තීරු බද්ද
“තීරු බද්ද” (tīru badda) — official fee in Sinhala. Noun, level B1. The border tax you know from customs. tīruva is a strip, a column — hence the tariff grid. In a live sentence: “බඩුවට තීරු බද්ද ගෙවන්න ඕනේ” — You have to pay duty on the goods. You can hear how it sounds right here. Written with the characters ත, ී, ර, ු, බ, ද, ්, ද. A word from the everyday Sinhala course, level B1.
In short
| Written in Sinhala | තීරු බද්ද |
| Read in Latin letters | tīru badda |
| Translation | official fee |
| Part of speech | noun |
| Level | B1 |
- තීරු බද්දtīru baddaofficial fee
Why it looks that way
The border tax you know from customs. tīruva is a strip, a column — hence the tariff grid
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- බඩුවට තීරු බද්ද ගෙවන්න ඕනේbaḍuvaṭa tīru badda gevanna ōnēYou have to pay duty on the goods
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “official fee” in Sinhala?
«තීරු බද්ද», read “tīru badda”. In a live sentence: “බඩුවට තීරු බද්ද ගෙවන්න ඕනේ” — You have to pay duty on the goods. You can hear how it sounds right on this page. Noun, level B1; written with the characters ත, ී, ර, ු, බ, ද, ්, ද.
How is “තීරු බද්ද” written in Latin letters?
tīru badda. This is a practical spelling — you need it to read aloud and be understood, not to meet an academic standard.
Why does this word look the way it does?
The border tax you know from customs. tīruva is a strip, a column — hence the tariff grid. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
Can I hear how it sounds?
Yes, right on this page: click the word and it will play. The sound works on any phone, and nothing needs to be installed.