Tibetan phrasebook



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
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

 * ཨ : 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

 * ཀ : Like "k" in "skill" (k).
 * ག : Like "g" in "garden" (g).
 * ང : Like "ng" in "sing" (ng).
 * ཅ : Like "ch" in "charge" (ç).
 * ཇ : Like "j" in "jar" (xh).
 * ཉ : Like "ny" in "canyon" (nj).
 * ཏ : Like "t" in "stop" (t).
 * ད : Like "d" in "drop" (d).
 * ན : Like "n" in "never" (n).
 * པ : Like "p" in "spot" (p).
 * བ : Like "b" in "beat" (b).
 * མ : Like "m" in "mighty" (m).
 * ཙ : Like "ts" in "weights" (c).
 * ཛ : Like "ds" in "adds" (x).
 * ཡ : Like "y" in "you" (j).
 * ཟ : Like "z" in "zoo" (z).
 * ཞ : Like "s" in "treasure" (zh).
 * ར : Must be trilled - just like Italian "r" (r).
 * ས : Like "sa" in "sand" (s).
 * ཤ : Like "sh" in "shut" (sh).
 * ལ : Like "l" in "lonely" (l).

Common diphthongs

 * ཁ : Like "k" in "kill" (kh).
 * ཆ : Like "ch h" in "punch hard" (çh).
 * ཐ : Like "t" in "time" (th).
 * ཕ : Like "p" in "pit" (ph).
 * ཚ : Like "ts h" in "fights hard" (ţh).

Basics

 * Hello. : 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
 * You're welcome. : Yin dang yin
 * Yes. : Re
 * No. : Ma re
 * ( 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.

Numbers

 * ༡ : chig
 * ༢ : nyi
 * ༣ : sum
 * ༤ : zhi
 * ༥ : nga
 * ༦ : drug
 * ༧ : dun
 * ༨ : gyey
 * ༩ : 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

 * 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

 * 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
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

 * today : (de ring)
 * yesterday :  (kha sang)
 * tomorrow : (sang nyin)


 * last week :  (za khor ngön ma)
 * next week : (za khor jey ma)


 * Sunday : (za nyi ma)
 * Monday : (za da wa)
 * Tuesday : (za mi mar)
 * Wednesday : (za hlag pa)
 * Thursday : (za phur pu)
 * Friday : (za pa sang)
 * Saturday : (za pen pa)

Months
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--pa"



chhi da  pa

The numbers are listed above. The only exception is for January, because the Tibetan for 'first' is not chig pa but 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

Colors

 * Color : tseun dok
 * Blue : ngeun po
 * Yellow : ser po
 * Green : jang koo
 * Red : mar po
 * Brown : mook po
 * Black : nak po
 * Orange : li wang
 * White : kar po

Directions

 * 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

Money
How Much

Ga-Tsod

Yuan

Gor-mo

1-Yuan

Gor-mo Chik

Eating

 * 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! : shelak nye po nang ko
 * delicious : (H) shimpo  t(r)opo (H)
 * meal : sol tsi'
 * meal, food : (NH)  (H) kalak, shelak