Useful Hindi Words For Travellers

you have opened a pandora's box here, indiaprof, drowned are the '[really] useful words for [unsuspecting] travellers' in a torrent of smut!

for those of you who are good at this kind of thing, please come up with a suitable conclusion to this:

"i once met a lewd young man from jaipur..."

(he claimed he got turned on by hindi swear words, i kid you not!)

back to useful hindi words:

chor = thief

choree = theft

pakdo = catch

these words to be shouted in two's for emphasis (chor, chor - pakdo, pakdo) if you happen to be a victim of a 'chain-snatcher' or a 'jeb katra' (pick-pocket).

i find "chhutta hai?" far more commonly used ("have change?"). the answer invariably is "chhutta nahin hai" - "don't have change".

Ahm uh! I wanted to write that too but after reading Prof's experience with it and the consequences of mispronouncing it, desisted.
But now that it is mentioned that is the main form of asking for change if you can get the pronunciation right otherwise don;t set yourself up for embarrassment.

i once met a lewd man from jaipur
who spat naughty words like a viper
his speech was so grotty
it belonged in a potty
so I taped up his mouth with a diaper


Phew, that was difficult! You didn't make it easy, finding suitable rhymes for Jaipur!

Karuna, I'm impressed.

Well, thanks for chhutti, but all the same, given my experience with mispronunciation, and people not listening well... think I'll stick to tute paise, even if it's a bit old-fashioned. Anyway, so am I. Especially in India, where the average age is, what? Fourteen?

I don't even understand half the slang in America; how can I possible understand it in India? And do I even want to?

another good one Karuna
Right professor!

I once met a lewd man from Jaipur
Who had left his pants in North Raipur
When he googled for them post mishap
He found the results were all crap
Better ask the question on indiamike, sir.

Oh, the old "supercilious professor who likes to fire from the hip" routine.
If you'd bothered to read my post properly - I didn't say Delhi people were polite, I said that as one moves east from Delhi folks become politer.

Having grown up and learnt the language from scratch in Delhi, I hardly need a lecture from you about what Dilli Hindi is like! Save it for those who (might) need it.

It is a fact that there are layers and layers and layers where politeness is concerned in Dilli Hindi - it helps to understand what someone means if one knows what region they are originally from. As has been hinted, a particular person may come across as rude without intending any rudeness whatever. Then it's a simple question of whether one makes allowance or not.

Dilliwalla,

You're right, of course. I missed that part of your post. Sorry about that.

When walking in Shahjahanabad, I've found the Hindi to be very clear and easily understood by someone who has learned it in school instead of from birth (and tolerably polite), but I wouldn't say people are talkative or overly friendly. It's crowded and busy in Delhi. For that matter, Londoners and New Yorkers and even people in San Francisco (where I'm from) can be the same way for the same reasons.

When your city is overrun by tourists and outsiders in town on business, you try to ignore them, which probably comes across as rude. I've done it to tourists in San Francisco, so I try not to take it personally.

You're also right about layers of polite, now that I think in more detail about my Delhi experiences. But those idiots on their motorcycles I have no patience for. They're ruining life for everyone, charging down narrow streets like they're the bloody Padshah. Then again, they usually aren't speaking Hindi. Just looking very, very superior.

I think all these lists of words could be useful but as long as someone does not know Hindi pronunciation and the transcription is not precise, mispronunciations can occur all the times and be even worse than simply using English for a foreigner...just my opinion...

If a kind native speaker would like to record something and post it online I thing it would be much much more useful

Halikirang,

Too true. I've heard some Hindi so garbled no one could possibly comprehend it. If I hadn't studied in school, with a native speaker to help me, it would be very difficult.

In this thread, some of us are using phonetic transcriptions, and Holikirang and I (and others) tend to use a more standard transliteration, but that doesn't necessarily produce the sounds of the language. For instance, the verb hai (is) = "hey." And more confusing, "hain," (are) has an almost silent, nasalized "n" like the accented Spanish n, but not quite... (See, it's really hard to explain; you just have to actually hear it.)

In Indian newspapers, a sort of modified form of transliteration is used that's partly standard, partly phoenetic. So you see different spellings, with sometimes d used instead of t, etc.

Also, when you use postpositions, some words become inflected, so you need to know how these changes work, and that (to me) is probably the most confusing thing about the language. And, of course, there's gender, but Hindi-speakers are not overly particular about that.

All this said, most people in India will tolerate any amount of blundering with the language, and are just happy to see you trying. The only people who get surly about this are richer, more educated people who, honestly, should know better than to make fun of someone trying to speak a foreign language they weren't born with.

Recently I found a post that I posted years ago asking for people to write Hindi things down as they are spoken. Phonetically and with the stressed syllables in capitals (I understand the general rule is stress on the second syllable?).

As an example, earlier I wrote shikayat and then wrote shk-EYE-ut, because that's how I was taught to say it by listening to it spoken. Without that, most English speakers would read the word as "SHIK-aa-yaat", I think.

It would be really, really useful if people could do that. If you can include the Devanagari for those of us who can read it, that would be the most help. Some things aren't translatable (how many T sounds can one language have?!); I'm just a casual learner, but I would always stress the importance of being able to read the script.

Karuna's right again. When I really want to know how to pronounce a word in Hindi, I look it up in my dictionary and find the Devanagari script version of the word. That way, you know what vowels are stressed and which one's aren't. Using a long aa for a shot "uh" sound is probably the most common mistake I hear (and that Western students learning Hindi make).

But Hindi is, once you start tackling it, not a difficult language. Structurally, it's fairly simple, and with a vocabulary of a few hundred words you can be quite functional. Pronunciation comes quickly, too, especially if you can find a native speaker to help you with the script.

I remember learning the script in about three or four days, just fiddling around with it. It looks difficult, but it isn't really. And if you get off the train in Gwalior, you'll be able to get back on, because none of the signage there is in English Roman script.

i once met a lewd man from jaipur
who's mind was rotted to the core
once down at city palace
he exposed his phallus
but only to take a leak on the door.

Not Hinglish! Perfectly good English - the Brits taught us! Not OUR fault if they (and others) don't use it anymore.

From my first Hindi/English school dictionary - chutiya (= blockhead.
I have yet to find any description anywhere that links chutiya directly with that, er, other word. I think most people just assume that becos they sound so alike.

Btw, chutiya ( चूतिया ) = soft t.
Chhutti ( छुट्टी ) = hard t, and both pronounced ('Chhut' as in put, then tee/tea)
The plural wud be छुट्टियाँ .

Please note the slight difference between singular and plural - the character for the 'ee' sound changes!
Also, in writing by hand the second ट would be appended under the first and the little diagonal stroke removed (used here to denote a "half" letter or sound - somehow the software doesn't convert corrrectly in this particular case, it does otherwise. Like क in पक्का /pakka)

1) Chaudah ( चौदह ) = 14
Very simple - 'chau' as in jaw, then d'h.
Of course many folks just go daa. It's the 'chau' that is crucial though - get it right and there'll be no misunderstandings.

2) Re Chhotu ( छोटू )- I find most problems that foreigners have with learning correct pronunciation is the awful transliterations done by.......us Indians!
The above spelling wud be much more accurate and therefore easier to teach. It is very important to use 'Chh' for Chhachh (see anar's post) or for Chhotu. And putting in a second 't' where none belongs means many foreigners end up pronouncing both.
'Chho' as in 'toe', and try to spit without actually spitting .
'tu' as in boo, you, moo, goo.....er, I think that's clear . Hard t.

Er, surely you were thinking of chhakka?

Wud someone pleeeeeeeez state which word this is?!! (Ok, being rhetorical, I won't either ). But none of the two words commonly used for fornication come close to any we have been discussing.
And then there's a unique third one, only seen once - actually used in a Kabir-doha format.

Chhor ( छोड़ )
Again, inadequate transliteration, and actually compounded by the fact that there is no uniformity in transliterating that last letter/sound. Some use 'r', some use 'd' for that "in-between" sound (dash it, forgot to install Devnagari or I'd have typed em to show the difference).
EDIT:
r sound - र
d sounds - द and ड (soft and hard, respectively)
That in-between sound! (less incorrect if 'r' used) - ड़
Folks may like to note the very small difference between this letter and the one for hard 'd' - only the dot below! And it's this that is at the root of the transliteration issue/problem - the second is basically seen as an 'offshoot' of the first. The first one being basically the English 'd' sound, therefore some pandits feel the second one shud also be denoted with 'd'.
BUT it leads to a lot of confusion - many times you'll hear transliterated names pronounced with the soft or hard d sound as described above.

I personally believe that only 'r' should be used in Roman script for this case becos there's much less chance of getting the pronunciation wrong (specially with an Indian accent).
Ok, only two sounds with 'r' possible, but three with 'd' - we ourselves have problems with unknown place names that have either letter, as Imentioned above. But with 'r' you have half a chance of getting it right.

Mombatti . 'Mom' as in loam.
(This one's spelling is fraught! - basically when combining mom and batti. But wax is मोम )

That second one wud clearly mark you as a foreigner (ok, after your appearance ). "Aapke pas [item] hai/hain? (for singular/plural)

Shik-aa-y't ( शिकायत ) - soft t.
Of course in Delhi you're much more likely to be understood if you say "Com-plant(American pronounciation) book"

Aaaah, regional variations - let's not EVEN start!

(Btw, your Eng Lit degree should be revoked - pronoUnciations??!!! )

My experience is that when Garhwalis want to swear, they use..............Hindi.

Exactly what I said in reverse, innit? As you moved westward, the language got impoliter.