྱབ། Bigyar gyab
    PULL
    ཐན། Than
    TOILET
    གསང་སྤྱོད། sang chö
    MEN
    བུ། bu
    WOMEN
    བུ་མོ། བོུ། bu mo
    FORBIDDEN
    བྱེད་མ་ཆོག je ma chog
    SHRINE THIS WAY
    མཆོད་མཇལ་ཡོད། chö jel yö
    Hello.
    (བཀྲ་ཤིས་བདེ་ལེགས།) Tashi delek.
    Hello. (informal)
    De-po ()
    How are you?
    Khye-rang ku-zug de-po yin-pe ()
    Fine, thank you.
    De-po yin. Thug je che.
    What is your name?
    Khye-rang gi tshen-la ga-re zhu-gi yod? (polite) Khye rang gi ming ga re yin (informal)
    My name is ______ .
    Ngai ming ___ yin.
    Nice to meet you.
    Khye-rang jel-ney ga-po joong ()
    Please.
    Thuk-je zig ()
    Thank you.
    Thuk-je-che (ཐུགས་རྗེ་ཆེ།)
    You're welcome.
    ()Yin dang yin
    Yes.
    Re (རེད།)
    No.
    Ma re (མ་རེད།)
    (Note: Yes and no are usually expressed using an affirmed or negated version of the question ending.)
    Excuse me
    gong-pa-ma-tsom / gong-ta
    I'm sorry.
    Gong dag
    Goodbye
    Chagpo nang, as in take care. Kha lay shug (said to other person if they are staying). kha lay pheb (said to other person if they are going)
    I can't speak Tibetan [well]
    nga pö-kay [yag-po] kyab gi mey
    Do you speak English?
    khye-rang in-ji-kay she gi yö pey?
    Is there someone here who speaks English?
    dhir inji-kay shenyan yö pey.
    Help!
    Rog pa je
    Look out!
    Phar toe
    Good morning.
    ngadro deleg
    Good evening.
    gondro deleg
    Good night.
    Sim shag nang
    I don't understand.
    Ngai she gyi med. Ha kho gi mey.
    Where is the toilet?
    Sang chod gawa yö rey.

    Problems

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    Numbers

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    chig
    nyi
    sum
    zhi
    nga
    drug
    dun
    gyey
    gu
    ༡༠
    chu
    ༡༡
    chu chig
    ༡༢
    chu nyi
    ༡༣
    chu sum
    ༡༤
    chu zhi
    ༡༥
    chob nga
    ༡༦
    chu drug
    ༡༧
    chu dun
    ༡༨
    chu gyey
    ༡༩
    chu gu
    ༢༠
    nyi shu
    ༢༡
    nyi shu tsa chig
    ༢༢
    nyi shu tsa nyi
    ༢༣
    nyi shu tsa sum
    ༣༠
    sum chu
    ༤༠
    zhib chu
    ༥༠
    ngab chu
    ༦༠
    drug chu
    ༧༠
    dun chu
    ༨༠
    gyey chu
    ༩༠
    gub chu
    ༡༠༠
    gya
    1000
    chig tong

    Time

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    Now
    da ta
    After
    Jē la
    Before
    göng ma
    Morning
    shok-pa
    Moon
    nyin-gung
    Evening
    gong-dag
    Night
    tsen mo
    Midnight
    tshen gung

    Clock time

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    1AM
    tshen la tchhu tshö chig pa
    2AM
    tshen la tchhu tshö nyi pa
    1PM
    tchhu tshö chig pa
    2PM
    tchhu tshö nyi pa

    Duration

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    du ring

    Minute(s)
    kar ma
    Hour(s)
    tchhu tshö
    Day(s)
    nyi ma
    Week(s)
    za khor
    Month(s)
    da wa
    Year(s)
    lo

    Days

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    today
    དེ་རིང་ (de ring)
    yesterday
    ཁ་སང་ (kha sang)
    tomorrow
    སང་ཉིན་ (sang nyin)
    last week
    གཟའ་འཁོར་སྔོན་མ་ (za khor ngön ma)
    next week
    གཟའ་འཁོར་རྗེས་མ་ (za khor jey ma)
    Sunday
    གཟའ་ཉི་མ་ (za nyi ma)
    Monday
    གཟའ་ཟླ་བ་ (za da wa)
    Tuesday
    གཟའ་མིག་དམར་ (za mi mar)
    Wednesday
    གཟའ་ཧླག་པ་ (za hlag pa)
    Thursday
    གཟའ་ཕུར་བུ་ (za phur pu)
    Friday
    གཟའ་པ་སངས་ (za pa sang)
    Saturday
    གཟའ་སྤེན་པ་ (za pen pa)

    Months

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    When referring to months, the Tibetans distinguish between their own calendar and the internationally used calendar. For the purposes of this phrasebook we only want to refer to the latter and this is quite easy, since it follows the pattern:
    "foreigner-month-<number 1-12>-pa"
    ཕྱི་ཟླ་<xx>པ་
    chhi da <xx> pa

    The numbers are listed above. The only exception is for January, because the Tibetan for 'first' is not chig pa but དང་པོ་ dang po, so:

    January
    chhi da dang po
    February
    chhi da nyi pa
    March
    chhi da sum pa
    April
    chhi da zhi pa
    May
    chhi da nga pa
    June
    chhi da drug pa
    July
    chhi da dun pa
    August
    chhi da gyey pa
    September
    chhi da gu pa
    October
    chhi da chu pa
    November
    chhi da chu chig pa
    December
    chhi da chu nyi pa

    Writing time and date

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    Colors

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    Color
    ཚོན་མདོག་ tseun dok
    Blue
    སྔོན་པོ་ ngeun po
    Yellow
    སེར་པོ་ ser po
    Green
    ལྗང་ཁུ་ jang koo
    Red
    དམར་པོ་ mar po
    Brown
    སྨུག་པོ་ mook po
    Black
    ནག་པོ་ nak po
    Orange
    ལི་ཝང་ li wang
    White
    དཀར་པོ་ kar po

    Transportation

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    Bus and train

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    Directions

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    Street
    Lam kha
    Right
    Ye-la
    Left
    Yon-la
    Straight
    kha thug
    North
    Jang chog la
    South
    lho chog la
    East
    shar chhog la
    West
    nub chhog la

    Taxi

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    Lodging

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    Money

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    How Much

    Ga-Tsod

    Yuan

    Gor-mo

    1-Yuan

    Gor-mo Chik

    Eating

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    Fruits
    sching tog
    Vegetables
    tsel
    Apple
    ku shu
    Breakfast
    zhog dzha
    Lunch
    nyi gung kha lag
    Supper
    gpong dro kha lag
    Chicken
    dzha scha
    Beef
    Kang scha
    Meat
    tshag scha
    Fish
    nya scha
    Cheese
    chur wa
    Egg
    go nga
    Salad
    drang tsel
    Bread
    ba lap
    Rice
    dre
    Noodles
    thuk pa
    Bon appetit!
    ཞལ་ལག་མཉེས་པོ་ནང་གོ། shelak nye po nang ko
    delicious
    ཞིམ་པོ་ སྤྼོ་པོ་(H) shimpo t(r)opo (H)
    meal
    གསོལ་ཚིགས་ sol tsi'
    meal, food
    ཁ་ལག (NH) ཞལ་ལག (H) kalak, shelak

    Bars

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    Shopping

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    Driving

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    Authority

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    This Tibetan phrasebook is an outline and needs more content. It has a template, but there is not enough information present. Please plunge forward and help it grow!


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