In Burmese slang, “gaw” means cool.
Put that together with the pronunciation of the first syllable in the English word “dialogue” and you have “Gawdai,” or cool dialogue, a very literal definition of slang itself.
“Gawdai” is the name of a new community-driven Burmese Slang Dictionary app by Escape Pixel, a start-up with operations in Yangon and Singapore. It was founded in 2015 by artist/coder Thet Twe Aung.
Revived from an older version called “Gawdi,” the mobile app, available on iOS and Android (and as a standalone website), is emerging at a good time, as Myanmar’s tech scene takes off with locally developed ideas on everything from food to last year’s elections.
The company says it wants to preserve Burmese slang as an important part of Myanmar’s culture even though some might think it’s a bad influence on young people.
In reality, they said in a statement, “slang is an expression itself and has a beautiful cultural influence,” including hidden meanings and reasons “behind its birth.”
CEO Thet Twe Aung explained in an email how Gawdai works (it should be noted this is a Burmese-language app).
You can browse, add definitions, vote terms up or down, share them and add reports on slang words if you think they are incorrect or spam.
“Currently our moderation takes care of all the reports but in the future version, we will initiate the community moderation like Wikipedia,” Thet Twe Aung said.
As you might have expected, the app is not shying away from racier terms.
There is a NSFW section that requires browers (you don’t need an account to browse but you do for all other functions) to register their age above 18.
Hmmm wonder what salacious vocabulary lurks therein?
The company, which reports having 5,000 users and growing, says both zawgyi and unicode should be supported.
Eat your heart out urban dictionary.
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