Gifts of the Arabic Language, Al Hamdullah!

When we lived in London I used to laugh at my husband when he called someone back home in the Middle East as the first minutes were invariably spent in greetings and niceties and all manner of polite tete-a-tete for what seemed an eternity. Really, like the first five minutes. But then we moved to Amman and then Beirut and I got caught up in that exact same culturally polite back and forth and my English became peppered with these Arabic phrases and words for which there isn’t a good English translation and are an ingrained way of life.

For example, Sahtein comes from the Arabic word saha which means health and runs along the same lines as the French Bon Appetit, but as with so much of the rich Arabic language, Sahtein really means so much more. Not only do you wish someone sahtein when they sit down to eat, you can also say sahtein to someone who is taking a drink of something or smoking a cigarette or taking their pills. Anything ingested is worthy of sahtein. If someone compliments your food, you might say, sahtein, back at them, sort of meaning, “I’m so glad you’re enjoying it.”  Inversely, with anything you expel, if you cough or sneeze or burp, you get a brusque, saha! or two. 

Of course there’s habibi and habibti, literally “dear,” but again, much much more. At first it struck me as far too familiar and intimate coming from strangers, but yet again, when I understood how the word was commonly used, I adopted it with glee! When I worked in restaurant kitchens the cooks all called each other habibi and I prided myself on being the habibti when the ladies at the supermarket rung up my items.  There’s also habibti I regularly use as a sort of shorthand for “bless her heart” (and I’d never say bless her heart in English)!

Yisloma decki or “may your hands be blessed” is often used instead of thank you to someone who prepares or serves food for you or creates something for you, while Yatick le-afi can be said as a greeting instead of hello and means “may god grant you good in everything.”  If I trotted out yatick le-afi as an acknowledgement to the immigration officials at the airport they’d grin and tell me how wonderful my Arabic was (little did they know how little I really grasped). Neiman is another favourite of mine, a congratulations for being newly clean that was bestowed upon me every time I got my nails done, or my hair blown dry, or simply stepped out of the shower. Al hamdullah a salami doesn’t mean thank God for salami as I sort of wish it did, but instead is showing thanks for your safety and is spoken by everyone when you arrive at the airport or at their house from a short car ride and was murmured by everyone after the explosion at the Beirut Port on August 4, 2020.

After that horrendous Port explosion the other phrase you’d hear everywhere you’d go is salamtik which means “get well soon” …..well, sort of. It’s used equally to soothe a headache, a broken heart, a cancer diagnosis, a bad mood, and a stubbed toe. And as quickly as you might be bidden salamtik you’d very likely say al hamdullah, “thank God,” for surely it would be cured quickly. My dear Mother-in-law al hamdullahs everything! If there’s ever any doubt or gift or fault or falter or blessing, al hamdullah! I love FaceTiming with her from here so I can pull out all of my blessings and salutations! Similarly, mashallah, can be used as a compliment for everything from a cute baby to an 80th birthday greeting to a new job to a new home to a beautiful person to a graduation. It’s an admiration and blessing for what God has bestowed on you…al hamdullah. 

And there’s a particular response due for each one of these well-wishes which creates a delightful to-and-fro of pleasantries. It’s actually considered more than a bit rude if you just barge ahead in a conversation without acknowledging your cohort with some combination of these expressions. There’s a wonderful rhythm to these well-wishes, a comfort in their predictability and their meaning. At first I have to admit that I was put off by the inherent religious nature of these phrases, but I’ve gotten over it as they’re really just part of the daily vernacular that just happen to have god in them (like we might say “bless you,”) used by everyone regardless of their religious beliefs.

Now I find myself again in a place where these phrases aren’t used and when I get into a taxi I’m at a loss for words because I can’t ask the driver, Sho akhbarak? (literally, “what’s your news?” but colloquially used as “how are you?”) And I don’t really have an equivalent for al hamdullah when he tells me everything is fine or we speak about the pleasant weather. I used to wish my husband neiman every time he shaved and showered, now it seems strange and I find myself faltering for words. Out of the context of the Arab world it all feels a bit precious and artificial coming from my American lips, but they linger in my head…and how grateful I am. Al hamdullah.