The Nepali Phrasebook (Paperback)

~ (Author), Bimal Man Shrestha (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Review

"...Lonely Planet phrase books have long taken a hip, streetwise approach." -- Atlanta Journal-Constitution, May 27, 2004

"Lonely Planet Phrasebooks. Portable, pocket-size, cheap, and available for almost any country you might want to visit..." -- National Geographic Traveler, September 2006

National Geographic Traveler, September 2006
'Lonely Planet Phrasebooks. Portable, pocket-size, cheap, and available for almost any country you might want to visit...'

Product Description

All you need is Nepali! In the busy Durbur Square, make a connection with some well-chosen words. Get the low-down on the highlands from your porter as you trek through the mountains. Don’t just stand there, say something – take control of your Nepal experience.

• new pronunciation guide for every word & phrase
• take a hike – detailed trekking & mountaineering chapter
• Key festivals, traditional dance and music explored.
• string your own sentences together with the easy-to-use grammar section
• etiquette and body language pointers

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Lonely Planet; 4 edition (December 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1740591925
• ISBN-13: 978-1740591928
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 3.3 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #864,000 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in these categories: (What's this?)

  #6 in	Books > Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauruses > Foreign Language > Nepali
  #90 in	Books > Travel > Asia > Nepal

• This item is part of The Lonely Planet Phrasebooks Series.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Not a bad dictionary, but..., January 25, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Lonely Planet Nepali Phrasebook (Lonely Planet Phrasebook: Nepali) (Paperback)

The dictionary in the back was helpful, but the organization of the book is not very good and it is awful in explaining pronunciation. After studying it faithfully and trying it out, my Nepali friends, finally, asked in English, "What are you trying to say?" I also learned that some of the information was inaccurate. I hate to speak badly of it, since it is about the only Nepali language travel book on the market, but, hopefully Lonely Planet will consider an overhaul.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Helpful, up to a certain point, December 4, 2003

By	Emily "Emmy" (Bend, OR USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lonely Planet Nepali Phrasebook (Lonely Planet Phrasebook: Nepali) (Paperback)

My Nepali boyfriend gave me this little book to learn his language, since when I met him, I had nothing good to say about his country because I knew nothing about it. I was grateful for alot of things in the book, like grammer, sentence structure, who you speak to, cultural tips, etc. But I found the pronunciation guide horrible. They do not explain the differences between many sounds, and only explain certain consonants. They introduce the Devanagari script rather suddenly with no explanation. It would be helpful to know HOW to read it and understand what is written instead of just recognizing it by sight and nothing else, although that is good too.

The dictionary was helpful in the back, but very limited. It only went over words mentioned in the book, and didn't broaden words from outside of what was reviewed. I liked the book as a starter...but even my boyfriend admitted that some things were not said right. (Not as they speak it today, it's too old-fashioned, etc.) I kept having to go to him and ask him things, and the whole point of me having the book was so he wouldn't have to try and teach me. (hahahaha)

So, I guess I would recommend it to people who know nothing about Nepali, but be sure to have someone to ask questions. It's bad enough when you are running blind with a language you haven't heard of before.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Handy little phrasebook at a nice cheap price, May 28, 2003

By	"noumea3" (Australia) - See all my reviews

I was surprised that the two reviews prior to mine gave such a bad rating. Well, I'm half-Indian, I was born in the north-east of India near the Himalayas with very close contact with Nepalis in my early childhood and I couldn't actually see what the problem was with this book! It's small, compact, glossy, useful and very cheap, I mean what else do you want if you are only looking for the basics.

However, I can read and speak Hindi and know basic customs (which are actually explained in the phrasebook, for example food etiquette) so perhaps that made a difference. Hindi is closely related to Nepali and written in the same Devanagari script. You can actually learn the Devanagari script from this phrasebook which I find sets the Lonely Planet phrasebooks above most phrasebooks. If you don't want to learn the script, then the phonetic tranliteration system used is the correct one generally used by linguists, which ensures a word is correctly pronounced by the student, even when reading in English. This is why I prefer Lonely Planet phrasebooks as once you master the basics of script and pronunciation along with basic grammar (yes, it has a solid basic grammar section as well) you actually have a good base to further learn the language if you want.

I found the phrases in it very useful. You get a very good starting point for customs, ordering food, hotel rooms etc. As I said, it's also in a nice, very small size. Amazing actually how much information is packed in considering how small the phrasebook is.