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The Sheikh's English
In Hawaii if someone says "You know my
Feezicks Professah, you know da bolo head one? Some AKAMAI!"
what he means is “You know my Physics Professor at the University of
Hawaii, Manoa? The one with the shinny bald head? He is the most
intelligent man I have ever known!”.
A similar distortion of the Queen’s English takes place in the Middle
East.
The first thing one must do is expand one’s vocabulary immediately upon
arriving in the UAE.
When I first heard: “The shurtaa caught the motorist and gave him a
mukaalifaa” I really didn’t know what the speaker was saying. I
later learned that “shurtaa” means Police and “mukaalifaa” means “a
ticket”.
Another useful word to know is “khalaas”.
The first time I heard it was in a minibus. The front few seats in a Dubai
Transport minibus are reserved for the fairer sex. In the final minutes,
conductors allow males to take these seats. On this fateful day, seconds
after the conductor allotted these female seats to males.......seconds
before the bus was to start, two burkha clad Muslim women boarded the bus.
They were in a hurry; they weren't willing to wait for the next bus. They
looked pointedly at their reserved seats but the stout-hearted males
refused to budge.
Two other chivalrous men decided to vacate their seats in favour of these
members of the fairer sex. After some hesitation (during which the two men
in the women's seat stared straight ahead) the burkha clad beauties were
forced to take the last two seats on the bus, in the last row. And,
horror-of-horrors, were made to sit in close contact with the men.
A growl of anger rose from the other inmates on the bus. The males sitting
in the female seats decided to make a stand for it and refused to vacate
the seats. Soon there was a heated argument. Lots of shouting and
confusion. In the ensuing mêlée the two women’s voices were heard over the
din woefully proclaiming the words “khalaas” repeatedly. However, the
crowd didn’t want to ‘khalaas’ the proceedings.
Peace was restored when the two trouble makers were forcibly ejected from
the bus and marched to the Supervisor’s office. The women took their
rightful place and the bus left shortly thereafter.
“Khalaas” is a very powerful word. Once when a guy behind me was driving
with his headlight main beam on and this irritated me to such an extent
that I went to the extreme step of asking him (via sign language) to pull
off the road. I got out and marched over to his car. I could see that he
was stunned by this display of aggression and was wondering what would
come next. I asked him to roll down his window (there is a unique body
language for this in this part of the world – one extends one’s arm with
all fingers bunched together. It means “please. Do as I say” and is
followed by a gesture. In this case I gestured for him to roll down his
window. He lowered the window with great trepidation and I asked him why,
in the name of all that was holy, he was driving around with his main beam
on. His relief at not being struck forcibly on the face was evident. He
babbled something that escaped me. After listening a while, I wondered
what to do next. Obviously any further aggression was not called for and
yet I couldn’t just walk away without doing something positive. I let him
babble on a little further and then I beckoned him to stop babbling.
“Khalaas” I thundered and walked back to my car. I left him bewildered
and, more significantly, with a beam that had been lowered.
Conclusion: "Khalaas" means "It's OK", "Let it be", "Peace, brother" or
anything similar.
I once had the good fortune to work for a sheikh. He was a distant member
of the ruling family but nevertheless an important man in his own right.
He had been a Minister of the UAE many years ago. I spoke to him many
times without actually having met him. One day……..one fateful day………we
met.
I was filled with a sense of dread at how this meeting would go. Here was
a powerful man, a man on talking terms with the Ruler of Dubai. A man who
could make or break me with his little finger! Having never met a sheikh
in my life I was unable to mentally slot him into the many slots that I
had for the various Arab VIPs and dignitaries.
He was meeting me because he had purchased an expensive Nokia
Communicator; he initially didn’t know how to set it up to receive faxes.
I fixed that for him and gave to his driver who handed it to him.
I fixed and he faxed.
However man is a curious creature and he wanted to learn how to use the
wretched instrument to its fullest capacity. Not content with faxing, he
sent the instrument back to me with a message that he would be visiting
the office two days hence and that I should teach him the intricacies of
communication a la the Communicator. In other words he wanted to know
everything there was to know about it.
Why he wanted to go into the nitty gritty of the instrument I don't know.
Maybe sheikhs spend their time communicating and therefore Nokia
Communicator knowledge is important. I had no choice but to teach the
shaky Sheikh the Communicator's concepts.
Being a firm believer in Murphy’s Law I listed every thing that could
possibly go wrong and then addressed myself to each of these issues
multiple times till I had everything perfect. I even looked forward to
meeting the almighty sheikh.
Long before the appointed hour I saw a UAE national walking towards me.
Medium height. Medium build. Red as a cherry with the exertion of having
climbed two flights of stairs. “Salaam Alaikum” I wished the
stranger politely. “Walaikum Salaam!” he replied. “I am the Sheikh”.
There was a moment of stunned silence on my part and then I invited him in
to the office so that we could start the training session. “Communicator
khalee valee” he replied. “I am here to give you another task. A
very secret one. Tell no one about it” and saying this, he gave me my
secret task which, even today, is so secret that I won’t talk about it.
“Khalee Valee’ in this part of the world means “to hell with it”.
And I more fully appreciated Murphy’s Law than I previously had. The law
states “If anything can go wrong, it will”. I figured nothing could go
wrong. What went wrong was that he said khalee valee to the whole
project! Something that I never anticipated.
Shortly thereafter I met an Egyptian secretary to a UAE national manager
of a company. I was there to make a pitch for their website; they didn’t have
one and were looking for someone to do it. The Egyptian probably liked me
for after a while of waiting in his waiting room she took out a file and
showed me some photographs and then outlined a theme for my approach to
the big man. “He likes this too much” she told me. “If you tell him like
this, he will give you the order”. “Liking something too much” is
also a part of the lingo here.
Finally, one comes across “same same” very often. Ask someone something
and he will use something similar to this phrase: “This training program
of our company same same as that of Emirates Airlines”.
What else, you ask?
Khalaas. I have decided to stop. No more.
Khudaa Hafiz!
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