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

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).

Phrase list

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

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.

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

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

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

Colors

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

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!

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