Looking for practical Shan to Lingala phrases? This free guide lists 100 essential sentences for travel, study, work, and everyday conversation. Each line shows the Shan phrase first, then the Lingala translation (Lingala) — so you can scan quickly before a trip, class, or video call.
The phrases are grouped into eight topics: greetings and pleasantries, useful phrases for travellers, everyday conversation, directions and getting around, shopping and dining, emergencies and health, work and business, and time, days and numbers. Use the table of contents to jump straight to greetings, directions, dining, emergencies, or numbers. You do not need perfect grammar to start — short, clear sentences often work better than silence when you are learning Lingala.
Tip: when a Lingala phrase looks unfamiliar, compare it with the Shan wording — noticing word order differences helps you understand grammar naturally.
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Greetings and pleasantries
Hello, goodbye, please, thank you, and polite introductions for meeting new people.
မင်္ဂလာပါ
Mbote(mingalar par)
ကျေးဇူးတင်ပါတယ်
Melesi(kyeizu tin par tal)
မနက်ခင်းဖြန့်
Mbote na ntango ya mokolo(ma net khin phyan)
နေ့လည်ခင်းဖြန့်
Mbote na ntango ya midi(nei lyae khin phyan)
ညနေခင်းဖြန့်
Mbote na ntango ya soir(nya nae khin phyan)
ညအိပ်ချိန်
Malamu na butu(nya eit chain)
နောက်မှတွေ့မယ်
Tala yo nsima(nauk hma twei mae)
သွားတော့မယ်
Kende malamu(thwa dor mae)
သင့်နာမည်ဘာလဲ?
Nkombo na yo nani?(thing na mei ba leh)
ကျွန်တော်နာမည်ဂျွန်ပါ
Nkombo na ngai ezali John(kyaun taw na mei John par)
သင်ဘယ်လိုလဲ?
Ozalaki malamu?(thing beh lo leh)
သင့်ကိုတွေ့ရတာဝမ်းသာပါတယ်
Nayoki malamu na yo(thing ko twei ya ta wan tha par tal)
Useful phrases for travellers
Airport, hotel, tickets, and transport phrases for getting around on a trip.
သင်အင်္ဂလိပ်စကားပြောလား?
Ozali koloba lingala?(ozali koloba lingala)
ကျွန်တော်ဟင်းဒီကိုမပြောနိုင်ပါဘူး။
Nasalaka hindi malamu te(nasalaka hindi malamu te)