Grammatical Number

INTRODUCTION Many languages across the world express distinction in counting. In English, words that can be counted are either singular or plural; in other languages such as Sanskrit, words can be dual as well (indicating a count of two). Some languages such as Japanese may have optional number marking as well! The category of nouns, pronouns, adjectives and … Read more

Vocabulary: Swear Words

What is the fun in learning a language when you don’t know any swear words? Come on, even kids say ‘Stupid!’. Now very offensive words are omitted (obviously) so the swear words below are the ones you can use to scold people, sometimes. Use with caution! Die = मोर्! (mor) Stupid = मुर्ख (murkha) Idiot … Read more

Vocabulary: Days Of The Week + Time

What are the days of the week called in Nepali? Day as in Wednesday is called वार (vār), which is phontically identical to बार (bār). We will also look at time divisions. The week starts on Sunday. Saturday is observed as a public holiday in Nepal. On Fridays, certain offices have shorter working hours, referred to as a ‘half-day’, while … Read more

Telling The Time

Since we learnt how to count till 60, we can tell time now. If you want to know more about the numbers: Numbers: 1-30: Click Here Numbers: 31-60: Click here Now, time telling isn’t very complicated in Nepali. So how do we quote time? First, time telling largely revolves around the verb ‘बज्नु’ (bajnu) which means : to be … Read more

Vocabulary: Heavenly Bodies

Ever wondered what the moon or the Sun were ever called? Now, let’s go sky gazing!  Sun (casual) = घाम (gham)  Sun (more technical) = सुर्य (surya) Stars = तारा (taaraa) Moon = जून (juun) Moon (more respect) = चन्द्रमा (chandramaa) Sky = आकाश (aakaash) Space = अन्तरिक्ष (antariksh) World = विश्व (bishwa) Planet = ग्रह (graha) Mercury = बुध (budha) Venus = शुक्र (shukra) Earth = पृथ्वी (prithwi) Mars = मंगल (mangal) Jupiter = बृहस्पति (brihaspati)  Saturn = शनि … Read more

Vocabulary: Personal Relations

Across time you will encounter people who you will develop relations with, either as a best friend, friend, loved one or as an enemy. People relations are really simple in Nepali. Sathi is also more common than mitra. Also, Nepali lacks girlfriend/ boyfriend/ best friend so I have written the closest possible translation.: Relatives/ Kin … Read more

Case Marker: Mā

INTRODUCTION You accidentally wake up from a long coma and the first thing you ask is where you are. You ask yourself, how did you end up in the hospital in the first place? Maybe you got hit really hard by a baseball in the stadium? Or perhaps you were on a vacation when a crazy skater struck you from behind by the … Read more

Writing The Devanagari Script

INTRODUCTION Now that we have learnt the Devanagari script, we now explore how to write it effectively as well. So far, we have treated the characters mostly as individual glyphs, rather than building blocks. Thus, we might be tempted to write each and every character as they appear, making the text blocky and choppy. This … Read more

Case Marker: Le

INTRODUCTION Now that we have gone over what case markers are, we shall now look at them one by one and see how they function in a Nepali sentence. As a reminder, case markers appear after the case and are adjoined to the case itself, so instead of saying “in Rome”, you would say “Romein”. The first case marker we … Read more

Song: Nepali – 1974 AD

‘Yo maan ta mero Nepali ho’ is a famous Nepali song sang by 1974 AD. It translates to : This heart of mine is a Nepali. If you sing this song, then I am sure you will gain some respect from us Nepalis. To go to the video of the song, click HERE. I won’t provide … Read more