नेपाली (Nepali)

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby E}{pugnator » 2012-05-23, 17:17

That's nice to hear.

How regular is the Nepali orthography compared to spelling?

Besides, is there a high level of diglossia? (That is, the language you learn in books having not to do with the way people actually speak).
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Śrāmaṇera » 2012-05-24, 3:54

The Nepali you learn in books tends to be closer to Hindi, maybe a bit more "literary".

For example, my textbook taught me the expression " - ko bad" ("after") but my boyfriend (who is Nepalese) told me that was just pure Hindi to him, usually people say "pachhi".

I've read some experts recently started to fear Nepali (or at least what the language was supposed to be) might become endangered one day because its vocabulary is starting to be - too - heavily influenced by English, Hindi and also has many Arabic loanwords via Urdu.

As for the orthography, only a few things keep annoying me, but there would be the same problem in Hindi I guess. There are pairs of vowels (two "i", two "u" especially) and it's really almost impossible to hear the difference between the two (one is supposed to be shorter) and you need to write them differently with the devanagari script (sorry, I can't do it on this computer). I always got them wrong, unless I memorize the spelling off by heart.

Also, some consonants can be very tricky. One particularity of Indo-aryan languages is that they have retroflex and aspirated consonants. When I write, I find it sometimes a bit confusing to make a distinction between the many "t" and "d" (t, d, th, dh, T, D, Th, Dh).


But overall, Nepali is a wonderful language and Nepalese people are always willing to help you with your study.

Just keep in mind that maybe 49% of the population speak it as a mother tongue but there are really many other languages spoken in Nepal. Most of the Nepalese people I've met, for instance, don't really "relate" to Nepali (although they speak it) because they're Newars and speak another language (Newari, or "Nepal Bhasa").

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Śrāmaṇera » 2012-05-25, 4:14

मेरो कंप्यूटरमा अहिले देवनागरी देखिन्छ !

एक दमै रमाइलो लाग्यो !

तपाईहरुलाई आज कस्तो छ ? :)


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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-08-16, 7:14

Beautiful song! Thanks bijlee!
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-09-27, 6:02

Oh now I want to learn Nepali :(
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Limagne » 2012-10-14, 19:21


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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-10-15, 2:52

Limagne thanks so much for those links! I didn't even know of half of them! Thanks soo much!
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Bijlee » 2012-10-15, 3:31

All this fuss over a new forum has been making me want more Indo-Aryan languages haha. I've always liked Nepali. :doggy:

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-10-15, 4:20

Bijlee wrote:All this fuss over a new forum has been making me want more Indo-Aryan languages haha. I've always liked Nepali. :doggy:


Me too :( I wish I could drop all my other langauges and just do Indian ones :P (jk)
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-10-18, 2:15

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-11-09, 18:21

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-11-09, 18:22

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-11-09, 18:24

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oBvqVxO-Kno
I swear I heard this song somewhere else lol
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-11-09, 20:20

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2012-11-11, 18:34

Last night I was watching House Hunters International and the episode took place in Nepal. I really liked the houses they showed they were so simple but really pretty. The whole atmosphere of Kathmandu in the episode was really nice, I was so glad they actually did an epsidoe there, most of the time they always do it in Europe or the Caribiean lol
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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Vibhav » 2012-12-31, 8:22

My first post here!

Great to see all the enthusiasm for my language (especially Meera's :D ). Hit me up with any questions regarding the language.

I read through the previous pages and many of what has been written here is correct. Nepali as a language is very similar to Hindi, but not mutually intelligible. However, most of the urban Nepali, plus people living in districts bordering India can understand Hindi perfectly well. This I guess is a result of India's cultural domination in South Asia through its movies, television, radio. On the other hand, most Indians cannot understand Nepali even though they can read the texts as both the languages have the same script. Also, most Nepalis are multi-lingual in the sense that they have their ethnic native language first (Newari, Maithili, Bhojpuri, Magar, etc), then the national language (Nepali), and now English and Hindi.

Also, yes there is diglossia in the spoken and written Nepali language. The day to day spoken Nepali is more informal and shortened version of the formal. For example, if I want to ask "Where did you come from?", it would be "Kaan bata aunu bhako?" in Informal spoken with Respect when the more formal and written form would be "Tapai/Hajur Kahan bata aaunu bhaeko?"

The written Nepali is a lot more formal and uses much more direct Sanskrit words. So people wanting to learn the language might find it a little harder to adapt to the formal/informal spoken and written discrepancies.

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Re: नेपाली (Nepali)

Postby Meera » 2013-01-01, 19:00

Hello and welcome!! its so great to have a native Nepali speaker here. :mrgreen:
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