February 12th, 2010 18 comments
What do you think is the best thing in the world? Is it world peace, the beautiful innocence of a child, or perhaps money and fame? We have this type of discussion in today's lesson and as usual it's packed with useful vocabulary. Hopefully, after this lesson you will know how to say ArabicPod is the best thing in the world!

  4.7/5 (11 votes)


18 Comments
Fri 12th Feb 10@09:10 pm

Great lesson. I'm glad to have an opportunity to pick up colloquial terms that I wasn't taught in my classes. I'm wondering which term is used more frequently in everyday speech: íÞÏÑ or íÓÊØíÚ for "can". Or do they have different meanings? Sometimes it's hard to know the shades of difference between words that are translated the same way to English... Thanks for any advice!
Ehab says
Fri 12th Feb 10@09:49 pm

It is indeed (íÞÏÑ) that people use in the street. Both words have the same meaning, (íÞÏÑ) works in colloquial and classical while (íÓÊØíÚ) is more classical.
Desmond says
Sat 13th Feb 10@02:20 am

In “Fruit juice” we had “afdal (ﺃﻓﺿﻞwink shay' (ﺸﺊwink”. Are ﺃﻓﺿﻞ and ﺃﺤﻠﻰ interchangeable?
Sat 13th Feb 10@10:55 am

Hi Desmond,

ÃÝÖá is more classical and it literally means better or best if it has a definite article or shay2 comes after, whereas ÃÍáì literally means sweetest but it’s used colloquially a lot to have the same meaning as ÃÝÖá
czarek25 says
Sat 13th Feb 10@02:54 pm

ÇåáÇ æ ÓåáÇ

Very nice lesson guyssmile

Some comments according to lesson that might be difficult for beginnerssmileand I wanna sure if i
learnt them good .Any correction is welcomesmile
I will use in my examples more "Shamee" slang(which i trying to learn it by myself )

a7laa ÇÍáì*the word comes from 7elwÍáæ means like sweet or beautiful ,nice
Example below:

ÞåæÉ ÍáæÉ (q)2ahwe 7elwa- sweetened coffee
ÇÍáì åÏíÉ a7laa hadeyya- a most beautiful gift

*ÏõäúíÇ -donya-world.The classical form is ÚóÇáóã
3alam.
Some colloquial expression that i know.

åíß ÇáÏäíÇ-heek ad-donya-that's is life.
ÕÇÑÊ ÇáÏäíÇ ÈÑÏ-Saaret ad-donya bard-means like"It is getting cold.


* ÇÓæÁ)comes from word ÓíÆ"sayy2)-bad

ÇáÚáÇÞÇÊ Èíäåã ÓíÆÉ-al-3elaaq(2)aat beenhom sayy2a
Relations between them are poor.


*ÇíÔ-what? there are also other words heard like Ôæ-shoo (the LEVANTINE) Çíå-eih(EGYPTIAN)

*q(2)aSadÞÕÏ-to mean ,to intend

Ôæ ÈÊÞÕÏ ÈßáÇãß¿-shoo bteq(2)Sod be-kalaamak?What do u mean?

*q(2)adara ÞÏÑ-can, to be able to

ÇÐÇ ÈÊÞÏÑ-idha bteq(2)der-if you can....

*jaab-ÌÇÈto bring

ÌíÈáí-jeeb-le -Bring it to me!!!

The rest i guess is quite easy
All the best hope it helps a bit also

ÊÔÇÑß
Desmond says
Sun 14th Feb 10@10:18 pm

Thanks for the useful information, ArabicLover. I suspected there was a difference in register between the two variants, but I wasn't quite sure.
berry says
Tue 16th Feb 10@11:01 am

that helps me , arabiclover, I often feel lost when it comes to street arabic, since it is not written and I have to trust my impression of what I think was said.thank you.
berry says
Tue 16th Feb 10@11:14 am

ÃÍáì ÔÆ Ýí ÇáÏäíÇ ªæÇáÍÈ a question for wise ones here , what would be the meaning or lack of it , if I did not use the huwa ?
berry says
Thu 18th Feb 10@10:14 am

perhaps my question is not clear,I want to know if leaving out the pronoun huwa would produce a mishap .......any fear of an answer , ya Ehab?
Fri 19th Feb 10@01:45 pm

Ahlan Berry, Yes removing the huwa would produce a mishap, it needs to be there. If you remove it, it’s like saying in English “Best thing in life love”. ‘Huwa’ serves the ‘is’ purpose in English
Ehab says
Sat 20th Feb 10@08:23 am

Oh, I didn't notice the question before, sorry.
Yes, if you remove (åæ) and (Çá) then you end up with an incomplete sentence just like what ArabicLover wrote.
However, if you remove (åæ) only, like saying (ÃÍáì Ôí Ýí ÇáÏäíÇ ÇáÍÈ) then that would be fine and gives almost the same meaning.
berry says
Sun 21st Feb 10@07:37 am

thanks ehab and arabic lover, I am often not direct in my questions , an old cockney habit which does no good at all on the web .
syafii_35 says
Thu 25th Feb 10@11:42 pm

hello iam newbie from oosaka ,japan,thanks for lesson
stefanieov says
Tue 6th Apr 10@02:57 am

i'm a newbie toosmile taking Arabic at UGA. I learned that the word for "best" is ÇÍÓä
is that also commonly used?
Ehab says
Tue 6th Apr 10@05:05 am

Ahlan Stefanieov,

Yes, the word (a7san ÃÍÓä) is indeed commonly used as (best), in fact it literally means (best) while (a7laa ÃÍáì) that we used in the lesson is more like (the sweetest).

We wish you having ÃÍÓä time in ArabicPod.
Sun 4th Jul 10@04:45 pm

I have one major problem in standard Arabic (maybe, just maybe, you're already planning something for this), and that's the definite article ( Çá ).

You said many verbs take the article after howa & heya (acting as is) and it seems verbal nouns usually do too.

MY QUESTIONS: Why do LOVE, HAPPINESS & SADNESS all take definite articles in the last sentence of this exercise? Does it have to do with following a verb?

And from a previous lesson, when you said "you must go to school", school took the definite article.

And finally, when you see a sign that says: mamnu3 AL-tad7'een, why does the noun, smoking, take the definite article?


Hopefully you can ease my troubled brain
Desmond says
Sun 4th Jul 10@06:35 pm

Dear jacksonsgurufu,

I'll try to "ease your troubled brain". Several months ago I suggested that a podcast should be devoted to the problems associated with the use of the definite article in Arabic. Since these problems are relatively complex, Ehab and Mohamed may still be wondering what they ought to include or omit.

If you were a native speaker of French, the Arabic article wouldn’t bother you at all since Arabic usage closely resembles French usage in many respects. If you look closely at the words you’ve mentioned you’ll notice that some of them have certain features in common.

“Love”, “happiness” and “sadness” are all abstract nouns, and the sentences in which their Arabic equivalents occur are all generalisations. This is why the definite article has been used. This use of the article is termed “generic”.

If you consult a French grammar like Mansion’s excellent “Grammar of present-day French”, you’ll find that the same rule applies to words like “amour”, “bonheur” and “tristesse”. Mansion doesn’t use the term “generic”, but he draws a clear distinction between the particularising and the generalising functions of the definite article. His remarks could be applied directly to Arabic.

ﻤﺪﺭﺴﺔ is rather more difficult than words like ﺤﺯﻦ. “School” is a concrete noun, so it clearly doesn’t belong to the same category as “love” or “sadness”. In order to arrive at a better understanding of Arabic usage, we can begin by analysing English usage. In English we draw a distinction between “going to school” and “going to the school”. If we say that a child goes to the school, “school (+ article)” refers to a building, but if we say that a child goes to school, “school” (- article) assumes a more abstract meaning, for we mean that the child receives instruction on a regular basis. There may not even be a school building, for in poor African countries children are often taught in forest clearings.

In Arabic this distinction is unimportant (cf. the podcast entitled “You must”). It doesn’t matter whether you mean “go to school” or “go to the school”. In both cases the definite article is used. If you listen attentively to Arabs trying to speak English you’ll notice that they almost invariably make mistakes and say “he goes to the school” when they clearly mean “he goes to school”.

In this instance Arabic usage resembles French and German usage. In France people will say “Les enfants vont déjà à l’école”, and in Germany you’ll hear sentences like “Die Kinder gehen schon zur Schule”.
Mon 5th Jul 10@06:52 am

Desmond, you're my hero

This help with lessons is quite unprecedented.
I was attending a language school in Cairo several months ago & nearly every student would have a million questions to ask the teacher after class. But, as soon as the clock ticked 30 past, the teacher would happily inform us that any further instruction would be charged at 200LE/hour.
--Not to mention all the questions asked in class that would receive the usual 'insha'allah we will discuss this another time' reply.
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