If you’re going out to lunch with a Burmese friend who says he’s running low on water (ရေခမ်းနေတယ်), be prepared to pay for the meal. That means he’s broke. On the other hand, if you’re running low on water yourself, but he is overflowing, so to speak (ရေလျှံနေတယ်), you can probably ask him to pay for the meal.

In English, if you need some type of permit or approval from a government office or an institution, you may need to grease the wheel. In Burmese, you may need to offer the clerk or the boss some tea money (လက်ဖက်ရည်ဖိုး) to get your application on the top of the pile. And if you’re single, dressed in your best outfit, sitting in a conspicuous spot in a café, doing something cute or sexy to attract the attention of romantic prospects, you are displaying your goods on a tray (ဈေးဗန်းခင်းတယ်).

In this episode, my cohost Su, a Chiang Mai-based Burmese language teacher, and I discuss the colorful phrases and slangs the young people are using, and what they actually mean. Join us as we shoot the breeze, as you might say in English, or bake potatoes (အာလူးဖုတ်), as we might say in Burmese.

Vocabulary

ဗန်းစကား slang
နယ်ပယ် territory, sector, segment
အနုပညာလောက the creative sector
အနုပညာလောကသား members of the creative sector
ရေလောင်းပေးတယ် to bribe (lit. to pour water)
စကားဝှက် code word
လက်ဖက်ရည်ဖိုး bribe (lit. tea money)
လက်ဖက်ရည်ဖိုးထိုးတယ် / ပေးတယ် to offer bribe (lit. to offer tea money)
မိုက်တယ် to be stylist / hip
ဆယ်လဖီဆွဲတယ် to take selfie
ဓာတ်ဖမ်းတယ် to take photo (lit. to capture electricity)
ရေလျှံတယ် to have money to spend (lit. to be overflowing)
ရေခမ်းတယ် / ရေပြတ်တယ် to be broke (lit. to be low on water, to run out of water)
ဘိုင်ပြတ်တယ် to be broke
ကြွေတယ် to develop a crush
Crush တယ် to develop a crush
ကြူးတယ် to show off, to publicize someone’s virtues excessively
ဈေးဗန်းခင်းတယ် to attract attention, especially in the romantic sense (lit. to display goods on a tray)
အိုဗာတင်းတယ် to overact, to be melodramatic (from close pronunciation of “over” from “Ovaltine”)
Drama ခင်းတယ် to cause drama
အာလူးဖုတ်တယ် to be talkative (lit. to bake potatoes)
လေပေါတယ် to be talkative (lit. to be windy)
ရွှီးတယ် to lie, to make up stuff, to exaggerate
ပေါက်ပေါက်ဖေါက်တယ် to be talkative, to pester, to scold incessantly (lit. to pop popcorn)
ပွားတယ် to pester, to scold incessantly
စိတ်လေတယ် to be distracted, to be unmotivated, to feel down
ဘူတယ် to be at a loss, to be distracted, to be unmotivated, to feel down
ဟွန်ဒီ unofficial money transferring agent
လန်းတယ် to be stylish, hip (lit. to be fresh)
အထာကျတယ် to be impressive, attractive
ဘိုးတော် / ဘွားတော် dad, mom
ချောင်တယ် / ပေါက်တယ် to lose one’s mind, to be crazy
ပလပ်ကျွပ်တယ် to lose one’s mind (lit. to be unplugged)
ယောက်ဖ / သားကြီး good friend (lit. son, brother-in-law)

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

Would you ever drink a cigarette or a cigar? In English, you wouldn't, but in Burmese, you must. To describe smoking a cigarette or cigar, you must use the verb သောက်တယ် , the same verb for drinking coffee, tea, or Coca Cola. It may seem counterintuitive to use the verb to describe consuming liquid for smoking, but that's the correct form: ဆေးလိပ်သောက်တယ် , quite literally, to drink a cigarette.

When talking about having a dream, you cannot just use the single-word verb "dream," as you do in English. Instead, you have to use a noun-verb combo -- အိပ်မက်မက်တယ် meaning, to dream a dream -- the way Ella Fitzgerald did, when she sang "Dream a Little Dream Of Me."

And the standard way to say "take a photo" is ဓာတ်ပုံရိုက်တယ် , with the verb that means "to strike" or "to hit," as if you're trying to defeat your photo with a punch or a blow in a boxing match.

In this episode of Bite-Size Burmese, I introduce you to the standard choices of verbs in Burmese that might perplex or confound you if you're a foreigner. (Photo of old lady smoking in Bagan by Oneinchpunch, licensed from Shutterstock; Intro and end music: "When my ukulele plays" by Soundroll, Upbeat.io.)

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

Mid-April is when Burmese people celebrate the end of the old year and the beginning of another one with a water festival, similar to the people of Thailand and several other neighboring countries.

In modern times, young people driving around in open pickup trucks and shooting water through high-pressure tubes and cannons is the standard practice, but in the old days, people dipped laurel leaves into silver goblets of fragrant water and dabbed them on one another-- a practice that seems quaint now.

Also, in Thingyan in bygone times, street performers and dance troupes would come up with call and response routines, called သံချပ် Than Jaat, that celebrate life, welcome the new year, and also take jabs at the authorities’ hypocritical behaviors and corruption.

In this episode of Learn Burmese from Natural Talk, my regular guest Su, a Burmese teacher based on Chiang Mai, and I discuss these and more.

Vocabulary

သင်္ကြန် Burmese water festival

သင်္ကြန်ကျပြီ Thingyan has arrived

ပြက္ခဒိန် calendar

ကျင်းပတယ် to celebrate

နံ့သာရည် aromatic water

ရင်ဖုံး / ရင်စေ့ bosom-covered / bosom-buttoned blouse style

အကြိုနေ့ the pre-arrival, the precursor (to a festival)

အကျနေ့ the day of arrival (of a festival)

အကြတ်နေ့ the in-between day

အတက်နေ့ the day preceding the end (of a festival)

နှစ်ဆန်းတစ်ရက်နေ့ first day of new year

ရေသေနတ် / ရေပြွန် water gun / water canon

ကုသိုလ်လုပ်တယ် to perform good deeds

မဏ္ဍပ် pavilion

အတိုင်အဖေါက် call and response

အတိုင်အဖေါက်ညီတယ် the call and response are in sync

သံချပ် a call-and-response routine

ပူဆာတယ် to pester, to repeatedly request

အာဏာသိမ်းတယ် to stage a coup

သီလယူတယ် to pledge to observe certain precepts

အတာအိုး a well-wishing pot with flowers and leaves

၇ရက်သားသမီးအတွက် for those born on each of the weekday

ခွက်စောင်းခုတ်တယ် to slap a cup of water down with force

ဥပုသ်သည် those observing precepts

ညိုမြမလုပ်နဲ့ do not play coy, do not pretend to be disinterested

မူမနေနဲ့ do not play coy, do not pretend to be disinterested

ဈေးကိုင်တယ် to be holding out

မုန့်လုံးရေပေါ် sweet rice balls, a specialty of Thingyan

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

You might have noticed that, in Chinatown, red lanterns are going up, and lion dancers and dragon dancers are coming out, ready to parade the street. Mid-February is usually Chinese New Year, so both the Chinese community in Yangon, and the Chinese diaspora around the world are decked out in red dresses and new outfits, ready to welcome the new year. In this episode, my cohost Su, a Chiang Mai-based Burmese language teacher, and I discuss the new year festivities we can see around us. (Photo by Maritxu, licensed from Shutterstock, Music courtesy of Pixabay)

Vocabulary

ချစ်သူများနေ့ Valentine’s Day

ထုံးတမ်းအစဉ်အလာ tradition

ပြန့်နှန့်တယ် to spread

သည်းခံတယ် to tolerate, to put up with

တရုတ်နှစ်သစ်ကူး Chinese New Year

မြန်မာပြည်ဖွားတရုတ် Chinese born and raised in Burma

တိုးနယား mythical creature with features of lion, dragon, and phoenix

ဘုံကျောင်း Chinese clan house

အံပေါင်း red envelope with spending money (Burmese loan word from Chinese 红包 Hongbao)

ဒဏ္ဍာရီ legend, myth

တရုတ်တန်း Chinatown

မီးပုံး lantern

ဗျောက်အိုး firecracker

ဗျောက်အိုးဖေါက်တယ် to set off firecrackers

အမွှေးတိုင် incenses

မျက်စိစပ်တယ် to get itchy eyes

လမ်းသလားတယ် to stroll around

မီးရှူးမီးပန်း fireworks

ကလန်ကဆန်လုပ်တယ် to act rebelliously, to defy

နှစ်ဆန်းတစ်ရက်နေ့ New Year Day

လူပျိုဟိုင်း old bachelor (slang)

ဝက်သား သုံးထပ်သား pork belly meat

အိတယ် to be soft, tender (in meat texture)

ဘဲကင် roast duck

ခေါက်ဆွဲ noodle

စုတ်ချက် brushstroke

ဗန်းစကား slang

ရေပန်းစားတယ် to be popular

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

If a politician speaks ambiguously without committing to one side or the other on an issue, you might call it political doublespeak in English, and accuse him or her of being wishy-washy. In Burmese, you might say he or she is "straddling the sides of two boats," လှေနံနှစ်ဖက်နင်းတယ် or လှေနံနှစ်ဖက်ခွတယ်. On the other other hand, if you can resolve a conflict by satisfying the two opposing sides, your solution may be praised as ရှဉ့်လည်းလျှောက်သာ ပျားလည်းစွဲသာ , meaning "the chipmunk can tread on the branch; so can the bees build a hive on it"; or မြွေမသေ တုတ်မကျိုး "neither the snake shall die, nor the stick shall break." To learn how to use these phrases correctly, listen to the latest episode of Bite-Size Burmese. (Illustration by Burmese artist Nyan Kyal Say, NK Artbox; Intro and end music: "When my ukulele plays" by Soundroll, Upbeat.io.)

Vocabulary

• လှေနံ the edge of a boat
• လှေနံနှစ်ဖက်နင်းတယ် / ခွတယ် to straddle on the sides of two boats (to play both sides, to be noncommital)
• ဝေ့လည်ကြောင်ပတ် to be wishy-washy
• သောင်မတင် ရေမကျ neither stranded on the beach, nor going back into the water (to be in a stalemate, to be a deadlock)
• ရှဉ့်လည်းလျှောက်သာ ပျားလည်းစွဲသာ The chipmunk can tread on the branch; so can the bees build a hive on it.
• မြွေမသေ တုတ်မကျိုး Neither the snake shall die, nor the stick shall break.
• ပြန်လည်သင့်မြတ်သွားတယ် to reconcile

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

In the 1980s, when I was growing up in Rangoon under Ne Win's Socialist Government, I remember how foreigners were shocked by, among other things, local people chewing betel quid and spitting out splashes of red betel juice all over the sidewalks. Today, if you come from a place like Japan, where nobody expects you to tip, you’re in for a shock when visiting the U.S., where tipping is expected everywhere, from coffee shops to fine-dining restaurants (15-20% of your bill is the norm, in case you’re wondering). In both Thailand and Burma, travelers are expected to remove their footwear when entering temples and shrines, but there’s a notable difference between the two countries. In Japan, you can generally enter temple grounds with your shoes on, but must remember to remove them if you’re entering someone’s home, especially a traditional home with tatami mats.

In this episode of Learn Burmese from Natural Talk, my guest Su, a Chiang Mai-based Burmese teacher, and I discuss the culture shocks we have experienced at home and abroad. (Photo by Jirawatfoto, licensed from Shutterstock. Music courtesy of Pixabay)

Vocabulary

မျက်နှာချင်းဆိုင် face to face (adverb)
ခြေချတယ် to settle
မြေအောက်ရထား underground train, subway
မိုးပျံတံတား / မိုးပျံလမ်း overhead bridge or walkway (lit. flying bridge or walkway)
ညဈေး night market
ကျတ်ရွာ village of the lost souls / ghost village
သရဲတ‌စ္ဆေ ghosts
အလာကျဲတယ် to come infrequently (used with trains and buses)
အလာစိပ်တယ် to come frequently (used with trains and buses)
ဖိုမဆက်ဆံရေး intimate relationships (lit. male-female interaction)
ပွင့်လင်းတယ် open, progressive, liberal (socially)
ပရဝဏ် pagoda precinct
အများသုံးအိမ်သာ public bathroom
ကွမ်း betel quid
ကွမ်းတံတွေး betel juice (liquid from chewing betel quid)
ထွေးတယ် to spit
ပက်ခနဲ in a splash
လူ့ကျင့်ဝတ် social protocol, proper manner
လိုင်းကား bus
၃၁ ဘုံ 31 planes of existence
ဖေါ်ရွေတယ် to be hospitable
နှိုးဆော်တယ် to urge, to rally
ချေလျင် on foot (adverb)
တစ်ပြ a distance equal to one furlong or 220 yards, but Burmese people also use it to refer to ill-defined distances

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

Some homegrown businesses and neighborhood restaurants flourish in Burma, thanks for the power of viral posts and social media. But fake news of levitating monks and strange omens also spread online, like wildfire. While not exactly fake news, inaccurate news and old news also tend to resurface from time to time, stirring up racial tension or raising false hopes. In this episode of Learn Burmese from Natural Talk, my cohost Mol Mol from BLAY (Burmese Language Academy of Yangon) and I discuss the good, the bad, and the ugly sides of social media. (Photo by Lanlao, licensed from Shutterstock. Music courtesy of Pixabay)

Vocabulary

ကောင်းကျိုး benefits
ဆိုးကျိုး negative impact
မီးပုံးပျံ aerial balloon
ရင်တထိတ်ထိတ် anxiously (adverb, literally, with the heart beating fast)
လူမှုရေးကွန်ရက် social network
လူမှုရေး social
ကွန်ရက် / ပိုက်ကွန် network
သတင်းမှား fake news
ကောလာဟလ rumors
ပွဲဆူအောင် to stir up things
ပဋိပက္ခ riot, conflict
ဆဲလဖီ ဆွဲတယ် to take selfie
ဆဲလဖီ တင်တယ် to post selfie
ဆဲလီ celebrity
ဝေခွဲလို့မရဘူး cannot determine
ဈာန်ကြွတယ် to levitate, to float by spiritual means
Google ခေါက်တယ် to search in Google
Google လိုက် go ahead and use Google
နှလုံးရောဂါ heart disease
သုံးသပ်တယ် to analyze
ချဉ်းကပ်တယ် to approach
စကားချိုသွေးတယ် to sweet-talk
ဂျင်းမိတယ် to be deceived, to be taken advantage of (slang)
ဂျင်းထည့်တယ် to deceive, to take advantage of (slang)
ပေါက်သွားတယ် to become popular, to go viral online (slang)
ကျမ်းကိုးကျမ်းကား cited sources
ငွေသား cash, money
ပိတ်ပင်တားဆီး to forbid

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.

Given a choice, would you rather drink the Kool-Aid, or the bitter rainwater (မိုးခါးရေ)? The phrase “to drink the Kool-Aid,” meaning to embrace an irrational, foolish, or dangerous popular ideology, is associated with the tragic episode involving the American cult leader Jim Jones. The Burmese equivelent is "to drink the bitter rainwater" (မိုးခါးရေသောက်တယ်), stemming from the folktale about a kingdrom where everyone, save but a few wise citizens, drank the toxic rainwater and became insane.

The Burmese moviemaker Ko Pauk, who left the country after the military coup of 2021 and joined the resistance, made a documentary honoring the activists in the civil disobedience movement. Though it was released under the English title "The Road Not Taken," the original Burmese title was မသောက်မိသောမိုးခါးရေ ("The Bitter Rainwater I Refused to Drink"). The songwriter and singer ဆောင်းဦးလှိုင် (Hsaung Oo Hlaing) recently released a song titled မိုးခါးရေ ("Bitter Rainwater").

To learn more about the folktale behind the phrase and how to use the expression to talk about taking a stand or caving to pressure, listen to this episode of Bite-Size Burmese. (Illustration by Burmese artist Nyan Kyal Say, NK Artbox; Intro and end music: "When my ukulele plays" by Soundroll, Upbeat.io.)

Have a question about a Burmese word or phrase you heard here? Send us a message.