9 posts tagged “arabic”

I don't know what it is lately, but I keep finding interesting stuff in Arabic. Here's something that Julia sent me. Makes you wanna cry out "you don't say, man"!

I don't usually buy books on the "week of the book", but since everyone around me was buying, I decided to spoil myself just a little bit. I got me the "Bilingual etymological dictionary of spoken Israeli Arabic and Hebrew", by Abraham Stahl. A very serious book, in two volumes. Here's a little joke from the preface of the book, translated from Iraqi Arabic into Palestinian Arabic, and into English (the last one I did myself).

Sane3 il-kaslaan.
wa7ad qaal laSana3o: qoum shouf, qa3ed maTar ya la?
qaal lo: na3am, ya sidi, qa3ed maTar.
qaal lo: minnein Sar 3indak ma3loum?!
qaal lo: halqeit faatat min Sob il-quTTeh mablouleh.
qaal lo: qoum iTfi il-lamba.
qaal lo: ya sidi, tghaTTi lafoq raasak bil-l7aaf.
qaal lo: Tayyeb, qoum sakker il-baab mli7.
qaal lo: rabbna yi7fazak, ya sidi. qadeit lak shughultein, ushughlet ttalaateh qoum inte iqdiha.

The lazy worker.
A man said to his worker: get up and look, is it raining or not?
He replied: Yes, master, it is raining.
He said to him: How do you know that?!
He replied: Just now a wet cat passed by.
He said to him: Get up, turn off the lamp.
He replied: Master, cover your head with a blanket.
He said to him: Very well, get up, close the door firmly.
He replied: God help you, master. I already did two jobs for you, get up and do the third yourself.

Came back from 3 days in Eilat. Been to Kings City, Timna, snorkeled in the Red Sea, and stopped by the Dead Sea on the way back. Being on vacation has its fun sides - you meet new people, you see new places (you eat like there's no tomorrow :) but at the end of the day - there's no place like home. The temperatures are reasonable, the humidity is right, and even the water tastes normal again.
At the guesthouse in kibbutz Elipaz there were 3 taps in the kitchen - hot water, cold water, and potable water. In other words, the other two kinds of water are not meant for drinking. Is it that way all around Eilat? I don't know about other people, but I occasionally let water run through my mouth when I take a shower. Blah.
Another observation about life in the desert: in order to create the appearance of an oasis, the kibbutz people have to water their trees and bushes almost constantly. At all hours of day and night there's something dripping, sprinkling, or simply pouring into the sand. I don't see how that can be considered an adaptive settlement.
On the up side: I met a professional photographer who was also vacationing at the guesthouse. He had a Canon camera with a huge 100-400mm lens attached to it. I couldn't figure out what he was aiming at, but he looked very consumed with it. He suggested that I get an 18-55mm Canon lens for my camera to cover the problematic wide angle range of my collection.
One evening I returned to the geusthouse an hour earlier than the missus. I forgot to take the key to our room, and got stuck with Shachar watching a closed door. The reception was already closed, so I had to catch one of the passing by workers and ask for help. He asked me what room I was in, and I noticed his Hebrew was terrible. "Seventeen" I said in Hebrew, and saw it didn't register with him. "Saba3ata3ash?" I tried in Arabic. "Mar7aba!" the man gleamed with joy, and promptly continued in broken English - "I will get the boss, and he will open it for you". In ten minutes the room was open, and I could take the kid to bed.

Very peculiar. In a text I got from ArabicPod.net  there is a strange lam-meem ligature. For example the word "il-munaaseb" (the suitable) looks like this: in Word, but like this: in PDF. Looks like a consistent feature in all Acrobat documents. Where did the meem go?

Found this curious teach-yourself-Arabic website (thanks to shaulreznik), and listened to a few podcasts for beginners. Not bad at all. The only thing that bothered me was the language being taught. I know there are dozens of regional dialects all through the Middle East and the Magrib, and practically nobody speaks Classical Arabic in everyday life. I wrote the (UK-based) website owners regarding my concerns, and got the following reply:

Hi Danny
 
I presume you're talking about the "Close the door" beginner podcast. The Arabic used in this lesson is mostly classical, so it does not belong to any country in particular and can be used throughout the Arab world.
 
Best Regards,
 
Mohamed Moshaya
ArabicPod.net

Dror Kamir, our man in the Arabic Wikipedia (heb). Respect!