How to say "postman, mail carrier" in Arabic
New wordMeaningpostman, mail carrier
Arabic · Modern Standard Arabic
sāʿī barīdסאעי בריד
ساعي بريد
Hebrew · Modern Hebrew
davarدَاڤَار
How the two words are related
No Hebrew relative — learn it fresh.
Arabic root
س-ع-يLiterally 'the one who hurries with the mail' — sāʿī is an active participle of سعى 'to strive, hasten', unrelated to Hebrew's own דוור. No Semitic shortcut here, just two languages naming the same errand differently.
Learn it
On the street
How people actually say it in the spoken dialects, where it differs from the standard word.
Levantine · Palestine, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria
Everyday speech often says busṭajī instead — another Turkish -jī trade name, from 'posta', post.
Egyptian · Cairo and the Nile Delta
Cairo: busṭagī, hard g — the -gī is the same Turkish -ji.
Moroccan · Morocco — Casablanca, Rabat, Fes
Morocco: fakṭūr, from French facteur.
In a phrase
The postman came.
Plural
broken plural CuCāh again, like قاضي→قضاة, راعي→رعاة