Hello and goodbye are the easy part. The first real moment in any language is the one where you tell someone who you are. In Georgian it takes three short lines, and people light up when a foreigner reaches for them.
Your name
ჩემი სახელია (chemi sakhelia) means my name is, and you simply add your name on the end. ჩემი სახელია ლასე, my name is Lasse. Georgian names slot in cleanly, and foreign ones are welcome as they are. No need to find a Georgian version of yourself.
Georgians just as often say it with a verb instead of a noun: მე მქვია (me mkvia), which means I am called. Same idea, same move, you add your name after it. მე მქვია ლასე, I am called Lasse. Either line works, and reaching for one of them is the moment a stranger decides they like you.
Nice to meet you
This is the polite form, and it is the one to reach for with anyone you have just met. It sounds longer than the English, but the warmth is the point. Georgians treat a first meeting as something worth a full sentence.
Where are you from
Almost every first conversation in Georgia arrives here within a minute, because people are genuinely curious what brought you.
To answer, take your country, add the ending -dan (meaning from), and finish with ვარ (var, I am):
The first line says where you are from, the second says what you are. Swap in your own country and you are set.
The one question that breaks the ice
Turning this one around on a Georgian is a quiet joke that always works, because of course they do. But asking it at all signals that you are trying, and trying is the whole game here. Almost no foreigners learn this language, so the ones who reach for even a few lines get a reaction that is hard to describe until it happens to you.
Every phrase on this page comes straight from the first lessons of our audio course, where you hear each line, say it back, and use it in a real exchange until it sticks. The first lesson is free, so you can introduce yourself by the end of the week.
