Monday, June 9, 2008

A quick guide to arabic / kuwaiti

the other day a foreign friend who recently moved to kuwait asked me for some useful words she should use / understand, so i thought i'd share:

yalla: let's go / whatever / do it - depending on the tone
ya3ni: so-so / i.e. / really ? (when used with a question mark)
tamam: good / ok
chub: shut up / zip it
inshalla: will do (God willing)
eshda3wa: why (when used alone) / as if
haw: what the...
ha: what the...
ha? : come again?
bel mesh mesh: when hell freezes over
ay shay: whatever
wee: oh

if i'm missing any common ones, please share

13 comments:

Unknown said...

ya3ne = really? : this is more feminine than it is masculine. (or it sounds as such).

lol @ the haw/ha/ha?:p

again, most of those are for the female speaker, I wouldn't think a male would use "wee" as "oh"

wee: could also be "oh my.."
ay shay: any thing


mabi: I don't want [to]
laa: no
ee: yes / ok
la7tha: one minute / hold on
ba3den: later on
al7een: right now

Joud said...

hehe ok i agree that wee is more feminin (and older), but the ya3ne? works for both i think

mabi and ba3den very important, thanks !

Anonymous said...

madri.
mabi < very important as joud mentioned.

inta/intay.
roo7/ay moot/ay
9khaam.
wai3

MiYaFuSHi said...

looooooool nice choice of words

Joud said...

nq: wai3 ! of course !

miyafushi: thanks :)

Shayouma said...

LooooL useful

Haw is more like Haw says the dog! loooool

Joud said...

hehe yeah old joke

Zed said...

shinoh? = WHAT
shinoh = what?

halla walla = whats up

allah bilkhair = hello/hi/goodbye/whats up/ whats going on/ and many many more

Joud said...

yup shino is important too

the other 2 are more guyish

not bad zed, not bad

Unknown said...

Zed, with the shinoh thing, you forgot an important one, "shinhaw?!?"
so..

Shinhaw?!?! : WTF!?

Joud said...

hahaha

shinhaaaaaaw ?

awesome

Anonymous said...

3ayal whats ya 7athi? :P

Anonymous said...

my favorite is

chithi: like this

chithii? like this?