You might recall the Hebrew Shalom and the Arabic Salaam. Where can you speak both words and languages? In Israel. Now that some countries have recognized Israel, people who know Hebrew, or are Israeli or Jewish, can travel to Dubai, capital of the UAE, Emirates, and feel welcome. A big boost to hotels, restaurants and travel for Dubai. Time for more people to learn Arabic which is a handy language in many countries.
If you have seen pictures of the world's tallest tower, Burj Khalif, you might have suspected that the word Burj is tower. I mis-typed it as burg, which is German for mountain and small city. All the better. I can now recall that the correct spelling for the Arabic is like the German for mountain, or city, but with a j.
Arabic varies from country to country. However, these are some common easy to recognize and remember words which it is handy to know.
English - Arabic
(Similar to other Semitic languages such as Aramaic and Hebrew, with variations in Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Dubai capital of United Arab Republic, classical Arabic and spoken Arabic, Malay, Indonesian and some words in other languages)
God willing/please God - inshallah (run together but incorporating the word Allah)
Hello/peace - salaam (letters s-l-m, compare with Hebrew shalom and English Jerusalem)
1 tower - burj
2 sardines - sardine
3 salmon - salmon
4 thank you - shukran
5 tuna - tuna
Arabic - English
burj - tower
inshallah - God willing/please God
salaam - peace/hello
shukran - thank you
shukran habibi - thank you
So you can now say hello, tower, and goodbye tower, in Arabic.
From Translate Google I created this list, and found two or three words I already knew or easily remembered. When I reversed back to the English I got the translation which I have put in brackets.
sea
bridge
6 city - madina ( I have also seen the spelling medina)
7 market - suk
square
mosque
building
block
exit
entrance
open
closed
January
name / (noun)
date / (history)
year
8a day - yawm (like yawn - imagine yawning and going back to sleep instead of to work)
month
birthday
birthdate
anniversary
8b -(holi)day - ..... yawm (like yawn)
I recognized the word Eid which is very commonly used on holidays. I typed that in separately and got
9 eid - feast (holiday, festival)
Video of girl showing English words which sound the same but mean something different in Arabic.
I look at it differently, Arabic words which are easy to remember.
English sound (alphabetically) and Arabic meaning - English translation
sounds like English ' after' - in Arabic eat
what you say in Arabic is 'but' - duck (what you mean, in English)
'far' - mouse
'fat' - missed
'feel' - elephant
' fool' - beans
'feel' - elephant
'hat' - give me
'safe' - sword (also a boy's name)
'wish' - face
English meaning alphabetically - is the Arabic word (alphabetically) you say - although it sounds like another English word
9 beans - fool (memory aid - not the English word for a dessert but beans, fooled you)
10 duck - sounds like 'but/butt'
11 eat breakfast - sounds like 'after': 'after' we eat breakfast
12 elephant - memory aid for elephant - sounds like 'feel'
13 face - say 'wish', touch your face and wish they understand you mean face
14 give me - 'hat' (hold out your hand imploringly and beckon give me my hat, hat, hat
15 missed - sounds like 'fat' (memory aid for missed: after slimming I never missed being fat. How did you miss me? I was so fat that I don't know how you missed me!)
16 Mouse - sounds like far, (if you are scared then you will be glad it is far, or ask if the mouse is far. 'She shouted Fa Fa Fa - is she singing Do re mi fa?' 'No, she's shouting in Arabic that she saw a mouse!')
17 Sword / boy's name - 'Safe' (are you 'Safe' holding that sword?)
18 bin - son (similar to Hebrew Ben, as in Benjamin, meaning son of my right hand, and Reu-ben see a son, as I saw in an annotated bible telling the story of the 12 sons in the bible Old Testament and there are also other sons in the New Testament. Jesus is accepted as a prophet and holy man by many Muslims but not as the Messiah or Christ and Mohammed takes precedence over all preceding persons just as to the earlier Christians Jesus takes precedence over the characters in the Old Testament.)
19 Inshallah - God willing
If you go into Memrise you can record your memory aids and if you like you can share them)
Quiz
Now test yourself
You hear these words in Arabic. What do they mean?
1 after
2 but
3 burj
4 eid
5 far
6 fat
7 feel
8 fool
9 hat
10 inshallah
11 madina/medina
12 safe
13 salaam
14 salmon
15 sardine
16 suk
17 tuna
18 wish
19 yawn
20 el (conversational) /al Formal - the
21 tel - hill
22 salaam/ma salaam/ salaam aleikum (I recall the Israeli song, shalom alechem - peace to you)
12
13
14
15
16
17
You want to write or say these words in Arabic:
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
Useful Websites
Useful Websites
https://osxdaily.com/2017/03/22/type-accents-mac-easy/
https://context.reverso.net/translation/windows-mac-app
(Avast sent me a warning about this. My husband told me to ignore that warnings. 'Avast is just trying to sell an upgrade.')
Useful Language learning Websites
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interlingua
You can learn half a dozen words of a new language to see how the system works.
For 134 dollars you get a lifetime's membership to learn more than 30 languages.
Bella, 7 languages at the age of 4, shopping on stage on TV in Australian
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd9u9N7Z4TU
Song Shalom Aleichem in Hebrew with English transcription, female singer with guitar
https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=RDj-wAAtCvPnQ&v=j-wAAtCvPnQ
About the Author
Angela Lansbury is a teacher of English and other languages and gives talks and workshops on language and learning languages. For workshops contact annalondon8@gmail.com
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