fakhuur

imghabir

rii7ah mu2rifah

waayid na3saan

7ur

7asaas

maa9ikh

musaa3idah

muu shay

muu shay literally means 'it's not anything' as in, less than nothing. As in, really awful.

Hopefully this expression won't come up too much in your daily life. It can also mean, 'it's not something...' in which case:

muu shay ta3baanah fii-h

Translated: it's not something I'll lose sleep over. 

wa9ikh

7ayl

nakkad

I really enjoy those linguistic tussles when everyone in the room is trying to find the best translation of a Kuwaiti word. 

'Hey guys,' says the host to his guests, 'it's such a beautiful day, how about we grab our towels and hit the yaal?' (yahl)

'Oh but didn't you guys hear about that tanker accident? Now there's naf6 (naft) in the water,' says one of the guests.

An awkward silence falls.

'Yeah,' she continues, 'AND there was that shark report a while back.'

The host rolls his eyes at her. 'Uff, you're such a nakkad (neh-kid)!'

'Psst, what's a nakkad?' I whisper to the person next to me, but someone across the room answers:

'It means "moody".'

'laa2! (laa) interjects someone else. 'It's what you call a person who's super depressing, like, ah what's the right word?'

'"A sour puss"?' someone suggests.

'yimkin (yim-ken) ... if you're from Downton Abbey.'

Everyone laughs.

'"Moody" isn't such a bad translation of nakkad,' says the host, 'but it's not quite right. What you need is a noun.'

'How about "a Debbie Downer"?' I volunteer, half-joking.

And everyone kind of agrees.

Arabic	Pronounced?	English
يال	yaal	beach
نفط	naf6	oil
لاء	laa2	no
يمكن	yimkin	maybe

mit7amsah

It's the end of the week. mit7amsiin? 

I for one am very mit7amsah. Not just for a weekend's rest, but also because today marks one year since we moved into our current place.

Flashback to a year ago, while searching for a nicer home on a shoestring budget, I stumbled across a drop-dead gorgeous apartment - but on the wrong side of town. As in, the street was actually the red light district. Where all the shop windows were smashed in. And the building itself was home to a wild bunch of neighbours and a mad dog called Loco.

Friends and family said laa2 tsawuun-haa. They were scared. We were scared.

One night, nervously deciding, Theyab said, "laa2, not a good idea."

I said, "ya aallah 3aad!  The apartment has original wooden beams from 1862."

"waayid 3alay-haa," Theyab replies, "I won't be happy about you walking home alone at night."

As if the pressure couldn't get any worse, a colleague told me she'd lived on that street ten years previous - and had a knife put to her throat.

I tried to focus on the beautiful wooden beams. And as fate would have it, we moved in the following week. Our house plants all died before we made it through the door. I think they knew.

But touch wood (or the beams), a year has passed and we have no plans to leave. The neighbourhood is filthy - but full of life. Our neighbours are mayaaniin, but have huge hearts (one of them cooked meals for Theyab for an entire week while I was working abroad).  And Loco the dog is, well, living up to his name sake.

"Aren't you mit7amis about our house anniversary?" I ask Theyab.

"imbalah," he replies, "I just wish our neighbour would make more of that slow-cooked home-cooked ragu."

لاء تسوونه!	laa2 tsawuun-ah!	don’t do it! (>pl)
يا الله عاد!	ya aallah 3aad!	come on!
وايد عليهم	waayid 3alay-hum	so what about them?
مينون	maynuun	crazy (m)
مينونة	maynuunah	crazy (f)
مينونين	maynuuniin	crazy (pl)

jadhdhaab

So if beautiful is jamiil and pretty is 7iluu, how on earth do you say someone is attractive?

After all, you can be jadhdhaab without needing to be beautiful in the least. It has something to do with magnets..

Or magnetism. I remember at school the boy of everyone's dreams eventually picked the captain of the girl's football team as his girlfriend. A real tomboy. Nobody could believe it, especially not the pristine-looking girls who dedicated hours to their makeup ritual. The heart-throb's girlfriend wasn't like that. She had a bent nose, wore sweatpants and sported messy hair, and yet she had a gift for making people always want to be around her.

In short, she was jadhdhaabah.

taywaanii

a9lii

mita3sir

bunnii

naa3im

wasa6