السما زرقا.

The sky is blue.

Breakdown of السما زرقا.

• ازرق: blue
• سما: sky

Questions & Answers about السما زرقا.

How do you pronounce السما زرقا in Levantine Arabic?

A common Levantine pronunciation is is-sama zarʔa or es-sama zarʔa.

A few helpful notes:

• السما is often pronounced is-sama / es-sama, not al-sama
• زرقا is often pronounced zarʔa in many urban Levantine accents, because ق often becomes a glottal stop ʔ
• Some speakers keep a real q sound, so you may also hear something closer to zarqa

So depending on the speaker, you may hear slightly different pronunciations, but they all mean the same thing.

Why is there no word for is in this sentence?

Because Arabic often leaves out the verb to be in the present tense.

So السما زرقا literally looks like the-sky blue, but it naturally means The sky is blue.

This is completely normal in both spoken Levantine and Standard Arabic for present-tense sentences like:

• الباب مفتوح = The door is open
• البيت كبير = The house is big

If you want past tense, then a form of كان is used:

• كانت السما زرقا = The sky was blue

Why is الـ not pronounced al- in السما?