Burmese has no standard romanization, so I will use my own.

Pronunciation

a, e, I, o, u are like ah, eh, ee, oh, oo

â is an unstressed a, like the a in alone

ai like the I in Hi.

Ao or au is like the ow in how

ei is like the ei in weigh

ou is like the o is so

~ signifies the nasal, so bõ is like the French bon

k' t' p' and ch' are srongly aspirated, which means they are like there English

counterparts but with a strong rush of air following them.

Hs, hm, hn, hng are like the English s, m, n and s but proceeded by an h

ng is like the ng in sing

hy is like a strongly pronounced h as in huge

th is like the th in thin

dh is like the th in then

' designates a glottal stop, like the Cockney pronunciation of bottle (bo'l) or like

English uh-oh

Burmese is a tonal language and can consist of four tones.

1. Normal Pitch-long No special symbol
2. High pitch-long Marked by ´ over the vowel
3. Short, sharply falling Marked by a ` over the vowel
4. Short & High ending in a glottal stop.

Tones affect meaning: ka, ká, kà, ka' are different words.

Important: Unvoiced consonants (t, k, p, ch) become voiced (d, g, b, j) in compounds following a syllable other than the fourth tone. Hence, the verb particle -te often becomes -de

NOUNS

The plural is often not indicated but can be formed by adding -tei (become -dei after tones 1-3)

house tdrf ei~ houses tdrDJ f ei~dei

There is no indefinite or definite article (a or the)

The suffix -mà indicated feminine: hsaya /hsayamà

Possession is shown by placing the possessor first, changing the tone of the last syllable (if it's 1 or 2), to tone 3: dog 'kwei' the dog's head 'kwèi gãù'

Nouns take endings to signify prepositions:

to -ko

from -kà

at, in, on -hma

with -nè

The object of a sentence can also take -ko

wall nãyã

to the wall nãyãgo

from the wall nãyãgà

on the wall nãyãhma

with the wall nãyãnè

VERBS

Verbs come at the end of a sentence, so the word order in a sentence is Subject-Object-Verb. The present tense particle is -te (or -de):

I sing (m)	uGsefaw|f oDcsif;qkdwf	chanó dhâjì~s'ode
I sing (f)	uGsefr oDcsif;qkdwf	chama dhâjì~s'ode
You sing	cifAs|; oDcsif;qkdwf	k'âmya dhâjì~s'ode
He, she, it sings	ol oDcsif;qkdwf	thu dhâjì~s'ode
We sing	uGsefaw|!f oDcsif;qkdwf	chanodo dhâjì~s'ode

I eat fish chanó ngàgo sàde uGsefaw|f ig;8kd p|;w,f//

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