…as if Arabic were the only language in the world- the language of Adam and Eve, the language of paradise.
-Ten Years Captivity in the Mahdi’s Camp 1882-1892, Joseph Ohrwalder
Not to put too fine a point on it, but first year Arabic was perfectly adequate if you were an American wishing to send compliments to the aseeda chef. Lughma Kuwayyisa, Grub is Good, you say, even if his dialect was far from what you’d hear at the American University in Cairo where the language spoken in the Garden, al-Janayna, the diminutive form of the word for Paradise, al-Janna, was definitely not the Arabic of Western Sudan, but rather all-girls lycée French. KhairAllah might not say it when at dinner on the Darb, but the co-eds would…le Sorgho est Dégueulas.