Talking to people on the phone can be difficult enough in English, especially if you’re a millennial who barely remembers when you still had to pay for individual texts and didn’t have 3G everywhere. Doing it in a foreign language is notoriously even more difficult. By special request, then, here’s a few key pieces of vocabulary/expressions for speaking over the phone, along with a gif of Drake speaking Arabic over the phone (accuracy not guaranteed):
الو alo – this one is pretty straightforwardly ‘hello’ (though presumably from French allo not from English). As in lots of other languages, it’s limited to speaking on the phone, and is usually in a questioning tone: alo? It’s used in particular when picking up the phone (hello?) and when making sure the other person is still on the other end of the line.
اي ee… – immediately after saying alo, the person picking up the phone will often say ee (or in the southern Levant aa) followed by the person’s name or nickname: اي كريس ee kriis, اي ابو عامر ee abu 3aamir. We don’t really have anything similar in our phone etiquette.
مين معي؟ miin ma3i? – ‘who is this’? (literally who’s with me?)
معك… ma3ak… ‘this is…’ (literally ‘… is with you’)
عم احكي من طرف… ‘I’m calling on behalf of…’
اي شو بدي قلك ee shuu béddi 2éllak… ‘so anyway, I was calling about…’ (literally ‘right, what do I want to tell you’, a good way to change topic from polite hellos)
معي خط تاني ma3i khaTT taani – literally ‘I have another line with me’. This means someone else is calling you.
برجع بحاكيك bérja3 b7aakiik – literally ‘I’ll come back and talk to you’, but used to mean ‘I’ll call you back’. I’m fairly sure I’ve discussed this use of yérja3 (and yrédd) before – there’s another example here (birédd byérja3)
خلص شحني khéleS sha7ni – my battery’s dead/was dead (literally ‘has/did finish’, depending on context)
خلصت وحداتي khélSet wa7daati – I’ve run out of credit (‘my credits have finished’)
انفصل تلفوني nfaSal telefooni – my phone died (literally ‘disconnected’, but typically used for batteries dying for some reason)
ما انتبهت على تليفوني maa ntabah@t 3ala telefooni – I didn’t notice (you called), I didn’t notice my phone ringing
ما في تغطية maa fii taghTiye – there’s no signal, I’ve got no bars
الخط ضعيف élkhaTT Da3iif – the line’s not good
صوتك مو واضح Sootak muu waaDe7 – your voice isn’t clear
صوتك عم يقطش Sootak 3am y2aTTesh – your voice keeps breaking up (2aTTash = to break up)
ما عم اسمعك maa 3am ésma3ak – I can’t hear you
خارج التغطية khaarej éttaghTiye – out of service (literally what the machine says if you call someone who can’t be reached)
طلع رقم مجهول, رقم غير معروف Téle3 raq@m majhuul, raqem gheer ma3ruuf – both translations of ‘it came up as an unknown number’, ‘it showed as an unknown number’.
مكالمة لم يرد عليها mukaalame lam yuradd 3aleeha – the most common (if somewhat unwieldy) translation of ‘missed call’ on phone software, you might also hear mukaalame faayte.
As a quick appendix – what should you call your phone? All of تلفون telefoon, موبايل mobaayl, جوال jawwaal (probably a generonym from this company), خلوي khalawi (literally ‘cell’) and even – believe it or not – هاتف haatef (plural hawaatef, the only one of these words to have a non -aat plural) are used by different people with different frequency. If you have to speak about a landline (lol, imagine that), the term is خط ارضي khaTT arDi.
A telephone plan or contract is also called a خط khaTT (literally ‘line’). A simcard is called سيمة siime, سيمكرت siimkart, or شريحة sharii7a (pl. شرايح sharaaye7).
A charger is called شرجر sharjer or more commonly شاحن shaa7en (plural shawaa7en). The verb for ‘charge’ is شحن (sha7an yésh7an sha7@n) – and it’s quite common to say حطو ع الشحن ‘put it on charge’, just as in English (تليفوني ع الشحن can mean ‘my phone is charging’).