Guinea-Bissau Creole phrasebook

The Creole of Guinea-Bissau (kriol, kiriol, kriolu and Portuguis varying with dialects) is the main language of Guinea-Bissau. It is based on Portuguese and local African languages. The grammar is very simple, but the lack of an official orthography makes written Creole complicated, as it is spelled differently in every text.

For other Creole languages, see Creole.

Pronunciation guide

Vowels

Consonants

Common diphthongs

Phrase list

Basics

Hello. 
Bon' dia, bo tarde, bo noite. ( )
Hello. (informal) 
Kuma? ( )
How are you? 
Kuma k bu sta? ( ?)
How are you? 
I kuma? ( ?)
Fine, thank you. 
N'sta bom, obrigado. ( )
What is your name? 
Kuma ki bu nome? ( ?)
My name is ______ . 
Nha nome i ______ . ( _____ .)
Nice to meet you. 
nkontenti nkunsiu
Please. 
. tem pacença
Thank you. 
Obrigado. ( )
You're welcome. 
De nada. ( )
Yes. 
Sim. ( )
No. 
Não. ( )
Excuse me. (getting attention) 
. Colisença
Excuse me. (begging pardon) 
Diskulpa / purdan' ( )
I'm sorry. 
Diskulpa / purdan' ( )
Goodbye 
Tchau. ( )
Goodbye (informal) 
N'na bai. ( )
I can't speak creole [well]. 
N'ka obi kriol [dritu]. ( [ ])
Do you speak English? 
Bu ta papia inglis? ( ?)
Is there someone here who speaks English? 
ké i tem kin' k ta papia inglis li? ( ?)
Help! 
Djudan'! ( !)
Look out! 
kuidadu! ( !)
Good morning. 
Bon' dia. ( )
How have you slept? 
Kuma k bu mansi?
I slept well, thank you. 
N'mansi dritu / bem, obrigado.
Good afternoon. 
Bo tarde. ( )
Good night. 
Bo noite. ( )
Good night (to sleep) 
Bo noite/Bon' sonu. ( )
I don't understand. 
N'ka ntindi. ( )
Where is the toilet? 
Nunde ki kasa de banho? ( ?)

Problems

Numbers

un' - 1

dus - 2

tris - 3

kuatru- 4

cinku - 5

seis - 6

seti - 7

oitu - 8

novi - 9

des - 10

Time

Clock time

Duration

Days

today 
aós
yesterday 
aonti
tomorrow 
amanha
this week 
es semana
last week 
semana passada
next week 
próssima semana
Sunday 
dumingu
Monday 
segunda-fera
Tuesday 
terça-fera
Wednesday 
kuarta-fera
Thursday 
kinta-fera
Friday 
sesta-fera
Saturday 
sabadu

Months

janeiru fevreiru marsu abril maio junhu julhu agustu sitembru otubru novembru dizembru

january february march april may june july august september october november december

Writing time and date

Colors

Burmedju - red

Azul - blue

Pretu - black

Branku - white

Transportation

Bus and train

Directions

Taxi

Lodging

Money

Dinheru - Money

Ami n'ka tene dineru. - I don't have any money

Cen' fran" - 100 CFA

Duzentus - 200 CFA

Trizentus - 300 CFA

Kuatrusentus - 400 CFA

Kinhentus - 500 CFA

Seisentus - 600 CFA

Setecentus - 700 CFA

Oitucentus - 800 CFA

Novcentus - 900 CFA

Mil fran' - 1000 CFA

Dus mil - 2000 CFA

Pagan' - Pay me.

Patin' dinheru - Give me money.

N'misti troku - I want change.

Eating

Matabitchu - Breakfast

Djanta - Lunch

Sia - Supper

Bin' nó kume. - Come eat with us.

Pon' - Bread

Arus - Rice

Bianda - Meal with rice

Frutas - Fruit

Verduras - Vegetables

Kadju - Cashew

Batata - Potato

Mankara - Peanut

Adju - Garlic

Sabola - Onion

Bu na kussinha - You are cooking.

Bars

Shopping

Where is the market? Nunde ki fera?

How much does it cost? I kantu?

Do you have ( )? Bu tene ( )?

I want two kilos. N'misti dus kilus.

I only have 500 CFA. N'tene son Kinhentus fran'/ son kinhentus fran' k n'tene.

I want to go to the store. N misti bai taberna.

How much does it cost to go to ( )? I kantu k i kusta pa bai ( )?

Driving

Authority

Learning more

gollark: Being able to break the encryption on stuff is less obvious and can be done in bulk on intercepted data.
gollark: I'm an expert on this because I read *multiple* Wikipedia articles.
gollark: People are not idiots, and realized that that could be an issue, so there's work on designing asymmetric encryption schemes (symmetric is mostly safe as far as I know, except for Grover's algorithm) which cannot be broken by quantum computing.
gollark: Which breaks RSA and elliptic curve stuff.
gollark: Quantum computers *cannot* do anything ever a trillion times faster, or something ridiculous like that; they can accelerate some algorithms, for example factoring integers fast and something something discrete logarithm problem.
This article is issued from Wikivoyage. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.