Signs of Dubai
Dubai requires all businesses to maintain signs with both Arabic and English. English has been called a 'magpie language,' meaning, whenever English comes across a useful word in another language, English steals and then Anglicises the word. There is even a rather large dictionary consisting entirely of words that English has 'borrowed' (with no intention of returning) from other languages.
So, when a hotel is called, in Arabic, Burj al Arab, literally meaning The Arabic Tower, the English sign remains just Burj al Arab, giving the hotel a suitably exotic name to justify its once exorbitant prices (now somewhat more reasonable thanks to the declining dollar).
The same goes in the other direction. I walked past a 'Black and White Restaurant.' In Arabic, Black is 'Aswad,' while White is 'Abyad,' so the Arabic sign should have been 'Matam Aswad Wa Abyad.' Instead, the Arabic letters said 'Matam Blak and Wyt,' which makes absolutely no sense in Arabic.
It gets better: I was drinking tea with Farook and looking at a new shop under construction across the street. Farook asked me, 'What do you think this new shop will be when it opens?' Part of the reason was that the sign was not yet complete. The English name of the shop was 'The Medicine Shoppe' In Arabic, this should have been written as 'Al Mahall Al Tibb.' What was actually written in Arabic script was 'Medsin Shob,' which, again, makes no sense in Arabic.
I did, however, see wires sticking out below the English and Arabic names of the shop where, eventually, the word 'Pharmacy' will be added beneath the English sign, and the word 'Saydaliyya,' which means pharmacy, will be added in Arabic script beneath the Arabic portion of the sign.
But, for now, Farook wants to know how he's supposed to know that the place is going to be a pharmacy?
So, when a hotel is called, in Arabic, Burj al Arab, literally meaning The Arabic Tower, the English sign remains just Burj al Arab, giving the hotel a suitably exotic name to justify its once exorbitant prices (now somewhat more reasonable thanks to the declining dollar).
The same goes in the other direction. I walked past a 'Black and White Restaurant.' In Arabic, Black is 'Aswad,' while White is 'Abyad,' so the Arabic sign should have been 'Matam Aswad Wa Abyad.' Instead, the Arabic letters said 'Matam Blak and Wyt,' which makes absolutely no sense in Arabic.
It gets better: I was drinking tea with Farook and looking at a new shop under construction across the street. Farook asked me, 'What do you think this new shop will be when it opens?' Part of the reason was that the sign was not yet complete. The English name of the shop was 'The Medicine Shoppe' In Arabic, this should have been written as 'Al Mahall Al Tibb.' What was actually written in Arabic script was 'Medsin Shob,' which, again, makes no sense in Arabic.
I did, however, see wires sticking out below the English and Arabic names of the shop where, eventually, the word 'Pharmacy' will be added beneath the English sign, and the word 'Saydaliyya,' which means pharmacy, will be added in Arabic script beneath the Arabic portion of the sign.
But, for now, Farook wants to know how he's supposed to know that the place is going to be a pharmacy?
posted by Dubai@Random at 12:10 pm
1 Comments:
Thanks for a fascinating post. It is a subject dear to my heart - as a writer, I am keen to learn Arabic, but face the daily frustration of not knowing what is translated and what is transliterated. You explain the problem beautifully. Perhaps I need to learn to read the alphabet first, so I can recocgnise fake Arabic when I see it...
EoD
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