မင်္ဂလာပါ
mangga.lapa/mɪ̀ɴɡəlàbà/
မင်္ဂလာပါ (mangga.lapa) is the Burmese way to say hi.
The phrase မင်္ဂလာပါ is used to say hello or hi. Unlike English, which uses different greetings depending on the time of day, this phrase can be used regardless of the time.
Meaning: friendly, informal greeting (intj)
What does it mean word for word?
The phrase combines mangga.la (auspicious or blessed) with the polite particle ပါ (pa), so it literally means 'may auspiciousness be unto you'.
Is there a formal and an informal way to say it?
While often translated as a friendly greeting, မင်္ဂလာပါ is actually the standard polite and formal way to say hello in Burmese.
How does it change in a sentence?
The particle ပါ (pa) at the end of the phrase is what makes the greeting polite. Omitting this particle would make the greeting feel much more abrupt and less respectful.
How do you pronounce it?
mangga.lapa (/mɪ̀ɴɡəlàbà/)
Did you know?
- While မင်္ဂလာပါ is the standard greeting, many Burmese people greet friends by asking ထမင်းစားပြီးပြီလား, which means 'have you eaten rice yet?'
- In Myanmar, a greeting like မင်္ဂလာပါ is often accompanied by a slight bow of the head to show respect.
- If you are greeting a close friend of the same age, using မင်္ဂလာပါ might actually make you sound too stiff or distant.
Examples in context
- မင်္ဂလာပါ။ နေကောင်းလား။Hi! How are you?Tatoeba #3189925 by Vortarulo, translation #30316 by Zifre
- မင်္ဂလာပါ၊ နေကောင်းလား။Hi, how are you?Tatoeba #3189927 by Vortarulo, translation #473177 by exjimmy
- မင်္ဂလာပါ၊ တွေ့ရတာ ဝမ်းသာပါတယ်။mingalarpar, twe ya dar wan thar par tal.Hi, nice to meet you.
Example conversation
Two friends meet at a coffee shop.
- နှင်းနှင်း Hnin Hninမင်္ဂလာပါ အောင်အောင်။mingalabar Aung Aung.Hi, Aung Aung.
- အောင်အောင် Aung Aungမင်္ဂလာပါ နှင်းနှင်း။mingalabar Hnin Hnin.Hi, Hnin Hnin.
- နှင်းနှင်း Hnin Hninနေကောင်းလား။nay-kaung-lar?How are you?
- အောင်အောင် Aung Aungနေကောင်းပါတယ်။nay-kaung-par-tal.I am doing well.
Sources
- Wiktionary, “hi” translations and entries မင်္ဂလာပါ, CC BY-SA 4.0, dump of 2026-09-26.
- Example sentences: Tatoeba CC BY 2.0 FR.
