Tibetan phrasebook

Tibetan 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.

We have a separate Amdo Tibetan phrasebook for that dialect.

Pronunciation guide

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" (j).
ཉ: Like "ny" in "canyon" (ñ).
ཏ: Like "t" in "stop" (t).
པ: Like "p" in "spot" (p).
ཙ: Like "ts" in "weights" (ţ).
ཛ: Like "ds" in "adds" (ds).
ཟ: Like "z" in "zoo" (z).
ཞ: Like "s" in "treasure" (ž).
ར: Must be trilled - just like Italian "r" (r).
ས: Like "s" in "suck" (s).
ཤ: Like "sh" in "shut" (š).

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

Hello.: Tashi deleg (བཀྲ་ཤིས་བདེ་ལེགས)
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

Numbers

1 ༡ chig
2 ༢ nyi
3 ༣ sum
4 ༤ zhi
5 ༥ nga
6 ༦ drug
7 ༧ dun
8 ༨ gyey
9 ༩ gu
10 ༡༠ chu
11 ༡༡ chu chig
12 ༡༢ chu nyi
13 ༡༣ chu sum
14 ༡༤ chu zhi
15 ༡༥ chob nga
16 ༡༦ chu drug
17 ༡༧ chu dun
18 ༡༨ chu gyey
19 ༡༩ chu gu
20 ༢༠ nyi shu
21 ༢༡ nyi shu tsa chig
22 ༢༢ nyi shu tsa nyi
23 ༢༣ nyi shu tsa sum
30 ༣༠ sum chu
40 ༤༠ zhib chu
50 ༥༠ ngab chu
60 ༦༠ drug chu
70 ༧༠ dun chu
80 ༨༠ gyey chu
90 ༩༠ gub chu
100 ༡༠༠ gya

Time

Clock time

Duration

du ring

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

Writing time and date

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

Bus and train

Directions

Taxi

Lodging

Money

Eating

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

Shopping

Driving

Authority

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!

Learning more

Listen to tibetan numbers on WikiBabel Tibetan language disambiguation page - Standard Tibetan and Tibetan phrasebook in Wikidata together