Physical Body & illnesses

Let's make learning Burmese language fun and interesting. In this lesson, I will describe physical body parts in Myanmar, and what to do with them. For example, when I think of "hand", the old Beatles song "I wanna hold your hand" came up to my mind. How would you say that phrase in Burmese?

I will cover the common Myanmar Language usages associated with each body part, as well as illnesses and medical terms to be used when you see a doctor. Let's start systematically from the top down.

Head

Burmese word for head is ခေါင်း | goun3.

ခေါင်း မာတယ်

goun3 ma2 deare2

the person is very stubborn. (head + hard + affirmative ending word)

ခေါင်းကိုက်တယ်

goun3 kite deare2

I have a headache. (head + bite + affirmative ending word)

ခေါင်းမူးတယ်

goun3 mu3 deare2

I feel dizzy. (head + dizziness/drunken state + affirmative ending word)

ခေါင်း အေးအေး နဲ့ စဉ်းစါး ပါ

goun3 ay3-ay3 neare1 sin3-za3 ba2

That's the advice to think over something with cool head. Here's the break-down.

ခေါင်း | goun3 — head

အေးအေး | ay3-ay3 — coolly. Note: when you double up the word ay3 which means "cool", the word becomes an adverb "coolly".

နဲ့ | neare1 — with; using

စဉ်းစါး | sin3-za3 — think

ပါ | ba2 — polite suggestion.

ခေါင်းဖြီးမယ်

goun3-pfyi3 meare2

I will comb hair. (head + comb hair + will)

I need a hair cut

ဆံပင် | za1-bin2 — hair

ညှပ် | hnyut — cut with scissors

ချင်တယ် | chin2 deare2 — I want to (want + affirmation)

ဆံပင် ညှပ် ချင်တယ်

za1-bin2 hnyut chin2 deare2

I want a hair cut.

Cheek

ပါး | pa3 — cheek

ချ | cha1 — strike; fight

ပေး | pay3 — give

မယ် | meare2 — will

ပါးချ ပေးမယ်

pa3 cha1 pay3 meare2

I'll give you a slap.

In one website, a Canadian woman who travels extensively in Myanmar (without any companion or guide) had learned to say a phrase quite similar to this. She mentioned that if local punks harass her by saying "pretty lady, pretty lady", that phrase will come in handy.

Face

မျက်နှာ | myet hna2 — face

ပျက် | pyet — be ruined

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

မျက်နှာပျက်တယ်

myet-hna2 pyet deare2

Reputation is ruined!

မျက်နှာ | myet hna2 — face

ငယ် | ngeare2 — small

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

မျက်နှာငယ်တယ် | myet-hna2 ngeare2 deare2 — "feel small" is the feeling you have when other people look down on you, have low opinion of you, and or make disparaging remarks about you, your family or your country. The truth could be real or imagined.

Tongue

လျှာ | sha2 — tongue

ရှည် | shay2 — long

လိုက်တာ | lite da2 — so much

လျှာရှည်လိုက်တာ

sha2-shay2 lite da2

means the person is so long-winded. That person talks and talks and talks and talks.

Heart, Chest, other organs, illnesses, symptoms & diseases

အသည်း | a-theare3 — liver

ကွဲ | kweare3 — break

ပါ | ba2 — soften tone

ပြီ | byi2 — has reached a certain state or condition.

အသည်းကွဲပါပြီ

A-theare3 kweare3 ba2 byi2

My heart is broken! ( Note: not a medical term. Doctors cannot cure this. I hereby declare that there are no broken-hearted people in Myanmar— only those with broken liver.)

The video clip below describes how Myanmar girls are afraid of broken liver.

Note: This word အသည်း is often misspelled as အသဲ.

ရင် | yin2 — chest

နာ | na2 — be painful

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ရင်နာတယ် | yin2 na2 deare2

I feel hurt! (Note: not a medical term. Doctors cannot cure this.)

ရင်ပတ် နာတယ်

yin2-but na2 deare2

I have a chest pain. (Medical term.)

နှလုံး

hna1-lone3 — heart(organ)

နှလုံးသား

hna1-lone3 dtha3 — heart that feels.

This is a modern Burmese word which gets the idea of Heart from English. I have covered in that Burmese song not to break the hna1-lone3 tha3.

အဆုတ် | a-hsoat — lungs

အဆုတ် ရောဂါ | a-hsoat yau3-ga2 — lung disease

ရောဂါ | yau3-ga2 means disease.

Both active and passive smoking can cause

အဆုတ် ရောဂါ | a-hsoat yau3-ga2 - lung disease.

If your diet is high in cholesterol, trans fat and saturated fats, and if you don't exercise regularly, you may want to check whether you have

နှလုံး ရောဂါ | hna1-lone3 yau3-ga2 (heart disease).

Both type 1 and type 2 diabetes fall under the category of hsi3-jo2 yau3-ga2 - diabetes.

ဆီး | hsi3 — urine

ချို | cho2 — sweet

ရောဂါ | yau3-ga2 — disease

ရှိတယ် | shi1 deare2 — I have (present + affirmation)

ဆီးချိုရောဂါ ရှိတယ်

hsi3-jo2 yau3-ga2 shi1 deare2

I have diabetes.

If your illness is long-term and chronic, use the words

ရှိတယ် | shi1 deare2 to mean "I have".

Some other illnesses under this include:

သွေးတိုးရောဂါ

thway3 toe3 yau3-ga2 — high blood pressure / hypertension

ကာလသားရောဂါ

ka2-la1-dtha3 yau3-ga2 — venereal disease

အေ အိုင် ဒီ အက်(စ်)

ay2-ine2-de2-ets — AIDS (Just say the English initials)

The full term for Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) is:

ခုခံ | khu1-khan2 — resist

အား | ah3 — strength

ကျဆင်း | kja1-hsin3 — decrease; decline

မှု | hmu1 — case (this particle modifies "kja1-hsin3" to noun)

ကူးစက် | ku3-set — spread (roughly: contagious)

ရောဂါ | yau3-ga2 — disease

In addition to long-term chronic illnesses, the words

ရှိတယ် | shi1 deare2 can also be used to say if you or someone is pregnant:

ကိုယ်ဝန် | ko2-woon2 — pregnancy

ရှိ | shi1 — have

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ကိုယ်ဝန် ရှိတယ်

ko2-woon2 shi1 deare2 — (She is / I am) pregnant.

Use the words

နေတယ် | nay2 deare2

for short-term symptoms like flu, fever, cough, cold, vomit, running nose, swollen glands, and so on.

ဖျားနေတယ်

pfya3 nay2 deare2

general term which means [I/he/she has/have] fever and flu-like symptoms.

ချောင်းဆိုးနေတယ်

choun3-hso3 nay2 deare2

Use this phrase if you have a cough: I have a cough.

အန်နေတယ်

un2 nay2 deare2

I am vomiting.

နှာရည်ယိုနေတယ်

hna2-yay2 yo2 nay2 deare2

I have a running nose. (nostril + liquid + to leak + "as of current" + affirmation)

Use the word ရောင် | youn2 if something is swollen. It's the same word and spelling for "color". For example,

ဒူးရောင်နေတယ်

du3 youn2 nay2 deare2

My knees are swollen. (knee + swollen + "as of current" + affirmation)

အဆစ် ရောင် နေတယ်

a-hsit youn2 nay2 deare2

My joints are swollen. (joint + swollen + "as of current" + affirmation)

အဆစ် | A-hsit is a singular form of a muscle joint. If you want to stress that several joints are swollen, you can use the plural word အဆစ်တွေ | a-hsit dway2.

Human Anatomy - Internal Organs

Stomach

The complete word for stomach in written Burmese is ဝမ်းဗိုက် | woon3 bite. In spoken language, this word is shortened as ဗိုက် | bite.

ဗိုက် | bite — stomach

နာ | na2 — be painful

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ဗိုက်နာတယ်

bite na2 deare2 — I have a stomach ache.

ဝမ်း | woon3 — stomach

လျှော | shau3 — slide down

နေ | nay2 — stay; as of current

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ဝမ်းလျှောနေတယ်

woon3-shau3 nay2 deare2 — I have a diarrhoea.

ဗိုက် | bite — stomach

ကယ် | keare2 — feel filled up

နေ | nay2 — stay; as of current

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ဗိုက်ကယ်နေတယ်

bite-keare2 nay2 deare2

Use this phrase if you have a bloated feeling in the stomach due to indigestion.

Hand

Burmese word လက် | let is the general term for the whole hand from the shoulder to the finger tip. If you want to be more specific,

လက်မောင်း | let-moun3 — arm

လက်ဖဝါး | let-pfa1-wa3 — palm

လက်မ | let-ma1 — thumb (hand + similar to "mother" as in "mother ship")

လက်ညှိုး | let hnyo3 — index finger

လက်ခလယ် | let-kha1-leare2 — middle finger (hand + middle)

လက်သူကြွယ် | let-dtha1-jweare2 — ring finger (hand + rich )

လက်သန်း | let-thun3 — little finger

လက်ချောင်း | let-choun3 — fingers

လက်သည်း | let-theare3 — finger nails

Here is an advice on not to use your index finger on other people:

လူများ | lu2 mya3 — other people (people + many)

ကို | go2 — to

လက်ညှိုး | let-hnyo3 — index finger

မထိုး | ma1-hto3 — not to point your finger at (not + to punch or poke at)

ပါနဲ့ | ba2 neare1 — please don't (polite suggestion + negative imperative)

လူများကို လက်ညှိုး မထိုးပါနဲ့

lu2 mya3 go2 let-hnyo3 ma1-hto3 ba2 neare1

Don't put your blame on other people by pointing finger at them.

Age old wisdom says if you point one finger at others, three fingers are pointing back at you. (except for the thumb, I guess.)

How would you say, "I want to hold your hand"? The phrase doesn't sound natural in Burmese unless you hold hands (with your girlfriend, for example) and walk together instead of just sit there.

လက် | let — hand

တွဲ | tweare3 — attach

ပြီး | pyi3 — after that (conjunction to connect two verbs)

လျှောက် | shout — walk

ကြ | ja1 — plural to imply "we"

မယ် | meare2 — will

လက်တွဲပြီး လျှောက်ကြမယ်

let tweare3 pyi3 shout ja1 meare2

We will hold hands and walk.

Modify that phrase a bit, and it becomes a good one for politicians asking people to join hands with them.

လက်တွဲပြီး လျှောက်ကြပါစို့

let tweare3 pyi3 shout ja1 ba2 zo1

Let's walk hand in hand!

Waist and Back

ခါး | kha3 — waist

ညောင်း | nyoun3 — muscles to become sore and tired

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ခါးညောင်းတယ်

kha3 nyoun3 deare2

I have a back pain.

It's interesting that kha3 refers to the waist, but that phrase can be used for the muscle sore from the waist up instead of the word for the "back", which is kjau3.

Leg

You can use the word chay2-dout for your leg from toe to thigh.

ခြေထောက် | chay2-dout — feet

ညောင်း | nyoun3 — muscles to become sore and tired

တယ် | deare2 — affirmation

ခြေထောက်ညောင်းတယ်

chay2-dout nyoun3 deare2

My legs are tired!

As for me, my hands are getting tired. So, my last phrase for this lesson is,

လက် | Let — hand

ညောင်း | nyoun3 — muscles to become sore and tired

ပြီ | byi2 — has reached certain state or condition.

Yes, I am very, very tired. I am going to forget about my endless long days and exhausting late nights for a while. Hope you heart is lightened and refreshed by this video clip as it did to me.