Dialogue

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Danya: مرحباً, اسمي دانيا.
May: و أنا مي.
Timothy: Timothy here! Beginner, Lesson 13 - What time is it? أهلا بكم, hello, everybody and welcome to ArabicPod101.com. Today, we're joined by Danya and May.
Danya: أهلا أنا دانيا, Hi, I'm Danya.
May: مرحباً, انا مي. Hello, I'm May.
Timothy: What did we go last time?
May: Last time, we talked about how Arabic has singular, dual and plural forms for nouns.
Timothy: Okay, let's review.
May: كم لغة تتكلمين؟
Danya: أتكلم لغتان, و أنت يا تيموثي كم لغة تتكلم؟
Timothy: أنا أتكلم أربعة لغات.
May: عنجد. Really, Timothy, you speak four languages?
Timothy: No, not really. I'd say I speak two, English and Spanish, but my Arabic, it's not so bad, is it?
May: Yeah.
Danya: No, no I think it's good. I think it's excellent.
Timothy: The fourth one is French by the way. So what are we going to cover today?
May: Today, we're going to learn to tell time.
Danya: This isn't a very grammar intensive lesson. But what we're going to focus on is on the وزن of ordinal numbers.
Timothy: Okay, so since this lesson focuses on the sound system of Arabic, it will really be useful to go to ArabicPod101.com and check out the vocabulary list with audio. That way you can really practice the sound system, hearing all the similarities. All right, let's get into today's lesson.
May: Han is waiting at the bus stop and Fatima just walked up.
Danya: Fatima isn't sure if she missed her ride, so she is going to ask about the schedule.
May: This is a polite, casual conversation in standard Arabic.
Timothy: And we'll focus on how to ask what time is it?

Lesson conversation

فاطمة: عفوا، كم الساعة؟
هند: السادسة و النصف.
فاطمة: هل تعرفين متى تصل الحافلة؟
هند: تصل بعد خمسة دقائق.
فاطمة: شكرا.
Eric: One more time with the translation.
مرة ثانية مع الترجمة.
فاطمة: عفوا، كم الساعة؟
Timothy: Excuse me, what time is it?
هند: السادسة و النصف.
Timothy: It's six thirty.
فاطمة: هل تعرفين متى تصل الحافلة؟
Timothy: Do you know when the bus arrives?
هند: تصل بعد خمسة دقائق.
Timothy: It arrives in five minutes.
فاطمة: شكرا.
Timothy: Thank you.
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Timothy: What kind of public transportation is available in Amman?
Danya: Well you have busses, mini busses, taxis and services taxis.
Timothy: What's a mini bus? Is it like the short bus I used to ride?
Danya: It's just a large van.
May: They're very cheap and most of the people that use them are university students and commuters. In Damascus, a lot of people use them to get everywhere because it's kind of crowded and a lot of people don't own cars.
Danya: Now, all throughout the Middle East, there are taxis. They're really convenient because then you don't have to worry about parking.
Timothy: Are taxis expensive?
May: They're definitely more expensive than busses. But I think they're okay. They're getting a little more expensive because of the whole gas situation.
Danya: They vary. Now, it's funny because for example you're in Beirut, sometimes you can get a taxi to drive you from one side of the city to another and let's say you'll pay $15 and the same amount you could pay to get to Damascus, so there are huge variations.
Timothy: So Danya, you mentioned that a lot of people travel between Oman, Damascus and Beirut, what type of transportation do they use?
Danya: Well there are busses that travel between different cities. There are also taxi cars that will transport you. And they're much faster but they're definitely more expensive than busses.
Timothy: What about trains?
May: Trains aren't really popular in the Middle East.
Timothy: Why not?
May: I know that Saudi Arabia, Jordan and Syria are working on reviving the Hejaz Railway which hasn't been operating for years. I haven't really thought about it. It's just not popular.
Timothy: What about in the Gulf countries?
Danya: In the Gulf, most people own cars, but if you need a taxi, you can stop one on the street or you can just call a cab.
Timothy: Okay, are the taxis private owned or most does most of the taxis drive for a taxi company?
Danya: The drivers that go across borders between Jordan, Syria and Lebanon usually own their own cars. The taxis in the cities are usually privately owned, some of them are owned by companies and the Gulf, they're mostly owned and operated by private companies.
KEY VOCABULARY AND PHRASES
Timothy: Okay, let's get in to today vocabulary. Before we get into today's vocabulary, let's go back and flush out the review vocabulary. Earlier, we covered the word for language.
Danya: لغة [natural native speed]
Timothy: Language
Danya: لغة [slowly - broken down by syllable]. لغة [natural native speed]
Timothy: And today, we heard it in the phrase, how many languages do you speak?
Danya: كم لغة تتكلم؟
Timothy: Notice the pronunciation of the تاء مربوطة on the end with a grammatical ending, the تنوين.
Danya: لغةٍ.
Timothy: Now, we also gave you for the first time, the dual form of لغة.
Danya: لغتان [natural native speed]
Timothy: Two languages.
Danya: لغتان [slowly - broken down by syllable]. لغتان [natural native speed]
Timothy: Notice how the تاء مربوطة gets turned into a pronounced تا when we attached the dual ending.
Danya: لغتان [natural native speed]
Timothy: And we heard the plural form of لغة.
Danya: لغات [natural native speed]
Timothy: Languages.
Danya: لغات [slowly - broken down by syllable]. لغات [natural native speed]
Timothy: Now, when we asked how many languages in Arabic, we actually said, how many language using the singular form.
Danya: كم لغةٍ؟.
Timothy: Okay. And we heard that same construction in the central dialogue.
Danya: كم الساعة؟ [natural native speed]
Timothy: What time is it?
Danya: كم الساعة؟ [slowly - broken down by syllable]. كم الساعة؟ [natural native speed]
Timothy: So this literally asked how much is the hour.
Danya: Right, كم, how much, الساعة, the hour.
Timothy: Okay, so let's repeat that word.
Danya: الساعة [natural native speed]
Timothy: The hour.
Danya: الساعة [slowly - broken down by syllable]. الساعة [natural native speed]
Timothy: So in Arabic, we say it's the sixth hour instead of its six o'clock.
May: الساعة السادسة.
Timothy: Okay, what's the next word?
May: نصف [natural native speed]
Timothy: Half.
May: نصف [slowly - broken down by syllable]. نصف [natural native speed]
Timothy: In this dialogue we used نصف to mean half an hour, its half past six.
May: الساعة السادسة و نصف.
Timothy: How else can this word be used?
Danya: It's used just like the word half in English, so anything of half the quantity you're amount or hour, anything.
Timothy: Okay, next word.
May: متى [natural native speed]
Timothy: When.
May: متى [slowly - broken down by syllable]. متى [natural native speed]
Timothy: So this is used as a question word.
May: متى يبداً الفيلم.
Timothy: When does the movie start? Can this word be used in a construction like I was doing something when something else happened?
Danya: You would use a different word.
Timothy: Okay.
Danya: عندما. So عندما كنت أشاهد الفيلم جاء تيموثي., When I was watching the movie, Timothy came or while I was watching the movie, Timothy came.
Timothy: متى is only a question, right? Okay. Next word.
May: تصل [natural native speed]
Timothy: She arrives.
May: تصل [slowly - broken down by syllable]. تصل [natural native speed]
Timothy: Now, that's a ص in the middle, right?
May: Yes, ص.
Timothy: I only see two root letters, where the third?
Danya: The root for تصل is و ص ل .
Timothy: Okay. And when one of the other root letters is a و or a ي it often gets changed in the present form.
Danya: Right. It can be tricky at first.
Timothy: Okay. So another great study technique is to sort your verbs out into different groups depending on their conjugation patterns. Every verb are regular, but there are a lot of patterns to get used to. All right, next word.
Danya: حافلة [natural native speed]
Timothy: Bus.
Danya: حافلة [slowly - broken down by syllable]. حافلة [natural native speed]
Timothy: Okay. And the plural form?
May: حافلات [natural native speed]
Timothy: Buses.
May: حافلات [slowly - broken down by syllable]. حافلات [natural native speed]
Timothy: And حافلة is feminine?
Danya: Right.
Timothy: Now, we have another preposition.
Danya: بعد [natural native speed]
Timothy: After.
Danya: بعد [slowly - broken down by syllable]. بعد [natural native speed]
Timothy: What are some ways بعد is used?
May: الحافلة تأتي بعد خمسة دقائق.
Timothy: The bus is coming in five minutes. Now, we just said that بعد means after, but in this example you just gave us the bus comes in five minutes. We translated that as in.
Danya: Right. So it could be used to mean either after in or in the meantime, but only for a short periods of time.
Timothy: Okay.
Danya: So five minutes, ten minutes and then more than that, it really only means after.
Timothy: All right. So really what we want to get at is that prepositions are used differently depending on the language. And you should try to focus on learning full sentences as examples for how to use your prepositions. In this case, if you want to say the bus arrives in five minutes, you say الحافلة تصل بعد خمس دقائق. All right, what's the next word?
May: دقائق [natural native speed]
Timothy: Minutes.
May: دقائق [slowly - broken down by syllable]. دقائق [natural native speed]
Timothy: And the singular?
May: دقيقة [natural native speed]
Timothy: Minute.
May: دقيقة [slowly - broken down by syllable]. دقيقة [natural native speed]
Timothy: Okay, and what about two minutes?
May: دقيقتان [natural native speed]
Timothy: Two minutes.
May: دقيقتان [slowly - broken down by syllable]. دقيقتان [natural native speed]
Timothy: Now, this is a feminine word that ends with a تاء مربوطة, but it doesn't follow the normal plural scheme.
Danya: Right. The plural is irregular. You'll just have to memorize the plural form.

Lesson focus

Timothy: Right. Let's move on to today's grammar point. Today's grammar point is forming ordinal numbers. Ordinal numbers tell you the order of things like first, second and third, et cetera. Now, just like one and first have different forms, Arabic also has different forms for the cardinal and ordinal numbers.
May: واحد
Timothy: One.
May: أوٌل
Timothy: First. Okay, let's hear two and second.
May: إثنان
Timothy: Two.
May: ثاني or ثانية
Timothy: Second. Now for three to ten, there's a special sound pattern for making the ordinal numbers. First, let's hear the number three.
May: ثلاثة
Timothy: ثلاثة has three root letters, ث,ل, ث. To make that ordinal numbers, what you need to do is take a long A sound after the first letter and a short E sound before the last letter.
Danya: ثالث or ثالثة.
Timothy: Okay, now let's review the number four.
May: أربعة
Timothy: What's the root?
May: ر ا ب ع.
Timothy: Now, apply the wazn for ordinal numbers.
Danya: رابع or رابعة
Timothy: Okay. Now, let's quickly run through the rest of the numbers up to ten, five.
May: خمسة.
Timothy: The root?
May: خ ا م س.
Timothy: And apply the wazn.
Danya: خامس or خامسة.
Timothy: Now, just like one and first and two and second, each have different roots for the ordinal and cardinal numbers. Six has that same issue going on, so let's hear the number six.
May: ستٌة
Timothy: And the ordinal form.
Danya: سادس or سادسة
Timothy: The ordinal form has its own root. What's the root word?
Danya: س د س .
Timothy: And it uses the same wazn as all the other ordinal numbers.
Danya: سادس, سادسة
Timothy: Okay. Now, seven.
May: سبعة
Timothy: And the root?
May: س ب ع.
Timothy: Now apply the wazn.
Danya: سابع or سابعة
Timothy: Seven. Right, now let's hear eight.
May: ثمانية
Timothy: And the root?
May: ث م ن .
Timothy: Now, apply the ordinal wazn.
Danya: ثامن or ثامنة
Timothy: Okay. And nine.
May: تسعة
Timothy: The root?
May: ت س ع.
Timothy: And now, apply the wazn for ordinal numbers.
Danya: تاسع or تاسعة
Timothy: Right. And the last one, ten.
May: عشرة
Timothy: And the root?
May: ع ش ر .
Timothy: And now apply the wazn.
Danya: عاشر or عاشرة

Outro

Timothy: All right. So in each of those forms, we gave two forms for the ordinal numbers. The first one was for masculine and the second was for feminine words. Well that's all the time we've got for today. And make sure you stop by ArabicPod101.com and pick up the PDF where you'll find a detailed write up of today's grammar point. Also join a discussion in the forms or leave us a comment in the post. Until next time.
May: إلى اللقاء
Danya: مع السلامة

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