When the greeting is between adult Arabs, they rub their noses together. This is the equivalent of an adult person kissing a child’s forehead. You can even tell which part of the Arabian peninsula somebody is from just by looking at the way they rub their noses. It is, in fact, thousands of years old custom that has been passed down in generations. Rubbing noses is a sign of respect and pride in the culture. Muslims reply to it by saying ‘wa alaikum assalam’, meaning ‘may peace be upon you as well’.Ī rubbing nose is a gesture of welcoming people in the Arab world. Its meaning goes likes ‘may God’s peace be upon you’. The most common greeting Muslims use between them is ‘Assalamu alaikum’ which is a phrase from the Prophetic traditions. ‘Anti’ is used for females, and ‘anta’ is used for males.Īll the greetings mentioned above are generic Arabic greetings. Reply ‘Misa a noor’ to ‘Misa al khayr’, and ‘wa anta (or anti, depending on the gender of the other person) to reply to Tisbah ala Khayr. When someone wishes you Sabah Al Khayr or Sabah a noor, you should say ‘Sabah an noor’, which means ‘a morning of light’ or ‘a beautiful morning’. Generally, Arab men and women do not shake hands with each other.ĭifferent greetings require different replies: Shake Hands and embracing accompanies these verbal greetings in the case of male to male and female to female. The meaning of this phrase is roughly ‘wake up to a nice morning’. Tisbah ala khayr – Though the meaning has nothing to do with good night, this is what Arabs use to greet people instead of goodnight. Just like the English phrase good evening, this one is used in the afternoon. Misa al khayr – means good evening or a beautiful evening. Sabah al khayr – Same as the good morning in English. This one is also used to welcome anyone at any time. Ahlan is a more casual way of saying ahlan va sahlan. This can be used to greet anyone irrespective of the time of the day. There are a few words or types of welcoming phrases in Arabic, depending on the person and situation.Īhlan wa sahlan (or simply Ahlan) – This is the equivalent of hello in English. So here are some of the most used and important phrases you can have under your belt when you visit Dubai. Especially because welcoming even strangers is the Arab way. Dubai is a multicultural place, and you can do just fine with a bit of English.īut it is still good to know the basic greetings in case someone greeted you in Arabic.
So if you are planning to visit Dubai, you might be wondering how you would get around here without knowing Arabic. As the name of the country denotes, the native language of the UAE is Arabic. Dubai is a part of the United Arab emirates.