Urduni Babe just called. Oh, she cracks me up. It seems out of nowhere she has discovered I can speak Arabic, although we have been friends for eight years. Bi athaanha (in her ears). The fifty phrases I know, I know REALLY WELL.
Telephone rings.
“Allo”. (In Jordan, no one ever tells you who they are. It is a guessing game. People get offended if you don’t get through the generic ‘allo’ and figure it out. Makes wrong numbers feel like crank phone calls)
“Ah, Urdani-Babe, Aiyish min asmaaaaaa miinik! keefik ya azzezeh?” (oh, Jordanian Babe, she who hears from you lives! How are you, oh _____ oops, sorry I forgot what it means!!!)
“Shu, ya Kinzi, saar issa3a tis3a oo nuss oo enti mish naimeh? enti, il wahdi illi daymaan pthikili ‘Naam Bakeer, Oom Bakeer..” (so, Kinzi, how can it be 9:30pm and you aren’t asleep? Aren’t you the one who is always telling ME ‘early to bed, early to rise…”)
“Mazbuutah ya helweh, ana sahiyya ashanik, bastana fiiki, ba3rafish anaam bidoon soatik! (That’s right oh great beauty that you are, I am awake for your sake, waiting on you, Ican’t sleep without hearing your voice!)
Raucous laughter. No one laughs like UB
“Bagoolich ya binit, adaysh enti beda7ktiini” (I tell you girl, how much you make me laugh)
“Enti bil aktar (You make me laugh more)
“Tab, biddi your recipe for cinnamon rolls, habeebti. Fi deyuuuf bukri, inseet wayn hatayt il recipe” (OK, I want your cinnamon roll recipe darling. I have guests coming tomorrow and I forgot where I put it)
- to be continued, because it’s 10pm and I need to go to bed 
(hah-hah, you should see my spell-checker in overload right now)
hehe i can only imagine what you sound like
you should have a rule in the house to have an arabic day a week, where you can only talk to each other in arabic :p
Loooooool
what’s the recipe, i feel like caking (that’s my word for cake baking)
good job, kinzi! I am dually impressed that you were able to recall it all with such vivid detail!
How long has it taken you to learn Arabic?
Dee, ta3eye-li isma3i! We speak Arabic at certain meals. My oldest, who is the most shater, will say things to me in rapid-fire haki that his siblings can’t understand when he wants to watch a movie with us after they are in bed. If my husband and I don’t want the kids to understand something, we speak German.
Basel,
Joycie, I typed it within minutes. Hope I can remember the rest for post 2!
Marvin, well, I started learning Arabic in college as a cheerleader for our soccer team, which included a bunch of minor Saudi princes (who couldn’t speak a word of English bought their entrance . They have since bought the school, it seems). I’ve been learning for real for 17 years, but not sure if I will ever be literate, one doesn’t truly ‘learn’ without being able to read the language.
Meli, tada: http://kinziblogs.wordpress.com/2009/01/07/kinzis-easy-cinnamon-rolls/
this post has over 3,000 visits, that and the Dumb Blonde Jokes from Breaking Dawn are kinzi’s biggest hits.
weheheyyy thank yooouuu, I feel a caking weekend coming on
:O you speak German too ??? awesome
Meli enjoy! the beauty of this recipe is it is no-rise and it keeps in the frig for 3 weeks!
Dee, heh-heh, yea, I love Deutsch, I lived in Austria and met my hubby there. I can read German too (I still read my German bible), it makes sense like Arabic does, but since English is linguistically related it is much easier.
Impressive Arabic.. You are getting better and better
I am happy in how advanced you became.. Good work 
Just a warning about the cinnamon rolls. They are TOOO yummy. once you make them once, anyone served them will demand them constantly. HelperBean started making kinzi’s recipe and now is equired to bring them to all Filipina gatherings, gets frequent requests from Jiddo Bean and has JuniorBean telling us that he’s going to dream about them every night. (Along with pancakes and mensef, of course). Cautionary tales from the BeanPole…
I love it! Especially the bit about no one identifying themselves on the phone…it’s the same over here in my beloved Lebanon.
Rula habeebit ‘albi, bi-eye-oonik! Insha’allah ra7 ata3allum aktar!
MB, heh-heh, I saw them in your house today!
LEBNAAANI-BABE!!! You visited my blog! I KNEW you would hit this one first!! This will be your name at Kinzi’s now, and I may have to tell some stories about your Hay Nizzal days …