Home, Town, Neighbourhood and Region
Talk about your town and region in Bengali. Learn the words for places like a library, a bakery and a pharmacy, and features of the landscape, each shown in the Bengali script with its sound and meaning.
Practise it before the paper, not after
Free, interactive practice on the words and structures the examiner keeps asking for.
Start revising freeWhat you'll cover
Your town and region in Bengali
To talk about where you live in Bengali, you need the vocabulary for the places in your town and the features of your region. Each word is written in the Bengali script, with its sound in brackets and its English meaning beside it, so you learn to read it and say it at the same time.
Places in town
Learn each place in the Bengali script, with its sound and meaning:
Buildings or landscape?
It helps to sort the words into buildings you visit and features of the landscape:
Match the Bengali to the English
- ফার্মেসী (pharmesi)
- বেকারী (bekari)
- লাইব্রেরি (laibreri)
- স্মৃতিসৌধ (smritishoudho)
- a pharmacy
- a bakery
- a library
- a monument
The Bengali word for library
Which Bengali word means library?
- লাইব্রেরি (laibreri)
- ফার্মেসী (pharmesi)
- বেকারী (bekari)
- স্মৃতিসৌধ (smritishoudho)
More useful words
Beyond the buildings, the landscape has a mountain, পাহাড় (pahar), and a bridge, সেতু (setu). In daily town life, the cost of something is খরচ (khoroch), a bath is গোসল (gosol), and sadly a road accident is সড়ক দুর্ঘটনা (sorok durghotona).
Which word fits the scene
- পাহাড় (pahar)
- সেতু (setu)
- রাস্তা পারাপার (rasta parapar)
- সড়ক দুর্ঘটনা (sorok durghotona)
- You can see it from the edge of town and it takes hours to climb
- Without it you would go a long way round to reach the other bank
- The painted stripes where the traffic is supposed to stop for you
- Two cars meet at a junction and an ambulance has to be called
Which are buildings?
Select the TWO words that are buildings you can go into.
- ফার্মেসী (pharmesi)
- লাইব্রেরি (laibreri)
- পাহাড় (pahar)
- সেতু (setu)
Saying where you live
The place words become sentences once you add a pronoun and a verb. Bengali puts the verb last, and marks "in a place" with an ending on the noun rather than a separate word: - আমি ঢাকায় থাকি (ami Dhakay thaki) = "I live in Dhaka". আমি (ami) is "I", the ending -য় (-y) on ঢাকা (Dhaka) does the work of "in", and থাকি (thaki, "I live") comes last. - আমার শহরে একটি লাইব্রেরি আছে (amar shohore ekti laibreri achhe) = "there is a library in my town". শহর (shohor) is "town", and আছে (achhe) is the verb Bengali uses for what exists in a place.
Which sentence means "I live in Dhaka"?
Which sentence means "I live in Dhaka"?
- আমি ঢাকায় থাকি (ami Dhakay thaki)
- থাকি আমি ঢাকায় (thaki ami Dhakay)
- আমি ঢাকা থাকি (ami Dhaka thaki)
- আমার শহরে একটি লাইব্রেরি আছে (amar shohore ekti laibreri achhe)
Getting to the library
Put these steps in order to walk to the library.
- Leave your home
- রাস্তা পারাপার (rasta parapar), cross at the pedestrian crossing
- লাইব্রেরি (laibreri), arrive at the library
Complete the town
In Bengali, a library is _____. A bakery is _____. A pharmacy is _____. A mountain is _____ and a bridge is _____.
Town words in Bengali
Tap the TWO statements that are TRUE.
- লাইব্রেরি (laibreri) means library.
- সেতু (setu) means bridge.
- বেকারী (bekari) means mountain.
- ফার্মেসী (pharmesi) means monument.
- পাহাড় (pahar) means library.
Where do you go?
For each situation, choose the correct Bengali word for the place.
- You need some medicine. Where do you go?
- You want to borrow a book. Where do you go?
- You want to buy fresh bread. Where do you go?
Your turn: write in Bengali
Write about your area IN BENGALI, using the two patterns from this module. Write in Bengali script - the transliteration in brackets is a reading aid only.
- Say where you live with the verb-last pattern: আমি ঢাকায় থাকি (ami Dhakay thaki - I live in Dhaka), swapping in your own town with the -য় (-y) ending
- Say what your town has, with আছে (achhe): আমার শহরে একটি লাইব্রেরি আছে (amar shohore ekti laibreri achhe - there is a library in my town)
- Swap in another place: বেকারী (bekari - a bakery), ফার্মেসী (pharmesi - a pharmacy) or স্মৃতিসৌধ (smritishoudho - a monument)
- Name a feature of the landscape the same way: পাহাড় (pahar - a mountain) or সেতু (setu - a bridge)