Meaning
Wishing someone a good night.
Cultural Background
Saying 'Good night' is often accompanied by a slight nod of the head as a sign of respect, especially to elders. Many people recite the 'Metta Sutta' (Loving-kindness discourse) before sleeping to ensure a peaceful night without nightmares. Young people in Yangon often use English loanwords like 'Good night' or 'Sweet dreams' in text messages, often written in Burmese phonetics. In business, it is common to use the most formal version 'Kaungသော ညချမ်းလေး ဖြစ်ပါစေ' in emails or formal messages.
The Gender Particle
Add 'khin-byar' (if you are male) or 'shin' (if you are female) after 'par' to sound extra polite and native.
Farewell Only
Never use this to greet someone. It's like saying 'Goodbye' the moment you see them.
Meaning
Wishing someone a good night.
The Gender Particle
Add 'khin-byar' (if you are male) or 'shin' (if you are female) after 'par' to sound extra polite and native.
Farewell Only
Never use this to greet someone. It's like saying 'Goodbye' the moment you see them.
The 'Eit taw mal' Alternative
With very close friends, 'Eit taw mal' (I'm going to sleep) is much more common than the formal 'Good night'.
Test Yourself
Which phrase is the most polite way to say 'Good night' to a teacher?
ဆရာမ၊ _______။
'Kaungသော Nya Par' is the standard polite farewell for the night.
Complete the phrase with the correct polite particle.
ကောင်းသောည__။
'Par' is the essential polite particle for greetings and wishes.
Match the situation to the correct phrase.
You are leaving a friend's house at 9:00 PM.
Since it is night and you are leaving, 'Good night' is appropriate.
What would the daughter say back?
Father: 'သမီး၊ အိပ်တော့လေ။' (Daughter, go to sleep.) -> Daughter: 'ဟုတ်ကဲ့ပါ ဖေဖေ၊ _______။'
It is the natural polite response when being told to go to sleep.
🎉 Score: /4
Visual Learning Aids
Nighttime Phrases
Farewells
- • ကောင်းသောညပါ
- • အိပ်တော့မယ်
Wishes
- • အိပ်မက်ကောင်းပါစေ
- • အေးချမ်းပါစေ
Actions
- • ဘုရားရှိခိုးတယ်
- • မျက်နှာသစ်တယ်
Practice Bank
4 exercisesဆရာမ၊ _______။
'Kaungသော Nya Par' is the standard polite farewell for the night.
ကောင်းသောည__။
'Par' is the essential polite particle for greetings and wishes.
You are leaving a friend's house at 9:00 PM.
Since it is night and you are leaving, 'Good night' is appropriate.
Father: 'သမီး၊ အိပ်တော့လေ။' (Daughter, go to sleep.) -> Daughter: 'ဟုတ်ကဲ့ပါ ဖေဖေ၊ _______။'
It is the natural polite response when being told to go to sleep.
🎉 Score: /4
Frequently Asked Questions
5 questionsIn this specific phrase, 'Kaung-thaw' is the standard. 'Kaung-de' is used in sentences like 'The night is good'.
It's a bit early. Usually, wait until it's dark or someone is actually going to bed.
Yes, especially in cities, on the phone, and in formal settings. In villages, people are more likely to say they are going to sleep.
The most common response is to say it back: 'Kaungသော Nya Par' or 'Aye aye, Kaungသော Nya Par'.
Not really for the formal phrase, but young people just say 'Gn'.
Related Phrases
အိပ်မက်ကောင်းပါစေ
similarSweet dreams
အိပ်တော့မယ်
informalI'm going to sleep
မင်္ဂလာညချမ်းပါ
similarA blessed/auspicious evening
မနက်မှတွေ့မယ်
builds onSee you in the morning
