Singapore - Qatar terminology changes and the Arabic language.

Been here for a while and the following are some of the terminology changes.

handphone - mobile
sms - text
telephone - landline
junction (traffic) - signal
hello / hi - salam-allay-comb (translates as "Peace be upon you")

And the best of all?
No lah / Cannot lah - Inshallah (translates as "if God is willing")
hmm..so it is not so good if you keep hearing inshallah during meetings and conversations.

Talking abt the arabic language, I have tried to learn the basics for 2 months. Not quite there (actually kind of given up already..). In my view, here are the challenges when learning this language:

1. Throat sounds. Arabic language (or even the Hebrew language) involves "throat sounds" - sounds produced by the throat/end of your mouth. This way of Pronunciation is foreign to the chinese and english languages where sounds are generally produced within the centre of the mouth itself. To better illustrate, trying to pronunce throat sounds seems like trying to spit for chinese speakers.
One example is "Good Morning" = "Saba'a-Al-Kair" Kair needs a throat sound. Check the url below for further info.

2. Male and Female versions of the verbs and nouns (at times). This simply means that "give" is pronunced differently in "he gives" and "she gives". To expand the idea, it is also different for "they (for 2 persons) give", "they (all males) give" and "they (all females) give". kind of like French tho - le and la.

3. Ommission of "he", "she" and "they" during speech generally. Since the verb has a different pronunication for different subject, they just omit it during speech. This makes things more complex and hard to memorize.

Well, having said all that. Did master some commonly used nouns and verbs and of course, the arabic numbers.



At least something. also bought the CDs to learn arabic language - those interested can borrow when i return. : )