ဗျ / ကွာ / ဟ

Among close friends, Burmese speakers end sentences with short casual words. They show closeness, so they are only for people your own age or younger whom you know well.

ဗျ looks like part of the polite ခင်ဗျာ, but it is casual. Never use it with a teacher, an elder, a monk or a stranger: a man says ခင်ဗျာ to them, and a woman says ရှင်.

ကွာ adds a pleading or fed-up feeling: မလုပ်ပါနဲ့ကွာ (come on, don't). ဟ calls a friend's attention or shows surprise: ဘာဖြစ်တာလဲဟ (what happened?).

ကွာ and ဟ go with casual pronouns such as ငါ, နင် and မင်း, and they leave out ပါ, except in a plea like မလုပ်ပါနဲ့ကွာ. ဗျ is milder: men use it with male friends and men they know, often with ကျွန်တော်.

Learn to recognize them in films and chats before you use them. Using one with the wrong person sounds rude.