• Haere mai Welcome! Come!
• Hei kona ra Goodbye (less formal)
• Kia ora Hi! G'day! (general informal greeting)
• Morena (Good) morning!
• Nau mai Welcome! Come!
• Tena koe Formal greeting to one person
• Tena korua Formal greeting to two people
• Tena koutou Formal greeting to many people
• Tena tatou katoa Formal inclusive greeting to everybody present, including oneself
Pronunciation
The following English equivalents are a rough guide to pronouncing vowels in Maori:
- a as in far
- e as in desk and the first 'e' in where; it should be short and sharp
- i as in fee, me, see
- o as in awe (not 'oh!')
- u as in sue, boot
There are fewer consonants, and only a few are different from English:
• 'R' should not be rolled. It is pronounced quite close to the sound of 'l' in English, with the tongue near the front of the mouth.
• 'T' is pronounced more like 'd' than 't', with the tip of the tongue slightly further back from the teeth
• 'Wh' counts as a consonant; the standard modern pronunciation is close to the 'f' sound. In some districts it is more like an 'h'; in others more like a 'w' without the 'h'; in others again more like the old aspirated English pronunciation of 'wh' ('huence' for whence)
• 'Ng' counts as a consonant and is pronounced like the 'ng' in 'singer'. It is not pronounced like the 'ng' in 'finger', i.e., Whangarei is pronounced Far-n(g)ah-ray (not Fong-gah-ray); Tauranga is pronounced Tow-(to rhyme with sew) rah-n(g)ah (not Tow-rang-gah).
- nzherald.co.nz
