Mafeesh Araby

I have no time for a real update today since we’re headed to Chicago House, so let’s have an Arabic lesson! You can learn all the fun words I can remember. I’ll spell them out as they should be pronounced, not as they are actually spelled:

- hello: ah-lan (pronounce the ‘h’)

- thank you: show-kran (I use this a lot)

- no: la

- yes: eye-wa (like ‘Iowa’, but w/out the ‘o’)

- sorry/no big deal/whatever: ma-lesh

- okay: ta-mom

- to draw: rasam

- brush: for-sha (to brush: bi-forsha [‘bit’ as in ‘bit’])

- Arabic: are-ah-bee

Now for the fun ones. For some reason, I can’t remember useful phrases like stop, or thank you, or fork/spoon/knife/plate/glass, but I was easily able to remember the first Arabic word I was taught this trip: mosquito. The guys probably wonder why I talk about mosquitoes and teddy bears so often, since the girls think it’s hilarious to ask me what those words are so that I’ll yell them out. Kat is also amused that I know what dogs say:

- cat: bee-sa (you call cats by saying, “biss biss biss biss” really fast)

- mosquito: na-moose-a

- bat: wat-wat (like the ‘wat’ in ‘wattage’)

- water buffalo: ga-moose-a

- teddy bear: da-boo-ba

- there is none: ma-feesh (this one cracks me up- “Quit touching ma-feesh!” Perhaps it’s only funny b/c ‘fish’ is pronounced ‘feesh’ in German)

- dog’s bark: how-how-how

- camel: gah-mel

- gecko: bors (this sounds random, but there are these adorable little gekos that live in our house. They don’t bother us at all, and we usually don’t see because they run away, but they eat bugs for us! If one will stand still long enough, I’ll try to grab a picture.)
- clothesline: hey-bill
- clothespin: mash-beck
- flip-flop: shib-shib

- World’s Greatest Linguist (I don’t know what that is in Arabic)

PS. If anyone is looking for a (rather expensive) Christmas present for me, I’d LOVE to have Arabic Rosetta Stone, since it looks like I’ll be back next year. Or my friends who like to do illegal things on the internet, any idea where one might torrent this (and by one, I mean you, and then I’ll steal it in a slight less “I can get caught” kind of way)? I’d love to come back next year and at least be able to make some simple conversation with the workmen.