MSA and Lebanese, Eating Healthy During Holidays

This 45 second clip is from the MTV 8pm news.  The anchor is speaking in MSA, but the reporter and the lady she interviews are speaking Lebanese dialect.  While it is Lebanese dialect it isn't slang.  It's basically MSA with a little Lebanese added.  Like the word نبلش (let's begin). 

 

في الخاص, كيف نحافظ على صحتنا و ما نسبة كميات الاكل المسموح بها في موسم الاعياد.

Special (report), how do we maintain our health and what is the proportion of the amounts of food allowed in the holiday season.

 بفترة الاعياد الناس بيستهلكو كميات كبيرة من الاكل العالي الدسم.  الامر الي بيسبب بضرر صحي اضافة إلى زيادة بالوزن.  شو هي الطريقة المعتدلة لناكل وجبات شهية و نحافظ بالوقت نفسه على صحتنا.

During the holiday period people consume large amounts of high fat foods.  This causes damage to health as well as weight gain.  What is a moderate way for us to eat satisfying meals and to maintain our health at the same time?

هلق الطريقة هي الاعتدال.  الاعتدال يعني حتى و لو كان عندنا وجبة ثقيلة ممكن نبلش بالخضراء بالاجمال يعني نبلش بالسلطة, ننتبه على 

المشروبات لانه بالمشروبات كمان في نسبة سعرات حرارية مهمة و اذا كتير الاكل دسم نخفف الكمية.

Now the way is moderation.  Moderation means that even if we have a heavy meal we can start with greens mostly, I mean start with salad.  Pay attention to the drinks because in drinks there is also a large amount of calories and if the food is very fatty we can lessen the amount.

Notes

There are a few things I'd like to mention that might help with some confusing parts of the transcript.

   

موسم الاعياد (mawsim al’ayad) – The holiday season

الاكل العالي الدسم (alakl al’aali aldasm) – high fat foods.  To tell you the truth I don’t know why they said it like this and I listened to it several times to make sure.  I would think that اكل عالي الدسم would have been correct but I’ve learned better than to correct native speakers at their own language.  Anyway, those three words, whether they’ve got the definite ال or not, they mean high fat foods.

وجبات شهية (wajbaat shahiyi) – satisfying meals

حتى و لو كان عندنا (hatta wa law kaan ‘andna) – Even if we had.  This is an important phrase.  If you don’t know it then it would be good to remember.  It comes in handy a lot when trying to express yourself.  The words حتى و لو (even if) are good to know.

وجبة ثقيلة (wajba thaqeela) – heavy meal.  You’ll notice that she actually says wajbi ta’eeli.  That’s the Lebanese way of saying it, changing the th to just a t and the q to a hamza (glottal stop).  You get used to it when you listen to enough of it.

مهمة (mhimi) – Important.  99% of the time this word would be translated as important, but here I went with “large amount of calories” instead of “important amount of calories” because the latter sounds strange.  Just to be clear.

سعرات حرارية (su’araat haraariyi) – calories.  

اذا كتير الاكل دسم (iza kteer alakl dasm) – if the food is very fatty.  You’ll notice that she put كتير before الاكل which, if you’ve studied MSA you know is not the way they do it in proper Arabic, but in Lebanese they do this.  They will sometimes put the adjective before the noun.  Most of the time it will still be اذا الاكل دسم كتير though.