Learn the tools to learn Arabic from the Egyptian people around you
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| In the previous lessons, we introduced you to some phrases you can use when in Egypt and this is the last lesson of the series dedicated to learning from the people around you. In this lesson, we are going to cover “How do you read this?” |
| In Egyptian Arabic, “How do you read this word?” is |
| btʾra alklmah deh ezzai? |
| Let’s break it down: |
| (slow)btʾra alklmah deh ezzai? |
| Once more: |
| btʾra alklmah deh ezzai? |
| بتقرا الكلمة دي ازّاي ؟ |
| The first word, btʾra, means “to read.” |
| (slow) btʾra. |
| btʾra. |
| بتقرا |
| Then we have the word alklmah, which is translated into English as “the word”, as we’ve covered before. |
| (slow) alklmah. |
| alklmah. |
| الكلمة |
| Next we have deh, which is translated into English as “this” (feminine). We’ve talked about this one many times before. |
| (slow) deh . |
| deh . |
| دي |
| Then we have ezzai, which is translated into English as “how”. |
| (slow) ezzai. |
| Ezzai. |
| ازّاي |
| The entire sentence again is: |
| (slow) btʾra alklmah deh ezzai? |
| btʾra alklmah deh ezzai? |
| You might also like to ask, “How do you pronounce this word in Egyptian Arabic?” which is btʾol alklmah deh azzai bellmaṣri? |
| Let’s break it down: |
| (slow) btʾol alklmah deh ezzai bellmaṣri? |
| Once more: |
| btʾol alklmah deh ezzai bellmaṣri? |
| The new word in this question is btʾol, which is a form of the verb “to pronounce”. It’s also the word we use for the verb “to say” |
| (slow) btʾol . |
| btʾol . |
| Let’s break the whole question down: |
| (slow) btʾol alklmah deh ezzai bell-maṣri? |
| Once more: |
| btʾol alklmah deh ezzai bell-maṣri? |
| بتقول الكلمة ده الزّاي بالمصري؟ |
| When you want to find out the meaning of the word or phrase, ask: |
| yaʿni ʾieh ? |
| “What does it mean?” |
| Let’s break it down: |
| (slow) yaʿ-ni ʾieh ? |
| Once again: |
| yaʿni ʾieh ? |
| يعني إيه؟ |
| The first word, yaʿni, means “meaning”. |
| (slow) yaʿni. |
| yaʿni. |
| يعني؟ |
| Next we have ʾieh which is translated as “what”. |
| (slow) ieh. |
| ieh. |
| إيه؟ |
| All together, we have |
| yaʿni ʾieh? |
| Or, “What does it mean?” |
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