In this blog, I introduce you to one of my favourite songs ever. I came across this song by coincidece, but since then I fell in love with it. I know that it is by a Lebanese singer called Omima, and a Lebanese composer called Marcel Khalifah who makes a lot of songs about the Palestinian people, and I believe this song is one of them.
It tells a story of a small sparrow who seeks refuge in a girl’s room after escaping the cage at the neighbors’ house. The sparrow is too weak to move and the girl shows kindness to the little shaken bird. The song is mainly a dialogue between the the girl and the sparrow. It is in Lebanese Arabic and it is so beautiful. In the end of the story, the girl asks the bird to look at the rising sun in the forest and to see freedom as God’s gift to all creatures. We do not know in the end of the song whether the bird manages to fly or not.
A link to the song and the lyrics are below. I could not provide a translation. I tried so hard to translate it, but it is never near the beauty of the original, so I will leave it for you to listen, read and discover for yourselves. I hope you enjoy it in the same way I do!
http://arabic2.salmiya.net/songs/oumeima/ram/oumeima6.ram
عصفور طل من الشباك وقال لي يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
قلت له انت من وين؟
قال لي من حدود السما
قلت له جايي من وين؟
قال لي من بيت الجيران
قلت له خايف من مين؟
قال لي من القفص هربان
قلت له ريشاتك وين؟
قال لي فرفطها الزمان
عصفور طل من الشباك وقال لي يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
نزلت على خده دمعة وجناحاته متكية
واتهدا بالأرض وقال… بدي امشي وما فيي
ضميته على قلبي وصار يتوجع على جروحاته
ضميته على قلبي وصار يتوجع على جروحاته
قبل ما يكسر الحبس اتكسر صوته وجناحاته
قلت له خايف من مين؟
قال لي من القفص هربان
قلت له ريشاتك وين؟
قال لي فرفطها الزمان
عصفور طل من الشباك وقال لي يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
قلت له لا تخاف اتطلع… شوف الشمس اللي رح تطلع
واتطلع على الغابة وشاف… أمواج الحرية بتلمع
شاف جوانح عم بتزقزق… من خلف ابواب العلية
شاف جوانح عم بتزقزق… من خلف ابواب العلية
شاف الغابة عم بتحلق… على جوانح الحرية
قلت له انت من وين؟
قال لي من حدود السما
قلت له جايي من وين؟
قال لي من بيت الجيران
قلت له خايف من مين؟
قال لي من القفص هربان
قلت له ريشاتك وين؟
قال لي فرفطها الزمان
عصفور طل من الشباك وقال لي يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
خبيني عندك خبيني دخلك يا نونو
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6 Comments
!شكراً يا عزيزة على هذه المقالة الحلوة
This is a beautiful, simple and highly symbolic song and your posting is well timed, we are all desperate to see that bird flying as it pleases him and especially in its homeland…
For some reason the link you provided did not work for me so I tried YouTube where I managed to watch a live performance (Sudan) at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YhC7aEFvpE&feature=related
سلامات
Dear Aziz,
I have a question concerning learning Arabic.
I`m studying completely on my own because I couldn`t find a course around where I live.
I recently completed the Michel Thomas method (Egyptian) Arabic Foundation and Advanced courses, MT is just great, makes Arabic sound less complicated then other languages I speak. Unfortunately the booklet only gives transliteration, no Arabic script.
But then I went for Rosetta Stone and in the very first lesson they throw homma (male and female) and hunna at me: yaqra`u, taqra`u, yaqra`Ani, taqra`Ani, yaqra`Una, yaqrA`na. No first and second person so far.
Also they pronounce all the case endings. (bintAni, waladun, mar`atul etc.)
I also have a self study course in German that goes to quite a good level and that course gives quite a differing, much reduced, verb table, almost identical to the one the MTMethod courses give (af”al, taf”al, taf”alEn, yaf”al, taf”al, naf”al, taf”alUn, yaf”alUn)
So my question is this: does it make sense at all to remember the dual and learn all those verb endings Rosetta gives me? Because from what I read elsewhere they are practically obsolete and are not even used in highbrow news media.
Thanks for your reply.
Dear Fayrouz,
Thank you very much for the lovely comment. I am so sorry the link does not work. Please try to copy and paste the link in another browser page. I had to download it on my computer before I could play it. I prefer this one because the music is very nice. I am sure you will like it if you could get it to work.
Thank you very much for the youtube link. I will add it to the post.
salam,
Aziza
Dear Thomas,
Thank you very much for your message and well done for all the hard work you have done to learn Arabic. I think that whether you learn things like dual and detailed conjugation tables depends on your aim of learning Arabic and which dialect. If you want to speak Arabic but not write it, then you can limit yourself to the grammar of the dialect you want to learn, e.g. Egyptian. However, if you want to write the language, then you must learn the detailed grammar of the written language. In my opinion, colloquials are more economical and more simplified versions of the standard, and you need to know both to have a good grasp of the language.
I have posted some information about dual and about conjugation in the grammar section. I think that I will also post on comparing the grammar of both Standard and Egyptian Arabic with a focus on pronouns and verb conjugations. I think that this will help you see the similarities and differences between both of them.
Please be careful about generalizations like dual and verb conjugations being obsolete in media Arabic. They are not! In fact, if you listen to AlJazeera or Al-’Arabeya or any other news outlet, you will listen to standard Arabic which observes all the aspects that you may think are obsolete.
If I have missed any point you raised, please let me know and I will write again.
Salam,
Aziza
Dear Aziza,
what is it I would hear on AlJazeera:
The boy drinks.
al-waladu yashrabu. – OR – al-walad yashrab.
The (2) men swim.
ar-rajulAni yasbaHAni. – OR – ar-rijAl yasbaHUn.
They (female) eat a sandwich.
hunna ya’kulna shaTIratan. – OR – hom ya’kulUn shaTIra.
Or something else in each case.
Thank you for your patience,
افلسطين الحرية
Thomas
Ahlan Thomas,
I think that you could hear both on Al-Jazeera. For example, if you listen to the news which written to be read, you should hear all the voweling, etc. However, if there is a speaker who is commenting or answering a question, then the degree of grammatical details they give will depend on their background and whether they use standard or colloquial in their answer. News readers and correspondents are expected to use Standard Arabic all the time even when they ask questions.
I hope this answers your question. If not, please write again.
Salam,
Aziza