معلش، نسيت الرسالة.

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Breakdown of معلش، نسيت الرسالة.

• ينسى: to forget
• معلش: sorry; never mind

Questions & Answers about معلش، نسيت الرسالة.

What does معلش mean here?

In this sentence, معلش is a soft, everyday way to say something like sorry, my bad, or forgive me.

It is a very common Egyptian Arabic word, and its exact meaning depends on context. It can also mean:

• it’s okay
• never mind
• don’t worry about it

Here, before نسيت الرسالة, it sounds like a casual apology.

How do you pronounce معلش?

It is usually pronounced something like maʿleesh.

A few notes:

• م = m
• ع is the deep throat sound ʿ that English does not have
• ليش sounds like leesh

So a rough English-friendly version is ma-leesh, but that leaves out the sound of ع.

Is this sentence Egyptian Arabic or Modern Standard Arabic?

It feels Egyptian colloquial, mainly because of معلش, which is very common in speech.

The second part, نسيت الرسالة, could also appear in more standard Arabic writing, but the whole sentence as a casual spoken line is very much the kind of thing you would hear in Egyptian Arabic conversation.

What does الرسالة mean exactly? Is it a message, a letter, or a text?