INTRODUCTION |
Now it’s time for some useful Survival Phrases for when you’re shopping in Egyptian stores. |
・ |
The first thing you say to a shop assistant in Egypt is law samaht, which is one of the polite phrases we learned in our previous lessons. After that, you will want to ask: “How much is this?” |
GRAMMAR POINT |
In Egyptian Arabic, we say |
bekam dah? if the thing we are interested in is masculine and |
bekam dih? for feminine. |
Let’s break the first question down: |
(slow) bekam dah? |
Once more: |
bekam dah? |
بكام دَه؟ |
bekam, means “how much.” |
(slow) bekam. |
bekam. |
At the end of the question we have dah, which is translated as “this”. This is used when the item you are asking about is masculine. |
Let’s move to the second question: |
bekam dih? |
(slow) bekam dih? |
بكام دِه؟ |
dih is the feminine form of “this.” |
・ |
Imagine that you’re at a clothing stand in a local market and want to buy a shirt. To attract the attention of the stall-keeper, say law samaht, then ask how much the shirt costs. The question will sound like this: |
law samaht, bekam el ‘amees dah? |
Let’s break it down: |
(slow) law samaht, bekam el ‘amees dah? |
And again at natural speed: |
law samaht, bekam el ‘amees dah? |
لو سمحت, بكام القميص دَه؟ |
First we have the familiar law samaht |
After that comes bekam, which means “how much”. |
(slow)bekam |
bekam |
After that we have el ‘amees, the word for “the shirt” |
(slow) el ‘amees. |
el ‘amees. |
The last word is dah, which is the masculine form of the word “this”. |
The whole question is |
law samaht, bekam el amees dah? |
Let’s try now with a feminine item. Let’s say you saw a nice bag and you want to know how much it is. You should say: |
law samaht, bekam el shanta dih? |
Let’s break it down: |
(slow) law samaht, bekam el shanta dih? |
And again at natural speed: |
law samaht, bekam el shanta dih? |
لو سمحت, بكام الشنطة دهِ؟ |
What changed here is el shanta, a feminine item, and dih, to suit it. It’s simple, isn’t it? |
8 Comments
HideHi listeners! Pick some object around you and train to ask the price!
Hi Leah,
There are general rules and a few exceptions.
But basically, any noun that ends in a ة is a feminine noun, and most* others are masculine.
You need to see a lot of nouns to see a pattern in the irregular nouns though!
Nora
Team ArabicPod101.com
How do we determine masculine items from feminine?
Hi Diego,
Yes, this series is in Egyptian Arabic, which is a different dialect than the other one you heard :)
Nora
Team ArabicPod101.com
I dont understand.. in this lesson we learn a different kind of arabic ??? Cause i saw a different way to ask how much, in the begginer we learn a different wats...i'm confused
Hi Jihad and Luigi,
Thank you for your feedback. I've reported the issue and we will fix it asap.
Shukran! :thumbsup:
Nora
Team ArabicPod101.com
there is still a mismatch in the lesson number...
Hello. Is this lesson #3 o #20? The lessons are misnumbered, #4 is really #3 and so on. I had a problem catching up with the lessons and I'm missing #20. Could you fix the problem and provide the correct link to download lesson #20? Thank you very much.