Is there a school in your town? A church or mosque? Maybe a factory, too? Learn to say some basic things about your city by watching a simple story video by Nadia Selim, entitled مدينة مرْيمmadiinat maryam ‘Maryam’s city’. This video is ideal for someone who has just worked through the Bite-Size Arabic book. In this article I present the vocabulary used in this video. Look here for supplementary information on other videos in this series.
The video is available both here on her Arabic with Nadia website and here on YouTube. Here is the video:
In the following, I’ll guide you through vocabulary used in this video, by category.
Prepositions
Here are all of the prepositions used in this video.
مَعَ
أَمام
بِجانِب
maʕa
’amaam
bi jaanib
‘with’
‘in front of’
‘next to’
فِي
عَلى
fii
ʕalaa
‘in’
‘on’
‘There is’
You are probably already familiar with the Arabic word هناكhunaaka, meaning ‘there’. This word can also be used to mean ‘there is’ or ‘there are’, as in these examples:
هُناكَ مَدْرَسة في مَدِينَتي.
hunaaka madrasa fii madiinat-ii.
‘There is a school in my city.’
هُناكَ سَيّارات كَثِيرة في الْشّارِع.
hunaaka sayyaaraat kathiira fii sh-shaariʕ.
‘There are many cars in the street.’
Places
Maryam lives in Suez, which is a city in the north of Egypt:
الْسُّوَيْس
مَدِينة
’as-suways
madiina
‘Suez’
‘city’
Here is a list of other words for places mentioned in this video:
كَنِيسة
مَسْجِد
بَحْر
kaniisa
masjid
baḥr
‘church’
‘mosque’
‘sea’
شارِع
جَبَل
مَدْرَسة
shaariʕ
jabal
madrasa
‘street’
‘montain’
‘school’
مَصْنَع
مُسْتَشْفى
بَنْك
maṣnaʕ
mustashfaa
bank
‘factory’
‘hospital’
‘bank’
وَسَط الْمَدِينة
وَسَط
wasaṭ il-madiina
wasaṭ
‘downtown, city center’
‘center, middle’
Other nouns
حارِس
عائِلة
شَجَر
ḥaaris
ʕaa’ila
shajar
‘guard’
‘family’
‘trees’ (mass noun)
أَصْدِقاء
’aṣdiqaah’
‘friends’
Adjectives
كَبِير
صَغِير
كَثِير
kabiir
ṣaghiir
kathiir
‘large, big’
‘small, little’
‘much, many’
بَعِيد عَنْ
قَرِيب مِنْ
baʕiid ʕan
qariib min
‘far from’
‘close to’
Odds and ends
مَعَ الْسّلامة
أَيْضًا
أَعِيش
maʕa s-salaama
’ayḍan
’aʕiish
‘goodbye’
‘also, too’
‘I live’
What next?
Once you have mastered these words, why not check out some of the other useful learning materials on the Arabic with Nadia website?