After quite a long time away, Shaun’s back with a vengeance! In the vein of Peter’s Aiya! (#80) post comes another Asian colloquialism ““ known as the ‘Lah” particle.
This term ‘Lah” can most commonly be heard in South-East Asia, especially by (but not totally restricted to) Singaporeans, Malaysians and Indonesians. Having said that, people in certain parts of China use ‘lah” a great deal, which includes those in Hong Kong and Taiwan. This is due in part to the emergence of Chinglish as a lingual force to be reckoned with. Unlike ‘Aiya”, which denotes frustration in some way, the term ‘Lah” itself has no meaning whatsoever. Used effectively, however, it simultaneously softens the force of an utterance and entices solidarity. Or more possibly, it is a term said subconsciously by reflex, used by those who just can’t help themselves ““ lah!
There are two possible theories to how the term ‘lah” became so prominent, especially with the South-East Asian crowd. Generally speaking, those in South-East
Asian regions such as Singapore and Malaysia have reasonably strong English skills, but the problem is they often tend to mingle local Creole and regional dialects in with their English. Thus, the term ‘lah” among many other terms was born. The first theory relates back to the Chinese language ““ the character 啦 (La! ) is effectively a fusion between two other characters 了 (Le) & å•Š (as in the ‘Ah” part in ‘Aiya”). Usually in Chinese, the character了 (Le) indicates a past event having occurred, and the character å•Š (pronounced ‘Ah”) denotes surprise. When meshed together, the ubiquitous term ‘Lah” or 啦 (La! ) is formed!
The second theory to how ‘Lah” was coined is rooted in the Malay and Indonesian languages. The basic thought process here is that when adding the term ‘lah” to the end of a sentence (typically a verb or request) in Malay or Indonesian, it adds an extra layer of politeness to the request. This is done by softening the tone, particularly when regular usage of the verb may seem impolite in some circumstances. For example, to say ‘please” in Malay, one would say ‘Tolong”, but when saying it as ‘Tolonglah” it effectively becomes ‘pretty please”. (Well, not literally, but you get the point). Somehow, ‘lah” has seeped through the confines of that particular language, and through the rise in prominence of English in these countries as a ‘global language”, it has consequently seeped into South-East Asian dialects of English as well.
Basically, the gist behind using this wonderful particle is that after any sentence you tack the term ‘lah” on at the end. Confused? Well, it’s deceptively simple, really. Instead of saying: ‘I want to go to the library”, you should say ‘I want to go to the library LAH!” with extra slurring of the words together in the applicable accent to get the message across most effectively. Simple, isn’t it? Usually you can get away with tacking ‘Lah” onto any, and I mean ANY sentence ““ pretty much the more you say it, the more the locals will accept you as one of their own ““ lah! (Okay, okay, I’ll stop with that now, it does get somewhat annoying after a while!)
There are several other colloquialisms that go hand-in-hand with the term ‘lah”. Asians who use the ‘lah” particle will also be prone to subconsciously using seemingly gibberish terms such as ‘wan” ‘mah” 
‘lor” ‘leh” ‘wat” & ‘meh” in conjunction with the almighty ‘lah” to emphasize one’s point. These particles are all influenced in some way by Asian dialects - usually various Chinese ones. They also possibly incorporate elements of local language and creoles ““ such as those shown above as possible explanations for the rise to prominence of the particle ‘lah”.
To those who do not believe there are those who actually speak like this, this author proposes you should head down to a place like Singapore and see these phrases in action for yourself. Singaporeans have essentially created their own language ““ Singlish, which is basically Singaporean-Creole English, influenced by both American and British English along with Malay, Tamil, and a variety of Chinese dialects including Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien, Teochew, Hakka and Shanghainese. That’s a mouthful, isn’t it? A foreigner should be able to comprehend what is being said to them. Just expect a whole lot of the aforementioned particles”¦ and of course when responding, remember to end each and every sentence with ‘lah”!
Just on an end note, try saying something like this (with deliberately exaggerated use of the local slang) to endear yourself to a native Singaporean”¦
‘Excuse me lah, can you help me wan? Okay loh, I need to go to this place mah, which way wan? Uh huh”¦ okay lah! That way very confusing leh. Meh, what to do, lah? Okay, take train then wat? Uh huh, so must walk too, wan? Wah kena, but very troublesome loh! What to do ah? No choice, no choice wan, okay can do lah! Thanks again lah! Buh-bye! (LAH!?! ““ optional)
In regular English, this pretty much means”¦
‘Excuse me, can you give me directions?” So just take the train then walk? Okay thanks!
Well, to be fair, us Asians have never been well-renown for our conciseness, brevity or succinctness, have we? (And yes, I am aware of the irony in gratuitously using 3 words to describe the same thing!)
Last 5 posts by Shaun
- #99 MSG - November 12th, 2008
- #98 Studying Overseas - October 29th, 2008
- #94 Jay Chou - October 6th, 2008
- #91 Multilingualism - September 17th, 2008
- #88 Numbers (8-8-08) - August 8th, 2008
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15 responses so far ↓
1 Derek // Aug 6, 2008 at 11:54 pm
You just made something that happened THIS VERY NIGHT make sense! Bless my boss, she puts up with my strange fumbling of the Chinese language, and even teases me about it a good bit. So good times.
Anyway, to the story! Tonight, she was talking about something, and was using “lah” a lot. She doesn’t normally, so I just assumed she was talking about my ordering my food spicy. ‘cuz the terms she uses to order spicy stuff sound — to my untrained western ears — like “din din lah,” “dah lah,” etc. So I always connected lah w/ spicy!
Suddenly, when she saw I was confused, she spurted out, “Yes, Derek, it all ends in lah!” I didn’t quite get it, but . . . now I do! What great timing.
2 Peter // Aug 7, 2008 at 12:08 am
thank sy
=)
3 sy88 // Aug 7, 2008 at 1:19 am
Thanks Derek, hopefully I’ll get more positive feedback this time than I did for my last piece, which was quite negative, although I did end up drumming up some controversy regarding people’s hair colours without really trying =)
Oh and before anyone who fluently speaks Malay or Indonesian comments, I’d like to say that I realise that “tolong” does literally mean “help” but, I’m pretty sure it can be used as “please” as well… at least I think it can.
4 B.H. // Aug 7, 2008 at 6:54 pm
Hey guys, a Malaysian here. Yes, the use of “lah” is ubiquitous and is used by Asians regardless of ethnicity. However, I’m not so sure about people from Thailand, Vietnam, etc.
I can however vouch that in Malaysia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, China it is commonly practiced.
I wrote a piece on it (and Manglish) for my Stuff Malaysian People Like blog:
http://malaysianisms.blogspot.com/2008/06/3-manglish.html
Happy reading!
B.H.
5 pam // Aug 8, 2008 at 8:05 am
Filipinos don’t use “lah.”
6 Thi // Aug 14, 2008 at 10:51 am
You wrote: “This is due in part to the emergence of Chinglish as a lingual force to be reckoned with. Unlike ‘Aiya”, which denotes frustration in some way, the term ‘Lah” itself has no meaning whatsoever.”
You really don’t know your Cantonese. Lah is a typical word used in Cantonese for emphasis and has NOTHING to do with English.
7 Elena // Aug 21, 2008 at 2:18 am
sy88, “tolong” does seem to mean “please,” at least when my (Singaporean) mom uses it. For example, “Tolong ä½ , 去ç¡è¦º lah.” (Please, go sleep)
8 sy88 // Aug 21, 2008 at 7:16 am
Ah ok nice to know Elena. My mum is Singaporean but since she doesn’t speak Malay she doesn’t use “Tolong” much. But then you have your lahs, wahs and lohs which she uses in abundance. Wow look at the time… 我现在è¦ç¡è§‰… lahï¼
P.S. I just figured out how to type in Chinese on my computer, and am exploiting the feature for all it’s worth now!
9 bernard // Aug 21, 2008 at 11:38 pm
Hey I know exactly where in Singapore that “Buy a drink lah” sign is located!!
Anyway hor, I think your “Endear yourself to a Singaporean” example would probably confuse us lor. It’s like an angmoh trying very hard to speak singlish… eee!
10 sy88 // Aug 23, 2008 at 6:07 am
Yeah bernard, I exaggerated that example a bit, I suppose. You see, it’s funnier that way =)
And I suppose I am an angmoh (sp?) of sorts. I am Asian, have a lot of my family in Singapore, but have lived in New Zealand and Australia most of my life. Last time I saw my Singaporean cousins they we like… “wah why dey speak like angmoh so much wan?” =)
11 singaporean // Aug 26, 2008 at 5:03 pm
yeah, your example is a little lacking in terms of how it uses ‘wan’… go ask your cousins how they would really say it. but kudos for appreciating that most singaporeans & malaysians have a fairly good command of the English language though.
12 Aoede // Sep 8, 2008 at 2:43 pm
Also, Taiwan is not part of China. While I understand the reluctance of some to identify it as such, surely it’s no hardship to simply avoid referring to the issue at all.
13 grace // Sep 11, 2008 at 2:55 am
actually, your application of \lah\, \loh\ and a few others is wrong. i know you’re exaggerating the use for comic relief, but they’re simply not used like that. i’m singaporean, born and bred.
14 ubunta // Sep 14, 2008 at 12:42 am
Haha… good thing you made a blog about this. In Cantonese, there’s also:
(1) You made a mistake ah.
(2) Did you mix it up (gaw choh) jeh?
(3) You crazy (che-ma-gun) gah?
15 kim // Oct 23, 2008 at 12:33 am
instead of ”lah”, we Filipinos say ”’nah”/”na”… its mostly used for bragging tbh…
lol just sharing.
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