Common Phrases in Major World Languages

This is a tool to generate a "cheat sheet" or phrase list of phrases with essentially the same meaning between any one or more different languages.

The most important and commonly used, useful, important, and helpful words and phrases are included. This is meant as a useful tool for travelers who must communicate or quickly learn phrases in a language that is new to them. These phrases are insufficient to give a speech or negotiate a business deal, but they should help with day to day travel emergencies such as asking, "Where is the bathroom?" Sections of phrases are translated for situations such as greetings, questions, amounts, shopping, food, and the little words of every day speech.

Translations are not literal, they are meant to give an equivalent meaning. Phrases are, as best possible, made applicable within different cultures that share a common language. The list is not complete for all languages. Please send me any new translations that you know. The following is a list of languages that are included, so far.

• 繁體中文 (Traditional Chinese)
• 简体中文 (Simplified Chinese)
• 普通话拼音 (Mandarin Pinyin)
• Español (Spanish)
• English
• العربيّة (Arabic)
• Bengali
• Hindi / Urdu
• Português (Portuguese)
• русский (Russian)
• 日本語 (Japanese)
• Deutsch (German)
• Malay / Indonesian
• 한국 (Korean)
• Vietnamese
• Français (French)
• Türkçe (Turkish)
• 广州话 (Spoken Cantonese)
• 英式广州话发音 (Anglicized Cantonese)
• Italiano (Italian)
• Polish
• Ukranian
• Farsi (Persian)
• Ελληνικά (Greek)
• עברית (Hebrew)
• Gaeilge (Irish)

A note on English pronunciation

As with most languages, there are some sounds that are particular to American English. These sounds are known to be particularly difficult for native speakers of Asians languages. The following is a list of American English words illustrating the sounds that are particularly difficult for Asians to pronounce.

leather
redder

there
dare

with
wheat

with
whiff

fuel
few

wall
war

pall
paw

vest
west

bit
beat

A note on syllable stress

Much difficulty in understanding a non-native speaker over the typical lazy native speaker is the stressing of syllables within multisyllabic words. Much information for distinguishing words is carried in the stresses. Unfortunately stresses follow few rules and must be learned by experience a listening.