Phone call vocab

‫الو‬ alo – this one is pretty straightforwardly ‘hello’ (though presumably from

French allo not from English). As in lots of other languages, it’s limited to speaking
on the phone, and is usually in a questioning tone: alo? It’s used in particular when
picking up the phone (hello?) and when making sure the other person is still on the
other end of the line.

‫اي‬ ee…  – immediately after saying alo, the person picking up the phone will often
say ee (or in the southern Levant aa) followed by the person’s name or nickname:
‫اي كريس‬ ee kriis, ‫امر‬0‫اي ابو ع‬  ee abu 3aamir. We don’t really have anything similar in
our phone etiquette.

‫مين معي؟‬ miin ma3i? – ‘who is this’? (literally who’s with me?)

‫…معك‬ ma3ak… ‘this is…’ (literally ‘… is with you’)

‫‘ …عم احكي من طرف‬I’m calling on behalf of…’

‫اي ش''و ب''دي قلك‬ ee shuu béddi 2éllak…  ‘so anyway, I was calling about…’ (literally
‘right, what do I want to tell you’, a good way to change topic from polite hellos)

‫برج''ع بحاكيك‬ bérja3 b7aakiik – literally ‘I’ll come back and talk to you’, but used to
mean ‘I’ll call you back’. I’m fairly sure I’ve discussed this use of yérja3 (and yrédd)
before – there’s another example here (birédd byérja3)

‫خلص ش''حني‬ khéleS sha7ni – my battery’s dead/was dead (literally ‘has/did finish’,

depending on context)

‫خلصت رصيدي‬ khéleS rasidi – I’ve run out of credit (‘my credits have finished’)

‫ما انتبهت على تليفوني‬ maa ntabah@t 3ala telefooni – I didn’t notice (you called), I didn’t
notice my phone ringing

‫ما في تغطية‬ maa fii taghTiye – there’s no signal, I’ve got no bars

‫الخط ضعيف‬ élkhaTT Da3iif – the line’s not good

‫صوتك مش واضح‬ Sootak mesh waaDe7 – your voice isn’t clear

‫صوتك بيقطع‬ Sootak bi ygaTTe3 – your voice keeps breaking up

‫ما عم اسمعك‬ maa 3am  ésma3ak – I can’t hear you

‫خ''ارج التغطية‬ khaarej  éttaghTiye – out of service (literally what the machine says if
you call someone who can’t be reached)

‫ رقم غير معروف‬,‫طلع رقم مجهول‬  Téle3  raq@m majhuul, raqem gheer ma3ruuf – both
translations of ‘it came up as an unknown number’, ‘it showed as an unknown
number’.

‫مكالمة لم يرد عليها‬ mukaalame lam yuradd 3aleeha – the most common (if somewhat
unwieldy) translation of ‘missed call’ on phone software, you might also
hear mukaalame faayte.

As a quick appendix – what should you call your phone? All of ‫ون‬00 0‫تلف‬ telefoon,
‫موبايل‬ mobaayl, ‫وال‬00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0‫ج‬ jawwaal (probably a generonym from this company),
‫وي‬00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0‫خل‬ khalawi (literally ‘cell’) and even – believe it or not –
‫هاتف‬ haatef (plural hawaatef, the only one of these words to have a non -aat plural)
are used by different people with different frequency. If you have to speak about a
landline (lol, imagine that), the term is 0‫خط ارضي‬ khaTT arDi.

A telephone plan or contract is also called a ‫خط‬ khaTT  (literally ‘line’). A simcard is

‫شريحة‬ sharii7a (pl. ‫شرايح‬ sharaaye7).

A charger is called ‫رجر‬00 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0‫ش‬ sharjer or more commonly

‫احن‬00 ‫ش‬ shaa7en (plural shawaa7en). The verb for ‘charge’ is ‫حن‬00 ‫( ش‬sha7an yésh7an
sha7@n) – and it’s quite common to say ‫حن‬00‫و ع الش‬00‫‘ حط‬put it on charge’, just as in
English (‫ تليفوني ع الشحن‬can mean ‘my phone is charging’).