Pronunciation guide
How to read and say Riau Malay
Letters, sounds and stress from Wikivoyage's Riau Malay phrasebook. Then hear the phrases and practice them, free.
▶ Practice Riau Malay phrasesThe Riau Malay as an original form of Malay has super persistent pronunciation (and writing). It shared slightly different system compared to its descendants variety, namely the Malaysian Malay and Singapore Malay (both diverged in 1970s) which utterly can be specified as English-based Malay using full English pronunciation (and writing) which they experience some sort of difficulty to differentiate the pronunciation between the vowels of a, e, i, and o.
Vowels
- A (a)
- as in father
- E (e)
- as in student
- E (e)
- as in ten
- U (u)
- as in rule
- O (o)
- as in open
- I (i)
- as in machine
- ai
- as in Thailand
- ui
- as in Louie
Consonants
- b
- like 'b' in "bed"
- c
- like 'ch' in "China"
- d
- like 'd' in "dog"
- f
- like 'ph' in "phone"
- g
- like 'g' in "go"
- h
- like 'h' in "help"
- j
- like 'dg' in "edge"
- k
- like 'c' in "cat"
- l
- like 'l' in "love"
- m
- like 'm' in "mother"
- n
- like 'n' in "nice"
- p
- like 'p' in "pig"
- q
- like 'q' in "quest" (with "u", almost always)
- r
- like 'r' in "row", like 'r' in "feather"
- s
- like 'ss' in "hiss"
- t
- like 't' in "top"
- v
- like 'v' in "victory"
- w
- like 'w' in "weight"
- x
- like 'cks' in "kicks"
- y
- like 'y' in "yes"
- z
- like 'z' in "haze"
Common digraphs
- ai
- like 'ai' in "aH-ee"
- au
- like 'aw' in "awe"
- oi
- like 'oy' in "boy"
- ou
- like 'ow' in "grow"
- kh
- like 'kh' in "khaki"
- sy
- like 'sh' in "sheep"